Gadgets
Drones
Looking after your property is a big part of DIY, home improvement, and home renovation. Taking time to perform regular checks to ensure everything is in place and as it should be, play a big part in keeping your home safe, secure, and weatherproof.
One of the biggest challenges is reaching the highest and most inaccessible areas like roofs, ridgelines, and chimneys to name a few.
Setting up ladders or access towers to reach these parts of your home can take a lot of time and are not always cheap.
One way I found to make this necessary task easier and more fun is to use a drone, they are great for accessing high points and difficult to reach areas, making the job much safer as you don’t need to climb up ladders.
Drones are great as they take up almost no room, are fun to use not just for checking your property but also great fun to fly, and prices these days are pretty low,
For example, the DJI MAVIC MINI available direct from DJI costs about as much as a good pair of binoculars and will let you access areas that would normally be restricted.
The Mavic Mini weighs in at 249 grams making it really lightweight, and means that it is classified in the lowest weight class, this means in many countries it doesn’t need to be registered,
(always check your local regulations before you purchase)
The DJI MAVIC MINI has plenty of range to cover most properties and even in training mode can reach 30 meters altitude.
The 12 Megapixel camera offers great image quality allowing you to clearly see areas of your property that need attention, and with flight times up to 30 minutes, you have plenty of time to cover big areas such as roofs.
Using drones makes the mundane and often dangerous task of property surveying quick, simple, safe, and fun. this means you are more likely to use it and keep your property in tip top condition.
Binoculars
Seeing is believing and being able to spot damaged or worn tile, shingles, or split gutters is a real benefit when maintaining your home.
A great way to keep track of things especially when they are inaccessible is to use a pair of binoculars. Having a good pair of binoculars means that you can spend less time climbing up and down ladders in order to check the condition of your property.
Not only does this save you time and effort, but it is also a lot safer too, the less time spent working at height the better.
Using a pair of binoculars that are clear, have good magnification, with robust yet comfortable housing makes easy work when looking for repairs.
A good mid-range pair of binoculars like Celestron Nature DX range can not only be used for DIY jobs like regular surveying they are recommended by Digitalcameraworld.com for beginners and intermediate users for all sorts of hobbies.
They come with a good warranty and will last for a very long time if you look after them.
I keep mine hanging up where I can find them easily and regularly use them to keep tabs on the condition of my roof and guttering.
They make a great addition to my tool kit and save me loads of time when I come to survey the house.
