General Building section wanted

[Mr_P]

Anybody else think it would be a good idea to have all the house builds, workshop builds and other general building questions altogether in a nice section ?

 

[Zeddedhed]

yes

 

[SteveF]

yep

would save some questions gone off page too quickly in the (off topic section)

Steve

 

[RogerBoyle]

Agreed

 

[morfa]

Yup, a general DIY section would be great. I often have general DIY questions I want to ask but don't know where to put them.

 

[NickWelford]

+1

 

[blackrodd]

If I may add my name, must say it's a very good idea!
Regards Rodders

 

[mseries]

I agree. Besides woodwork we have a lot of users here with experience of general building and home repair who are prepared to share their knowledge yet no specific place to do so. Technically its off topic, well kind of - bricklaying is, but roof construction isn't

 

[AndyT]

I see the attraction but have reservations.

I do like seeing most of the general diy/building type questions on here, but mostly because I feel I can trust most of the people who reply. Because we all have woodworking in common, (else why would we be on a woodworking site) we avoid the sort of unhelpful replies that other forums get, where the posters are routinely insulted for their lack of knowledge and the implication is that only someone as sure of his own perfection as the person replying should ever undertake such work. And it soon gets as unhelpful as all those IT help sites where helpless beginners just get told to reformat their hard drives.

So at the moment, I think what we have sort of works. As practical people we all do more than just woodwork so like to talk about other stuff from time to time, and mostly do so in the Off Topic subsection.

I generally start on 'new posts' rather than looking at specific sub-forums so don't need a sub-forum to find such stuff, but it could help people find answers already given. And I can see that a sticky list of workshop builds could be useful to anyone wanting to read up on methods before they start.

 

[Eric The Viking]

I agree with Andy T.

It's a woodworking forum primarily. I'm one of the worst offenders for veering off-topic, but I'd hate it to become so general it loses its purpose. There's also a huge gulf between professional builders (who split again into those doing mainly new-build estates and those doing maintenance), and their legal and commercial constraints, and those like me doing DIY. The professionals' view is interesting, but very often not relevant.

In the case of joinery makers and people who do on-site woodwork, I'm very interested though.

For me, it works as it is.

E.

 

[Mr_P]

Eric and Andy,

Good points, if it aint broke don't fix it. As you say this is first and foremost a woodworking forum. A general diy/building thread might encourage lots of one time posters, reduce traffic to that section and regular members might not get a good response when they had their own dilemnas.

I can imagine a zillion and one really boring threads about tiling, paving and I've just been quoted x for this job. Now and again is interesting but everyday, perhaps not.

Thanks to all,
Carl

 

[John15]

I agree with Andy and Eric. This is primarily a woodworking forum and allows other topics, such as Building, to be aired under 'General Chat'.

John