Fix It 101 | Fall Tune-Ups with Patton Ford

0:00Support for FixIt101 comes from Mississippi Solar, focusing on energy resilience and independence for homeowners, businesses, and small commercial customers, offering free consultations. A number of backup power options are available, including air cooled and liquid cooled generators, solar inverters with battery storage, and grid tide and off-the-grid solar solutions. Federal grants and tax credits are available for small businesses in most parts of Mississippi. More information at ms solar dot net. One of the pros of tankless water here is being efficiency. You also want to keep in mind with all your mechanical equipment, is it running efficiently? And the reason is because of cost, what are some things we do when we do a tune up jack to increase the efficiency of an air conditioning system? When we mean efficiency, we mean lowering costs. When you're looking at a tank water heater, that has a burner on it that is keeping that water at the same temperature 24-7, you know, 365 days a year, and it's constantly using gas. Well, a tankless is also referred to as an

1:04on-demand water heater, which only heats water when you are calling for water. So in turn, you're using less gas, so it's more efficient. Same thing with an NAC unit. The more power it's drawing, the more it's using, the less efficient it is. This is an MPB Think Radio podcast. Pull up a chair for Deep South Dining. Join Malcolm White and Carol Palmer for conversations about food, culture, and the tastes of the South. Come hungry Mondays at 4 p.m. on MPB Think Radio. From MPB Think Radio, this is FixIt 101, the home maintenance show to help you figure it out. And get it fixed. I'm Marissa Vaughn and for Pam Pibis, as you certified inspector, and owner of InspectItLikeAGirl. Pam is away on vacation, but we've got experts Patten Ford and Jack Morgan from Ford Plumbing and Air to talk about air conditioning, water heaters, and how to take care

2:06of all of your mechanical equipment during the summer and going into the fall. Join the conversation with us today by calling 1-877 MPB Ring. That's 1-877-6727464. Or send an email to fixit101 at MPBonline.org. Reminder fixit101 re-airs every Saturday at 11 a.m. right after the Gestalt Gardener at 9 a.m. Good afternoon Patten and Special Guest Jack Morgan. Tell us what's been going on man. Hey Marissa, we're glad to be here. We are celebrating one week from being the end of the summer. A week from today I believe. It's been a crazy summer. We do plumbing and air conditioning work. And so we've been hectic. It's been a hot summer. But that's what we're here to do. That's why we're in

3:06business is to meet the needs of our customers who have plumbing issues and air conditioning issues. This is our second summer to do that. And so we've learned a lot. Jack has been at the helm for so many of our big installs. He's facilitated those coordinated with customers on those. We both have learned a lot about about the HVAC world. And one thing that we'll just kind of before we get started talk about is just this will be on the agenda is addicts and how addicts are the devil. And there's not good to put expensive mechanical equipment in them but it gets done anyway. And so we'll kind of address all the problems that we see because of that. But before we get too much further into that, Jack tell us who you are. Give us a little bit of background. Tell your mom, hello on the radio, all the good stuff. Yeah. Well hey mom.

4:09Well I'm Jack. Jack Morgan. I've been with the company for four or five years now. Went through the apprenticeship program in 2022. I rode with Crockett Ford for about a year. And then kind of started doing some service plumbing on my own from there. I did mainly all the water heater installs. He did everything we threw him. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Until recently, I've kind of started just managing some jobs, some installs. Yeah. It's been great. And when we say installs, we mean installing replacing the old equipment, putting in new equipment. There's been in both plumbing and HVAC changes in because of government regulations, because of new construction methods, refrigerant changes, all kinds of stuff. There's been in both plumbing and HVAC updates that occur just because of

5:12technology. And so Jack, what are some of those things that we see? You want to talk about refrigerant changes? You want to talk about tank and tankless? What's the most, what's the, what you deal within the field when you're when you're talking to customers? What's the one that you feel like is the biggest pain point? And so the most confusing thing to really understand is refrigerant. When it comes to air conditioning units, free on, with some people going free on. Yeah. So essentially, it's what's making the air cold. But with that and the new equipment that's coming out, they change those refrigerants and you know, you can't mix them. So if you have a coil that runs off a certain refrigerant and your outdoor condensing unit goes out, you can't just swap it out with anything. You know, those refrigerants have to match. And that's where it kind of gets tricky when you have one piece of equipment that goes out. And it's more expensive. Yeah. And it's more expensive. AC

6:16is not cheap. Anybody that's paid an AC bill this summer knows that. But I would say that's probably the hardest thing to kind of wrap your head around is yes, this piece of equipment has gone bad and the other piece is fine. But they still have to work together and kind of fine in that balance can be a little tricky sometimes. Yeah. Yeah. That is the, that's a recent. So you go back 15, 20 plus years. You have the old R22 style. Then 15, 20 years ago, they came out with 410A. The new ones, 454B. It's all these letters and numbers. But each new version is supposed to be more environmentally friendly. And so that's the reason they change them so frequently. But as a result, like Jack said, you can't mix refrigerant types. And when you do, there are problems. We have seen that in situations where people have will go, work on some bodies unit. And it's been

7:18worked on recently. And they had it some free on. But we, as we do test on them and look at our gauges, it's clear that something's not right. And it's almost always because there's different types of refrigerant in that closed system that is causing problems. So that's one of the, as we've seen, mechanical equipment evolved. That's one of the evolutions we've seen. Another one is tank and tankless water heater. Jack and I think we could both talk all day about that. But Jack, what would you say if you were building a new house, what kind of water heater would you put in? I'm putting in a tankless, if I'm building a new house, they're just more efficient. It's never ending hot water. And really, that's about it. A tank has a limit on how much water it can provide. And I just don't like having a 50 gallon tank in my attic.

8:24A tankless would probably also be in your attic, but it's not holding 50 gallons of hot water above my master bedroom. So you put in your tankless, so there's a lot of ways you can do it. You put it outside, they have exterior units, are you putting it outside, are you putting it in attic, are you putting it in a closet? If you were building a new house, what would you do? If I'm building a new house, I'm probably putting it on an exterior wall. Anything in an attic, I'm going to try to avoid if I can. Especially here in Mississippi, if it's 95 degrees outside, bad insulation in the attic, it can get up to 150 degrees, 160 degrees. And you have an expensive unit up there, that heat's just stressing it out. I'm going to avoid that if I can. But me and you both know, 90% of equipment's in an attic. But yeah, and there's risk with everything. If you put it outside, you have to just be wary of the weather. We are in Mississippi, so we don't go below freezing too

9:29often. But when we do, you just need to be aware of that and prepare for it. How can you prepare for it? Always drip your pipes. People say drip your pipes, that doesn't mean a little tiny drip. It needs to be a full stream about the size of a pencil. And that's on hot and cold. Exactly. You don't want to just do it on cold because those are two different systems. You have your hot water system that's been fed from the hot water heater. And then you just have your cold water system that's coming from the city. And if you're just running your cold water, those hot lines are still at risk. They're not 130 degrees in the water line. So you still run that risk. So you just need to be aware of this type of thing. Now, tankless water heaters do have internal devices that inside the water heater itself will prevent it from freezing. But what happens, let's say, if the power goes out? Yeah. I mean, if the power goes out, then that safety measure is gone. And it's no longer

10:35firing up to keep that unit from freezing. So at that point, it is really important to start running some water. Because if you lose power, you're not getting hot water at all from a tankless. If you lose power and you haven't been dripping those pipes, it's a recipe for disaster. That's what we saw. We didn't see a little bit of that around here in this past January. But where we saw a lot of it was up in Oxford. We didn't, we weren't there this year, but we heard about a lot of houses, a lot of houses that as pipes began to thaw out after that freeze back in January, experience a lot of damage. So if both your freezing pipes, your pipes freeze and the power goes out, if you have a tankless water heater, that's not good. Now, this coming winter, we plan to be have people who are available to take care of that stuff in Oxford. So give us a

11:36call if you're in the Oxford or North Mississippi area, this coming winter. But I know we're still in the middle of summer. So a big thing that I've seen that energy is doing as we talk about efficiency is offering free tuneups. They will send subcontractors out to people's house for free, I believe, to do tuneups, which you have to ask why is it in energy's best interest to do that? What do you think, Jack? Well, we're back to HVAC equipment just for the listener. I know we were talking about water heaters, but as we talk about one of the pros of tankless water heaters being efficiency, you also want to keep in mind with all your mechanical equipment, is it running efficiently? The reason is because of cost, and I think that's why energy is doing that. Exactly. And so what are some things we do when we do a tuneup jack to increase the efficiency of an air conditioning system? Well, I mean, and that goes with tankless water heaters versus tank water

12:38heaters as well. When we mean efficiency, we mean lowering costs. So when you're looking at a tank water heater, that has a burner on it that is keeping that water at the same temperature 24, 7, you know, 365 days a year. And it's constantly using gas. Well, a tankless is also referred to as an on-demand water heater, which only heats water when you are calling for water. So in turn, you're using less gas, so it's more efficient. Same thing with an NAC unit. The more power it's drawing, the more it's using, the less efficient it is. And there's all type of little things that we look at when we come service these units to make them more efficient, whether that's free on, you know, could be anything. But it is important to increase the efficiency to lower costs. One big thing, I think that people probably think is a gimmick sometimes cleaning the condenser

13:39coils. We've seen a lot of condenser coils that are just mad at, we had one that was barely a year old that we installed last summer that was mad at up with leaf dust and grass. And especially if you have an out when we say condensing coils, we mean the outdoor unit. When those are especially, or when those are around grass, those can get especially mad at up with just outside, just dust and yard debris. So when those get mad at up, they run way less efficiently. That compressor has to run a lot harder. And as a result, your power bills are going to go up. So these are just some things as we talk about summer tuneups that we like to keep in mind. And after the break, we'll talk about some winter tuneups as well. You're listening to FixIt 101 on MPB Think Radio. I'm producer Marissa Vaughn in for Pam Pibis, who is away enjoying vacation. But I'm joined today by our experts Pat and Ford and Jack Morgan from Ford Plumbing and Air to join the conversation. You can

14:44call 1-877 MPB Ring. That's 1-877-6727-464 or send an email to FixIt 101 at MPBOnline.org. Before we go any further, I want to thank Mississippi Solar for sponsoring our show. For more information on solar power or solar powering your home or business, visit their website at ms solar dot net. Patten, thank you so much for being here today. What's going on? We're glad to be here. Glad to be back from the break. We were discussing the summer stuff we see with air conditioning units and tuning them up for the summer. But also, you got to do that for the winter. But before we get into that, the HVAC seasonality is definitely something that you have to keep in mind. The other part of our business is plumbing. And it's pretty steady. I think a lot of people think that the winter time

15:51is generally more busy for us. Would you agree with that, Jack? I would say that's probably what most people think. But I would say I don't feel busier in the summer or the winter. I just feel like we're doing busy. It's just pretty much busy all the time. Now, I think the reason people think that is because freezing temperatures and that does happen, pipes do burst. But there's a fairly specific set of conditions that have to be met for that to happen. And so that might happen once or twice a year if at all, where that was some years that didn't really happen at all. And so as a result, there are different types of issues we see in the summer and plumbing versus in the winter and plumbing. I will say, I do think when temperatures are mild, there's not as many things that are experiencing issues for plumbing. I feel like if we're ever have a low on the schedule, it's when there's a

16:52really, really mild temperatures, which seldom happens. It has to be a pretty small window of like, 65 in the morning and 80 in the afternoon, like really mild temperatures. But other than that, pretty much year round, there are issues with plumbing, which is great for us because it keeps busy year round. And with HVAC, that's not the case. There's extreme spikes in the summertime. And then in the winter time, we'll get some spikes as well. One thing in our company that we've tried to really capitalize on is because we do get plumbing companies handle gas and HVAC companies handle ventilation, two places where those meet are obviously your furnace, but that also in your gas logs and fireplaces. And so there are not many companies that will repair those. And so we've tried raise our hands and say, hey guys, call us for that. And so with fireplaces and gas logs,

17:58although it may be seem crazy to talk about those when it's 90-something degrees outside. But like I said at the beginning, a week away from the summer being over, and we're about a month and a half away from the time changing. And so it's going to get darker earlier. If you've got gas lanterns, you're going to notice them not working more because you're going to get home in the evening and see that that spot on the front porch is dark. And there is a nice pretty gas lantern there. This just not working. So that's something else that we work on. And that's all kind of included with our fall tune-ups. So what we do in our fall tune-ups is we we prepare your kind of shut your cooling system down, make sure everything goes good, and then we get your furnace and your heating system ready with your mechanical equipment. Now with the fireplaces jack, what all is included in there? Tell us about all the different options and all the little tiki issues we see with fireplaces. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I mean, obviously you have

19:03your wood burning fireplaces, everybody loves those. But when it comes to gas logs, you can either have what we call vented or vent less. Which essentially means is there a vent that takes the combustion out of the house or is it a closed vent and you don't have that? No chimney or anything like that. Yeah. So with vented logs, we see less problems with, I would say, mainly because if it's the stall correctly and it's well kept up with, which is a big if, a lot of these we see are original, so the homes and 20 years old and they haven't been used in five. So in those situations, it can be a little trickier and we have to kind of just mess around with them. But when it comes to vent less, obviously there's no way for that combustion to go. So it has to burn a little differently and when complaint will hear with those is a weird smell. Some people

20:04will think it's a gas smell. In reality, it's just the way that that gas has to burn to be safe without a vent. We'll see issues with those logs not being able to stay lit or the pilot light comes on but the burner won't come on. Just a couple different little issues here and there that we'll have to look at and sometimes they won't light at all. And that's sometimes why to replace those or clean a thermocouple just mainly just a little bit of trouble shooting. But it does require some maintenance. And most people, if they had the vent list for the vent free kind, they let it run for 15 minutes and they smell those oils and things that are burning and they shut it off. Because like you said, they think they smell gas or they think they smell carbon monoxide. Even the carbon monoxide is odorless. And so one of the things we do when we do that maintenance is we test

21:05to make sure it's safe because you don't want to ever minimize somebody's concern. Especially when it comes to smells and gas and all that stuff. So we check we do a safety check and make sure it's working right. So I would say if you've got gas logs or if you have a chimney and you're burning wood, like safety is definitely probably number one. And so that's something that anybody should keep in the front of their head. They're front of their mind, the top of mind. And then with gas lanterns, you know, we've, they're my in laws of Memphis and they have always so surprised by how many gas lanterns they see in this area. And you know Madison County, Northeast Jackson, they're just a big thing here. And we've got a great company copper sculptures that manufactures them and sends them all over the place here on Lakeland Drive. They're a wonderful

22:06company. They make really pretty nice gas lanterns. There's another one in Columbus called St. James Lighting. You know, there's one in New Orleans called I think Bevelow. So we're kind of in the middle of the region where gas lanterns are really popular. And so there's so many in town. We work in some neighborhoods where the houses will have literally more than 10. Yeah, some of them have 20. You know, there are some houses that have a lot. And so, you know, when people don't think about is what happens when that thing stops lighting? Well, sometimes, or stops, you know, burning. Well, what's the first thing? Like, if that flame goes out, Jack, what's happening when the flame goes out? Well, it's situational. But like immediately, like what's the thing when that flame goes out, that means gas is coming out. It's not being burned. Yeah, which is not good. Which, yeah, you never want free gas just just going out everywhere.

23:07What that issue is could, could kind of depend, you know, like Pam was saying, we do live in an area where gas lanterns are super popular. And even some neighborhoods will require their residents to have a working gas lantern. And depending on where it is, you know, most gas lanterns will be on the side of the house. Others can be on mailboxes. So with that, you know, we've seen a lot of, especially with the with the lanterns that are on mailboxes, just gas leaks within the line and the ground. And it's just kind of choking that flame out. And those are just really hard to detect. A lot of times we'll have to replace the gas line itself. But you know, if it's on the house, it could be a valve issue. It could be a stem issue. You know, sometimes you'll even have spiders and little critters crawling gas lines and and getting little nooks and stop up gas lines. So they can be tricky.

24:10Mm-hmm. I agree with that. And like you said, um, they're the ones that are looking at this call that's coming in and trying to read the notes on it. And I'm like, oh, trying to anticipate. But the ones that are like on a mailbox, those can be quite, quite frustrating. But you got to have them lit. You know, those the neighborhoods that require those do, or that have those do requiring to be working. So we can get in there and figure out figure out what's going on with them. But anyway, we've got a call from Doyle and Clinton. Mr. Doyle, tell us what you got going on. Well, your brother is very interesting. I was a boy. You have not talked about pharmacettes. Yes, sir. I know that there are programmable pharmacettes to have your and cootling come on and all at certain times of the day and night. Mm-hmm. Is it worthwhile to invest in a programmable thermostat

25:15for your heating and cooling system? If you were going to stay on top of it, Mr. Doyle, absolutely. Yes, sir. Because you think about it, if you can, if you're gone for the day and you can set it, kind of almost set the schedule and forget about it, then you're going to make sure that you're not cooling your house to 69 or 70 degrees in the middle of the day, which obviously was not good for your air conditioning system. And that, you know, before you get home, it's already started to cool your house down a little bit, you know, further. And so I would say yes. Now, the problem for people like myself is I'm bad about paying attention to all the details. I'll get set up, then the wintertime will get here and I won't reprogram it. And so in that situation, it's not necessarily bad, but, you know, just that extra step that people like myself have to remember. That's personally, I go back just the old standby kind. But for the people that we've put the

26:20programmable thermostat in the nest thermostat and who do care about that kind of thing, which should be everybody. They're very much worth the investment. You can save probably go ahead. What the cost of the programmable thermostat would be? It's kind of like anything else, Mr. Dool, you can spend as much or as little as you want. I say as little, you're going to at least spend a couple of two or three hundred dollars on the thermostat itself and the insulation. Now, there are some Cadillac cons. There's a brand called Ecobee or Ecobee where you can even actually set it's almost like an separate in other runes, like secondary thermostat to where if there's a room, let's just say in your house that doesn't have good air balance or where it stays warmer during the summer or cooler during the winter because of insulation or whatever, something like that. You can put that Ecobee and you don't end the thermostat's not set really far away from that room. You can put

27:25those Ecobees in and it'll aid that the cooling or the heating of that room. So the reason I've bringing that up is because you can spend just about whatever you want to. But I would say if you've got you know in your budget three to five hundred dollars, you can get a lot. You can have a lot of options for that. And I think within a month or two, you could probably probably two or three months almost have it paid for if you're making sure that you're staying on top of your thermostat usage and you're not cooling your house too much during the peak heat times of the day. Okay. Yes sir. That's very good new one. Thank you very much. Yes sir. Thank you. I have a little follow up to that because I'm looking now. I'm looking at all these programmable thermostats. Oh yeah. And yeah, like it looks like you can you know there's a few for like fifty dollars and most of them are like one fifty year or up. But is this like is installing a

28:32thermostat? Is that a job for a professional or is that something that you can do it yourself? But I would almost say you want to get it because if you get the wiring on the thermostat wrong, you can call some serious problems. We've had some people who put in thermostat programmable thermostats in themselves and the heat and the cool come on at the same time, which is really not good for all your equipment but definitely not good for the compressor. So a lot of downstream negative effects that sometimes you notice immediately sometimes you don't notice for you know a few days depending on the time of year that you put it in. But sometimes it won't turn off at all. So I would get a professional to put them in because sometimes the wiring isn't just on the thermostat but also on the control board on the internal unit or the furnace inside or the air handler. So I would say a professional is probably where you want to if you're going to invest that kind of money in it, this spending a little bit of extra to get a professional put it in is worth

29:37the investment because like Mr. Doyle reminded us it is an investment. We will over time and I don't think it's too much time regain that cost with your energy savings. So it's a great question. And is this something that we can call Ford plumbing and air? You can definitely call Ford plumbing and air. Yes, man, we would be more than happy to put one of those in for you. Evaluates and help you program it. That's the other thing is sometimes they're a little tricky. For me, you know, that's why I told Doyle I probably would not put one in in my own home because I just don't have the patience to sit down for five extra minutes in program. We know our own weaknesses. And so, but you know, if you are cost conscious and you're looking at those utility bills in August in July and even into September now and you're just, you know, it's just painful to look at those bills. Then that's something that you can, you know, especially as it cools off. And maybe

30:39your next bill is a hundred or two hundred dollars less than it was the previous month and take capture that money, invest in a programmable thermostat. And then when it heats back up, you'll be happy that you did. You're listening to FixIt 101 on MPB Think Radio. The home maintenance show to help you figure it out and get it fixed. I'm producer Marissa Vaughan in for Pam Pibis, who is on vacation this week and our guest hosts are Patten Ford and Jack Morgan from Ford, Plumbing and Air. And if you missed any of today's program, you can always listen back by podcast using any podcast app or our MPB public media app. And before we go any further, I want to thank Mississippi Solar for sponsoring our show. You can get more info on solar power in your Homer business at ms solar dot net back to you in the studio. Yes, ma'am. Thank you, Marissa. Well, we've been talking a lot about plumbing and air conditioning and would be remiss if I didn't

31:40mention that one of Jack's duties at Ford Plumbing and Air is he is our apprenticeship director. We'd like to call him the AD. And he he that he goes through our plumbing 101 class. He for any of the guys who are deemed apprentices, he helps them know like what's expected in next in their journey to get to lead technician. And so Jack, tell us about what is what your thoughts are on the apprenticeship director seat that you sit in. What have you learned since you started doing it? Yeah, well, it's a little different from when I started. You know, it's a little more structured now. You know, there's more of a plan. So it is cool to kind of be able to be a part of that. You know, like I was talking about earlier, when I started years ago, it was really you just, you getting the past. And that's that's the apprenticeship. But it is cool to kind of be able to

32:41check in with the guys. See see what they're interested in, you know, what they're understanding really well. Some of the pain points that that I might have forgotten about. You know, when I was coming through the apprenticeship program. But yeah, it's been awesome. We just, matter of fact, we just finished our, my first class, Friday, the first class that you taught. Not that, but yeah, that you too. Yeah. So yeah, we'll hopefully start back up here in the next couple of months with a new group. But yeah, it's been really cool just to kind of be a part of these guys journey and learning, learning the trade. A lot of people don't have any experience when they start. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. So it is kind of cool to see them start to understand the trade and kind of get into it. Like click. What when you first started plumbing, what was the biggest kind of like epiphany you had? Like, wow. So it was weird. I never even thought about plumbing

33:43before I got became a plumber. Like I didn't think about where water went. Yeah, where water came from or why it turned on and flushed it totally. Yeah. So that was honestly kind of the biggest shock was like, oh, there's a there's a system to this. There's a lot more behind this than you really think. Yeah. You know, kind of just thought water came out of faucets and came out of tub, tub spouts and kind of getting to see behind the walls and under the house. Kind of seeing what true plumbing is. It was really, really interesting to see, especially never thinking about it until I got into the trade. What was one of your first, I'll go first, but the first time you're like, oh, no, I just messed something up when you were learning. For me, I was installing a new water heater and I was putting in a new, I was trying to hook up the TMP, like put in, like, re-hook it up. And there's like first month, maybe first couple of weeks that I was doing it. And I was threading

34:48adapter into the temperature and pressure relief valve and I just tightened it too much and it just snapped. And which wasn't, it wasn't like anything bursted and exploded, but you know, all the threads were broken off in the female threads of the pressure relief valve and we had to take a little saw and sawing out and pride out of there. And I just remember thinking, knowing how tight to go, when it's too tight, too loose, that's that was always a hard balance for me to figure out. And it just came with time. But what was something like that for you? There's probably a few that I could say. The one that comes to mind was one of my first couple months in the driver's seat. I had a guy named Nick with me. Yeah, I remember when we had just done a rough end and they had poured the slab and one of our drains was a couple inches off. So Nick and I were tasked with going to bust up this slab and and moving this two inch drain a couple inches. I got there probably at 10 o'clock

35:54that morning and it was hot too. It was a hot day. It was hot on the slab. And no sun, no roof. Nothing. Just beaming on me. And we're getting to the point where I'm about to make the repair, I just need to chip out a little bit more concrete. And I hit something hollow in that slab, which means I hit the pipe and my my jackhammer went straight through. Yeah. So I ended up spending the rest of the day breaking that slab up and repelting that drain. And that that was. So what did you learn in that situation? I learned to take my time to think about, think about what I'm doing before I do it. I was probably rushing through it a little bit. I'm just trying to get out of the sun and I ended up being in the sun. But that's the one that comes to mind. Yeah. There's the phrase that they use the military that Crocket has brought up before that I

36:58think is a very good phrase. It's slowest smooth and smooth as fast. And as you're learning a new trade as you're trying to put all the pieces together in your brain and with your hands, you can't get going too fast, which is something I know I'm guilty of too. But so often when you're trying to rush through something, it's kind of counterintuitive because next thing you know you mess it up and the time you thought you were going to say just go ahead and multiply it by about 10 because you're going to have caused yourself a whole lot more trouble than you got to go and make up for. So that's as you're learning things no matter what trade you're in, that's something to keep in mind. All right. So you've been with the company for almost four and a half years. Four and a half years. Okay. So what's next, Jack? What do we do in next? Next goal is to expand forward plumbing really. There's a huge need for plumbing everywhere,

38:04especially in our home state. And what we kind of talked about a minute ago, but we saw a huge need in Oxford. We really did, especially last year when they had that ice storm and they really just didn't have enough people to handle it. And we saw that. And this is something that we've kind of been thinking about for the past couple years. But I think this winner, we're going to we want to be ready this winner. We want to be ready this winner. And we expect to have a full plumbing and age fat crew ready. Ready in Oxford this one. To meet the need. Our company, purpose we say is to meet the need. We want to meet the needs of our customers. We want to meet the needs of our co-workers and it's hard to work well with other people sometimes. And we feel like if we do those two things, we can make a good living and then ultimately meet the needs of our community. And like Jack said, we do feel like there is a shortage of skilled

39:04labor out there. And that's one of the things that both here in the metro area and abroad we want to do what we can to meet that need and train up new plumbers. And what Jack's done at the company has been really cool to see. He's really made a place for himself. A lot of different places for yourself. Sometimes this is too many seats you get set in. But I think he and I both believe that as we grow that we can continue to meet the need and be a place where young guys who want to learn the trade, learn it right, learn it from light-minded people. We want to be a home for the people like that. And so if you ever have any questions about what it's like to work in the trades, give us a call. We'd love to talk to you about it. If you ever have any plumbing or air conditioning questions just to ask us. Whether we come into your house or not, give us a call. We'd love to talk to you about them. But- Shut that phone number 4 on that. Yeah, you can call us at 601-940-0597. You can look us up online.

40:13We're pretty good about- we try to be good about the online scheduling and things like that. Because I know so many issues. You don't realize you have until you're at home at about 8 pm at night. Last thing you want to do is set a reminder in your phone to call 801 in the morning. So you can always schedule online if it's some kind of consultation or appointment you want to set up. And so anyway, as we approach- as we kind of begin to land the plane for the episode, we are approaching the winter. We are still- it feels like when the middle of the summer, but we're- it's coming to an end. So summer 2026, Jack, what were some of the highlights? Summer 2026. I got into HVAC. I've been a plumber for years. You know, we did start our HVAC department about a year and a half ago or so. I wasn't really into it until this summer. So I've really grown my HVAC knowledge.

41:17Not so much troubleshooting. Still learning a little bit about that. But just have a lot better understanding of equipment kind of how- how- how the HVAC system works. And then yeah, you know, we've just done ton of gas lines. I love gas lines. So we've been cracking those out and and business as usual on the plumbing side. Look, in the winter's coming, the gas line- a lot of the gas lines we do with are for generators. So we don't necessarily install and hook up the generators, typically an electrical contractor does that. But your generator runs on- it uses natural gas to operate. So when your power goes out and uses the natural gas to convert the natural gas energy into electric energy. And so that's something that, you know, don't sleep on that because about the time you need a generator, so is everybody in their brother. And so, you know, that's not a plug for us. We don't put those in. We'll like Jack said, we'll run the gas line to them. But I would say,

42:21you know, that's- does fall kind of under mechanical equipment, but it's also- it's also electrical, but definitely something to keep in mind as we approach the winter is. If you thought about a generator, do it now, call now, don't wait till you're a week away because it's going to be too late. We had a customer like that in the past freeze. I said we didn't have many water heaters explode, but the one I'm thinking about, they had two in the radic brand new home. They were on the schedule to get a generator the following Friday. And had they had a generator, their water heaters wouldn't have busted because like we said earlier, their power would have been on, everything would have been okay. But if you have ever thought about a whole home stand by generator, make the call today. It's 454 electrical companies will still be open for the next six minutes. Call them. We've used Lavaley electrical, Hesters electrical, I think solar. It's a company that sponsors the show, Mississippi solar, so give them a call. There's a lot of companies that will do

43:21that, but I cannot stress enough how important it is to go ahead and make the call now and set a wait until you see crazy temperatures. Instead of waiting till the forecast, the weather forecast makes you think you need to because then it's going to be too late. Anyway, what are some tips that you can think of, Jack, as we get ready for the shorter days, the lower temperatures, the fall, weather, football on the screen. What are some things that come to your mind if people are thinking about they're plumbing in their air conditioning? Yeah, well, obviously, dripping your pipes is extremely important in low temperatures. What about the gas grills? That's what I'm thinking about. The time of year is the grill time. It's been too hot, in my opinion. Of course, I know a lot of people like to grill on the summer. I like to grill out in the fall and the spring. Propane versus gas grill. Propane tanks, no fun, is it? Well, nobody likes replacing a propane tank.

44:23It's nice to write when the temperature is at 450, you just put the meat on. Yeah, or it freezes up. It's nice to just be able to crank that grill on and put on the Detroit lines. Yeah. And just watch some football. And the reason I bring that up is because that is something that, you know, Jack said we saw a lot of gas lines. So if you've ever thought about going from sterled, stand by, propane, burning grill, and you want to put a natural gas grill that where you wouldn't run out, you know, you would never have to worry about swapping that propane tank out again. That's something that we do. You have to convert the grill if you've got a propane grill, but that's not hard. That's something that can be done. And that way, you don't have to fool with a propane tank again. And it's, and per unit, it's less expensive. It's more efficient to do in that way too. So something to keep in mind. So as we close the show out, top plumbing

45:23misconception that comes to your mind. Let's say it's not as dirty as people think it is. There's a lot that goes into plumbing. Obviously drains and sewers that's on our turf. But it is a lot more broad than people think it is. There are a ton of different things that kind of fall into the plumbing category, whether that's water, gas, and now that we do, you know, heating an air that's with HVAC as well. Just working on specialty fixtures. I mean, there's all. Yeah, you're right. It just never really never ends. So I would say that, you know, especially also if you're a younger person that that might be thinking about it and that's something that you're worried about. Plumbing is so broad that that doesn't need to scare you away. I agreed. Agreed. I would say for me, that's a big one, but other misconception about plumbing is that that's probably you stole mine. That's got to be mine. That's got to be mine. All right,

46:31here's another misconception that we're going to keep talking on this show. This show is over. Marissa is going to lead us out, but thanks for listening to FixIt101 today with myself, Patten Ford and Mr. Jack Morgan. Have a good one. Marissa, take it away. I got you. Thank you so much for taking us through this episode today. FixIt101 is a production of Mississippi Public Broadcasting's Think Radio and is funded by the generous contributions from listeners like you. Our show was produced by me for Pam Pibis and our special guest host Patten Ford and Jack Morgan. I'm producer Marissa Von. Join us next Tuesday at four for more FixIt101 only on MPB Think Radio. This is an MPB Think Radio podcast. To hear previous shows, visit mpbonline.org or download the MPB Public Radio app to listen on your iPhone or Android phone on demand.