Carpenter Reacts to BAD WORK - UGLY Carpentry 

I would like to see an episode where you show the "ugly" and then demonstrate the right way to do it.

Only a real man uses his table saw as a computer desk.

Hack and butcher are common terms used but I think these people need their own category

Been a carpenter/contractor for close to 30yrs I've seen a lot of things like this and I could never understand how someone might think that it's the right way or acceptable 🤔 but always makes for a good laugh. Great show as always thanks brother.

I am the carpenter that did the first baseboard that you showed. I have been a trim carpenter for three weeks. I used to be a pizza cook and so I am used to my work being in 5 pieces and cheesy.

This hurts my eyes And my heart

Richard, you should make a video on how you would do the curve base molding.

I worked as a painter and decorator for 55 years, just retired, I earned a fortune over the years putting this type of work, right, there's always a bright side.

I started redoing all my baseboards in my house since I started watching your videos. This was two years after finishing them. My wife wasn’t happy. But it looks 1000 times better

My son bought a house with crown molding. It was mounted flat against the wall. Very weird.

Had a contractor do a horrible job on the trim for a laundry room. Paid him to get rid of him since he obviously couldn’t fix the mess he created. Have been slowly redoing everything myself , often referring to this channel. Whole experience has made me appreciate the skill of a good finish carpenter.

This should've been your Halloween episode because this is some scary stuff.

@ 3:45. Considering the door frame and drywall condition in the immediate area I’m thinking there was no charge. True slumlord craftsmanship.

I am a contractor and I saw a really ugly one not long ago, I should have taken pictures. Some people moved to my town from California and decided they were going to flip houses. They did their floors, trim, and drywall. They hired the cheapest guys they could get for tile. What a disaster. The trim had gaps that you could fit 2 fingers in filled with caulk, the LVP floor was falling apart because they didn't do proper floor prep and there was height differences everywhere in the subfloor. They broke sections of the locking system and didn't acclimate the product prior to installation. It was ugly and I decided to not work on the basket case. 🙃 The house was literally sinking in one corner. I turned the job down, because I wasn't going to cut corners and it would have been very EXPENSIVE to fix. I'm sure they lost their ass and learned a valuable lesson.

you need to do more of these....great video on what NOT to do can be very powerful.

I'd like to see how you handle some of those complex transitions with the rounded sections. I'm sure they sell round pieces, but can you make regular base go around that? Genuinely interested. I don't think I've seen that before done correctly.

I bought a fixer upper, was totally amazed at how bad the remodeling work was. there was a fire in the back of the house, whoever done the repair had reused scorched burnt lumber as new framing. They used a hammer as a saw literally hamming the end of any board off to fit where they wanted. One section of an outside wall about 12 ft. long only had one stud that actually went from bottom floor plate to top wall plate. 3 to 7 nails of all sizes in every stud for each 1 x 8 all the way down the wall on every board from sill plate header to the roof. This is just a drop in the bucket of all the issues I have found. I think a cub scout troop was hired for all remodeling and repairs, with a 7 year old as foreman.

It's incredible how people get hired by companies to for construction work. I had just had my home resided with hardi plank, and there was new Tyvek behind it. I hired a company to install new windows and I'll never forget when their new guy went right up to the new window opening and cut away all the Tyvek. The code inspector happened to be there and he and I were chatting and we both saw him cut it away. The inspector told the window installer foreman to fire that guy.

The first thing I do when I walk in to a house is look at the carpentry. If I saw this I'd roll around on the floor laughing. I'd call a person who does something like this a cowboy or a butcher. Hello from Ireland. Thanks for the videos

Butchering trim is one thing, but I have a finished basement "wall" one one side made with 15 pieces of small drywall! The unfinished wall side is inside of my utility room... They spent more $$$ on mud and tape to smooth out the wall instead of just buying a new sheet of drywall (which at the time was less than $7)!!!

On the crown for base job, it would have been less noticeable to have simply painted a 3.5" white stripe on the bottom of short run.

I worked for a painter for a number of years part time and when you work in rental properties you see things like this all the time because landlords don’t wanna pay professionals…. They want the cheapest job possible as fast as they can. The goal is to get the new tenants in by the first of the month.

Yes Richard I see some pretty ugly stuff when doing a remodel or a addition sometimes I have to stand back and wonder what was holding that wall or floor up even some rafters from time to time … and rental houses seem to be the worse ….

What is really crazy is that there are some clients who ARE ok with this lvl of work. 🤦

Richard, your only recommendation for the dryer vent segment should have been..."Sell your tools so that you have some money to put towards the cost of having someone that has half a clue to what needs to be done and never put your family in danger again. The only tool this person needs is a pen so that they can write a check to have work done.

Im a flooring installer and Ive seen these types of things many, many times. Im guessing the homeowners did these things but you never know.

😂 I won't complain anymore about our bad made wainscoting. The first and last picture was more a wtf moment 😂

I have a whole folder dedicated to crappy tile jobs!

7:37 - "what's the solution here?" my first suggestion would be for the HVAC guys to call a carpenter to help out. This is a classic example of what happens when subs who don't do or understand carpentry try to tackle it themselves. I work in remodel carpentry and I've seen this kind of disaster several times

I appreciate your warnings but this installment should have an age restriction. I think the final example should be at least partly pixilated. Young children could access this video accidentally and suffer trauma. But worst of all, some adults could see it and get ideas from it! 😀 Please keep up the wonderful content. Always a pleasure!

Thanks for showing this! I needed the confidence boost.

Well, Richard, thanks to you I've done some work that I'm actually proud of, but it wasn't so long ago that my work was less than stellar and I would now consider the old me "a hack". Lol

Great stuff. I was drawn to your channel because my house is full of such horrors (some of which are my own doing I must say). I am slowly making amends and bringing it up to scratch, and your association with Brent Hull is making me take it to the next level. Great channel.

Sometimes we look at the mistakes we've made in our trim work. But it's only noticable to us. This stuff...wow....how do you keep going when this is how it's coming out.

I still don't understand why people keep sharing pictures of my work. All my clients get a concrete warranty.

It depends on what kind of a decor look they were going for. For example, I think these "hacks" would set the perfect ambiance for both the manifest-writing and bomb-making workshop experiences.

That's got to be the easier money a joiner has ever made making this video

These literally look like all the buildings that have either a management company or the landlord that does the work in this city I live in

I really wish the person caulked the crown base to complete the job

I walked into a home recently and the entire basement was trimmed with door casing. Yes, everything.

For the next two weeks I won't be able to sleep anymore. Horror video that you put up to. Hoping the next one will be about fixes. Proper fixes.

We started the reno on our new house by tearing out where a previous owner had boxed in a large opening to put a door on a room. The sole plate of this wall-shaped structure rested on the carpet, on top of wood flooring, on top of the original linoleum, on top of the slab. Yes, three layers of flooring under a sole plate. The header plate was deck-screwed directly into the popcorn ceiling. There's a full-size kitchen wall cabinet hanging over the toilet in the "master" bath... makes a lovely headrest when I'm doing some strenuous thinking. They extended the countertop in the guest bath over the toilet tank so that there's literally not enough room for me to reach into the tank to work on anything. I'm not saying they were incompetent. I'm just saying they didn't know what they were doing.

I've seen this type of work many times and unfortunately had to do it once because the client didn't want to wait for the flex crown molding to arrive. I got paid and was good to go.

I saw crown molding installed like baseboard near the ceiling.

We bought an old house. A previous owner redid the bathroom and for the most part it doesn't look too bad. They did use crown at the wall/ceiling intersection, but they pit it flat on the wall. Putty and paint, make it what it ain't.

I bet they were all built on "Fuckit Friday!"

That first photo was just impressive. I'd live with that.

Man Richard, that was painful to watch 😥. It would have been nice to see you show us how to solve these odd angles. Thanks for sharing.

The last picture looks like a bullnose drywall corner bead next to a jambed doorway...no reason for base to even transition around this!!! The home centers sell radius corner block moulding for rounded drywall corners!!

I'm thinking that last pic I would dead-end each side into the rounded post piece and would have looked fine (well, provided the rest was done correctly!).

My uncle would say "Time to circumcise a few 2x4s..." Still makes me shudder.

I thought I was having a nightmare, then I heard your voice explaining the bad something, not carpenters. In Oregon, that's chainsaw carpentry. Pay with Monopoly money, oh, here's an extra pink five dollar bill!

I've seen the first technique work on 100+ year old stuff where nothing else would do, but it was done better and and a lot of work. @12:00 I couldn't even tell what they were trying to do. That's sad.

That first picture had carpet. They put that as baseboard! LOL

I bought my house new a few years ago. I didn't realize what a horrible job the finish carpenter and painter did on my door casings and baseboard until after I signed on the dotted line. Miter's didn't line up and there were dried gobs of caulk and spackle on the baseboards. I have been slowly replacing all the door casings and baseboards upstairs to a wider flat faced type trim. There was one curved wall that I had to deal with and I found a place online that sells the flexible base that matches the new base I've been installing. The flexible stuff is quite expensive...I think I paid $110 for a 6' piece but it was well worth seeing a smooth flow on the curved wall rather than the pieces that the builder installed.

house flippers for sure, there is one down the street from me, at the corner, they already have it listed and didn't even take all of the masking and paper off from the fence, when they painted it

Really enjoyed this Richard..thanks!!

I bet the homeowners thought they were saving money

This is awesome! Thank you! Please do more of these!

Yep, the last one was an eye scorcher.

My biggest slip up was I cut a piece of baseboard way too short by like an inch so I took cock filled up the gap and smooth it out but it had a little indent so when I was finally allowed access to the drywall putty I went back filled it in and shaved it down to make it look like the baseboard and then painted over it then I told my boss about it because it was his friend's house and he looked at was like God damn you did that because happy as I was I was still upset I couldn't do it the right way but it taught me a lot

My impression of the crown base. It's either a renter trying to cover up the missing base or the owner who just doesn't care.

The crown on baseboard was installed by a Home Depot employee

I won’t lie if I’m contracted to this the 3rd image. I will ask myself I need money to survive at the same time I wouldn’t know anyone to that miter! It’s one of those miters you need the old school to teach you! bc it’s a really hard miter just by looking at it, I would not know where to start and I’ve was doing finish carpentry for 4 years but that 3rd image got me thinking on how would I even start it ! Even with a bandsaw lol

Have you ever heard the story of the brick mason installing a new fireplace and finds out the builder is having money problems? The mason finished the fireplace and is not paid. Winter comes and the fireplace is used for the first time and smokes out the house. The builder calls the mason to fix it. The mason says I will fix it pay me what you owe me first. The mason is paid gets his ladder and climb’s to the top of the fireplace. He drops a brick down the flue and breaks the glass. 😁

3:30 Make a templete of the molding and sweep in plaster? 4:15 just stop, please. 6:11 do some renovation work- you'll see this all the time. 11:58 first admit this is a very difficult profile to trim. Mold the whole thing with bondo? LOL

In some states if they complete the job you have to pay them. 2nd photo they didnt paint the wall worth a darn either.

Thanks for restocking the come and take it shirts! I gotta buy a hat too now

Crown for base molding 😂hey, wait that was my job and also idk what your talking about thats high quality work I did there.

Question, I removed baseboards to lay down new flooring in daughter’s room. Before I re-install, I want to repaint and then install. I would like to hit some of the baseboards with a palm sander or da sander and then repaint - some drips from previous paint. What grit sandpaper would you recommend?

Why are you slamming my work, at least I never got a call back! 😂😂😂

Thanks for showing off some of my handiwork

I would like to see some with bad electrical work like this.

wait a minute... why isn't there trim on the garage man door?

About the crown I have a customer that had someone install the same crown but put flat on the wall like that and 12 inches below the ceiling. Looking at it Im like, why???

These "jobs" are for haunted houses for carpenters on Halloween.

Typical old homes where the owner is a DYI guy, can’t afford to pay out large sums of money to professional installers and really doesn’t care what the finished project looks like. Had they spent a little time researching the solutions to these projects they could have produced better results. At the least, they have provided you with some talking points for a video.

That last one could you show us how you would have done it please

My cousin's uncle's nephew has a saw and a hammer. He can do this for you cheap. He finds scraps on the street all the time.

Kinda reminds me of when I watched you do refrigeration.

5:50 at least the crown isnt upside down haha. Actually being on the floor I think it is now upside down.

I think I found out why there was so much silicone seal behind the toilet.

I don’t think you need to explain any of these pics anyone watching your Chanel knows these are just plain wrong!

This looks like ghetto rental work. Everything is just a bloody scab with band aids on it.

Can you please do a video how do this more complex transitions? I would love to see a real professional explain it. I am sure I would learn a lot and many of others guy here too it would be very appreciated.

I saw a group of guys cutting trim with a circular saw next to a new house I was doing a kitchen. Kinda hurts when I've spent 10's of thousands of dollars on tools and 7 years of getting screamed at by an angry old carpenter.

I've been on sites like this to help the helpless. The best part is them trying to ride my backside like I messed up the job. Oh or the homeowner pressing me on timelines when they been paying dude for this long.

Hey I’ve seen actual plumbers cut joist completely out the way to run pipe and leave joist hanging in mid air. At least that picture they left a sliver 😂

a crappy house with decent finishes and paint is loverly . these homes would make me cry and fix it, if it was my friends or family . and i am a electrician

In uk you can find plenty examples like this. This country is a different level of mind...

This is what happens when your gardener says yeah I "can put on some trend."

I have seen and learned how to do Bull Nose with 22 degree cuts from you but that is a pretty big radius. How would you handled this?

Show how you would have tackled those baseboard solutions.

Please do a video on how to miter that 3rd image Thanks

"I don't know what's going through their minds" Nothing. Nothing is going through their minds that's the problem 😕

Hey there! I was wondering how to avoid shifting in millwork after installation? I installed wainscoting using pine, birch and adhered with liquid nails and nail gun but I am seeing joints shifting really bad. Anyway this could be avoided or remedied?

Still laughing about the hacks and butchers 🤣 yes the work is sadly ugly but the look on your face when you talked about them made me LOL.

Some things can’t be unseen

The angle in the 1st photo is actually 135 degrees , not 45 .

I'm a carpenter and recently had a trim job and came across a window that had a flat bottom and a arch top I was able to extension jam the window using 1/4" plywood how could I trim the arch... keep in mind this is in small town montana don't access to lots of expert material such as flex mounding.... any advice for me?