What the house needs in September, north of the equator
20 jobs, in five groups.
September is the hinge of the year for a house and the most valuable month on this list. Everything you do now is preparation, and everything you leave costs more later. Run the heating for a full hour while an engineer can still come out quickly, bleed the radiators before the cold rather than during the first cold week, and look at the loft insulation to see that it is not squashed and still reaches the eaves. Check that the outside lights work before the evenings get dark and clean their lenses while you are there, and replace the bulbs that have gone. Wash the greenhouse glass down before the low light, push on the fence posts before the wind, and check the shed roof before the wet.
Safety
- Test every smoke alarm
- Press the button on each one until it sounds. It takes two minutes and it is the single most useful thing on this list.
- Test the carbon monoxide alarm
- Before the heating season and again in the middle of it. A carbon monoxide alarm has a sealed life of about seven years, printed on the back.
- Press the test button on the earth leakage unit
- Every six months. It should trip immediately. If it does not, that is an electrician rather than a job for the weekend.
- Have the chimney swept before the first fire
- Book it before everyone else does, which means late summer. A sweep will also tell you whether the cowl and the flashing are sound.
- Check the heater flexes and plugs
- Before the heaters come out of the cupboard. Look for cracked flex, scorched pins and anything that has been run under a rug.
Water and heating
- Bleed the radiators
- Cold at the top and warm at the bottom means air. Bleed them before the heating season rather than in the first cold week.
- Book the boiler or heat pump service
- Book it in late summer. Everybody rings on the first cold morning and that is the week you cannot get anyone.
- Run the heating for an hour before you need it
- One hour in the last warm month tells you what is wrong while an engineer can still come out quickly.
Inside
- Clean the windows inside and out
- Twice a year is enough, and one of those should be just before the dark months, when every bit of light through the glass counts.
- Vacuum the dust off the back of the fridge
- Twice a year. Dust on the coils makes the compressor work harder and run longer for the same cold.
- Run a hot empty cycle in the washing machine
- Quarterly, at the hottest setting with a machine cleaner or a cup of soda crystals. It is what stops the door seal smelling.
- Look at the loft insulation before the cold
- Check it is not squashed, that it reaches the eaves without blocking the ventilation, and that nothing has been storing itself in it.
- Replace the bulbs that have gone
- Before the dark months rather than during them, and check the outside ones at the same time.
Outside
- Push on the fence posts
- Before the windy months. A post that rocks will be flat by the spring, and it is a much easier job standing up than lying down.
- Check the shed roof and door
- Before the wet months. Roofing felt fails at the edges first, and a shed that leaks in June has been leaking since March.
- Check the outside lights work
- Before the evenings get dark. Clean the lens while you are there, because most outside lights lose more to dirt than to the bulb.
- Look at the window frames and sills
- Press a screwdriver gently into the bottom corners. Soft wood there is where rot starts and it is much cheaper caught early.
The garden edge
- Turn the compost heap
- Three or four times a year. Air is what turns a heap into compost rather than into a wet layer of grass clippings.
- Check the water butt and its diverter
- Before the rains. Clean out the leaves, check the tap, and make sure the diverter is set to fill rather than to bypass.
- Wash the greenhouse glass down
- Before the low light months. Dirty glass in midwinter is the difference between a plant that holds and a plant that stretches.
Tick them off as you go
This page is the plain list for September. The same list is tickable onthe house through the year, where the ticks are kept on your own device and cleared at the start of each year. Nothing is sent anywhere.
The garden half of the month is on the almanac page forSeptember, which covers what to sow, what to plant out and what is ready to pick.