RimBlock

Living room rear wall. Living room front wall. With projector screen down. And somehow our youngest sneaked in there. Shots of upstairs to come when I have taken them along with shots of the projector in action, the study room and dining area. RB

The kitchen (worktop still to come). View two. View out (my ladder in the way from filling my network trunking).

Right, some more pics. Excuse the mess, unpacking with a couple of screaming kids running around and pulling toys out of everywhere. The new front gate and door. View in to the living room. Lightbox on the stairs (blue lights below). Closer view of the lightbox.

Hi Mae, I had to hassle my wife to call them as the account is under her name and then had to wait for a week before they could come but the service was very good and to my surprise there was no confusion as to what I was doing having the routers (modems) in one room and connecting to the set-top-boxes via my own network. They needed to update the firmware on one of the routers and there was a faulty network cable but other than that it all went fine. No issues so far with the hangs and 'service unavailable' that plagued me in our old apartment seeming to have disappeared. Only issue is that the Rukus homeplugs which transferred between the router and the bedroom in our old place seem to have failed and I was going to use them until I finished the networking upstairs. Now I will need to get some new ones for the time being as the upstairs networking will not be completed in the near future. The kitchen networking will be finished in the next couple of days though. I took some pictures yesterday but have not transferred them yet to my PC. I forgot how wide my D-SLR lens is so I can get nice wide angle shots much better than the camera phone shots I have been doing until now. I will try uploading them tonight if they turn out to be ok. If not it will be out with my tripod and remote release so I can get longer steady exposures. Will take one or two with the projector running too which will def need a tripod to avoid blurriness. RB

Woah, finally done. Very good luck with the moving in, I am sure it will go fine . RB

Brand / model number. Good price if a reasonable brand and model. RB

And then there was internet....... The Singtel guys came today and everything is running ok. I still need to run the network cables upstairs so will use the powerline adapters for the bedroom for now. I managed to move some of the furniture around so the piano, table and study room bits are in more or less the right place. I will charge my D-SLR tonight and try to get some good(ish) photos tomorrow. Boxes still everywhere though . RB

Also worth a mention... My bag with missing network cable tester magically reappeared in the apartment while I was out taking my youngest to school. I suspect it was located and someone dropped it back for me. It was not there before I left and it was my wife that noticed it before me also commenting that it was not there the previous day. Two cable testers now RB

Oh how I love my new drill. Generally a higher model than the contractors and you know what they say about boys and their toys..... I installed the door bell yesterday. We bought a wireless set much like the one we had on the old apartment. One button and two receivers (one for down and the other for upstairs). I took the old one off, marched and drilled a couple of holes and put the new one on. Hmm, not quite straight but then drilling is not an exact science. I then selected a place for the first receiver unit (chime), carefully drilled another hole (oh this drill makes it so easy), put in the rawl plug and screw. I then attached the chime and went to the front door. Pressed the switch and nothing..... The range is listed as 15 > 20 meters.... I took the chime off the wall and moved closer to the door. Now it was working.... moving further and further until it stops, about 1 meter short of where I drilled (which was well under 15 meters) . Moral or the story, make sure you test the chime before drilling holes in your lovely new painted walls . Never mind, a bit of filler and paint and no one will ever know.... well apart from you guys and girls . Oh I also found a sticky pad in the box for the button so I didn't have to drill and screw it in outside the main door. Mind you, if I had found that straight away then I would not have used the drill and what would have been the fun in that . RB

Hi and thanks RRK. THe dishwasher is under the counter to the side of the kitchen sink. As the tiles were redone in the kitchen the plumber laid 4 runs from the main drainage pipe. 1. Sink 2. Washing machine 3. Dishwasher 4. Floor drainage. All are within around 1 meter of each other and under / inside the cabinet concrete base with pipe connectors / channels for the waters access. RB

Will check with my wife for free time over CNY holiday. RB

After a day at home..... The networking is sorted out. Using my awesome strength it seems I was pushing the blocks in to the jack body too hard. Placing these blocks in the just closing the butterfly back clips provides enough force and all the living room connections are done to wall boxes in the living room and to a patch panel in the study. Kitchen two to complete tonight then that will be the downstairs complete. Upstairs will be a bit more of a challenge. Things seem to still be going a bit wrong....... The glass wall is up with both sliding doors working. We still have to apply the frosted glass film to the bottom 2/3. To install the door they had to hack in to the cornice and now there is an ugly black hole where the glass goes through. Henry is trying to come up with an idea to hide the ugliness. The solid surfaces are in the master and upstairs common toilets but it is white and grey.... Whilst we agreed that the black tops would not look so good I was under the impression that it was going to be changed to a sand like colour matching both bathrooms. The white and grey just looks wrong to me. The plumbers have also come and fitted everything. Great service from them. The boxup of pipes is done in the common upstairs toilet but the door is bowing outwards at the centre of its height. The kitchen is complete apart from the granite counter top. My biggest problem with it is that the space for the dishwasher had a 5" gap down the side. The dishwasher is meant to be slid in to a hole in the cabinets with a 1/2" on each side. I really do not know how this can be fixed. I need to check the measurements I gave Henry to make sure they are correct before saying anything though. I have no reason to believe they are wrong. The main colour for our master bedroom is just wrong...... The original design was for a mid intensity pink but it was suggested to use something lighter or the room would be too dark. The colour chosen is a lilac which really doesn't match the deep red and black of the 'feature' wall. Not sure what can be done about this one either...... Oh well. Singtel in tomorrow so I have to dig out their router from the boxes and hope the phone lines are ok. Electricians doing last fixing today for kitchen and replacing a few sockets (a two to a three gang as they didn't have enough at the time). They are also doing the main distribution box and the lights for the stairs up/down cove light. We have bought two led T5s for the up and my wife chose two standard T5s in blue (????) for the down. Not sure how the neon blue will go with the light yellow walls but had to agree in order to get the "signoff" for the led T5s . She wants it to be a feature, I am just not sure it will be a nice one.... Oh well, as our old ID used to say...." there are no such things as problems, only new challenges." Now on to Henry to chat about the above. Hopefully with internet at home this weekend I will get round to taking some more pictures. Still really loving the projector. My youngest was watching Dora the Explorer on a 100" screen last night. Dora was bigger than him . RB

Oh yes. very scary. We were determined not to take out any loans this time as we have only just finished paying off our previous loans for the first place we bought 3 years ago. So far we have succeed although the credit card balances have gone up but, shhh, we wont mention that for now . I try not to think what else I could have spent that money on . Now I only have to worry about the massive home loan . Yes I agree. I also think it is worth the effort as for most people it is the one most expensive set of work you are likely to do in one go on your property and so it is nice to get it as right as you can afford as you will be living with it every day for, if the Government has it's way, more or less the rest of your life. RB

So where do we stand now with the reno progress. The carpenters were meant to be back on Monday to finish the kitchen but apparently have transport issues and so they should hopefully be finishing up today. This is a big issue as a fair few boxes we would like to unpack are for kitchen things. The class wall and door do not fit correctly as the walls and ceiling are not straight. The sides of the glass where they touch the wall have a big gap half way up and the ceiling on the left side pushes down a bit in one place which stops the left side door moving. The glass wall and doors look great but they are not frosted which was specified to add privacy in the study when I am working. The doors also have no locks. The shower glass is done although the master bedroom toilet one needs to dry and then be touched up before we can use it. The curtains are now up and look great. The projector is getting a work out every night. I am loving the 100" screen and HD blurays. I still have to find somewhere that sells the black and red speaker cable I bought in Homefix as I need another 25 meters to finish of my centre and rear speaker cabling on the right side of the living room (left side is done but Homefix in Tampines ran out of cable)..... And the worst of all....... the network connections are not working. My bag with my cable tester disappeared (small backpack without anything else in it) and I am guessing it was picked up by one of the workers clearing away by mistake. I finally got another one (they are only a few dollars) I could test the cables and found pair 3&4 were not connected in the plugs properly. Redid all the jacks in the face plates and still the same, used new jacks and still the same, attacked rj45 plugs to verify the cable and all was fine, cut off and redid the jacks again (sockets) and same problem returned. For the time being I have attached rj45 plugs to each end of one cable and am using a switch in the living room. I am guessing the jacks are not rated for this cable although both are 3M. My BiL is going to confirm with the supplier to see if they can get the cable and jacks working together and if so then how. My server is still causing issues starting so I will be getting a now home area drive as there are reports of older Samsung drives causing problems with a motherboards IRQ assignments and the drive light comes and stays on during the machines failure to start. I will also probably get a better PSU as that could also be contributing. Off to Sim Lim this lunchtime. We are not so happy with the main colour of our bedroom wall. The original was cherry blossom which was a medium pink but we changed to a lighter colour which when on the wall looks much more lilac. This doesn't go so well with the burgundy and black behind the beds headboard. Not sure what we can do about this now. I will be at home tomorrow to supervise the rest of the plumbing, the solid tops for the bathroom vanitys, and some electrical works. Friday we should have the new gate, front door and bedroom doors delivered. Henry had the door frames painted in a light yellow to match the core colour of the apartment common areas as my wife and MiL could not decide on what colour the doors they purchased together were . That is the last time I let them buy without me being there . We still have to find someone to hang the pendant light. So much to do and very little time after work.... RB

Will be around in between the reunion dinner at my MiLs and other visits but I suspect we will not be seeing many relatives as my wife is around half way through her pregnancy. The place is pretty much full of boxes at the moment though and there are a couple of issues which should be sorted out, I hope, by the end of the week (see next post). RB

Very nice and a smart use of the space..... expand upwards as is common in New York where space is also at a premium. I was going to ask if you had a ladder, steps or even a trampoline to get to the bed but then I saw this........ Must have been distracted by the pictures RB

If you want all that then yep... will be very expensive. We were quoted 5K for the stairs . RB

Hi Jim, I would suggest letting them finish the electrical works on the reno and then I can give you a proper assessment of their work along with the contact number. They should be finished this week. I would hate to pass on the contact and the work was not that good or problematic after I had passed it to you. Please PM me and I will not forget or have to go hunting for this thread . RB

For everything then yep, 50K sounds like a minimum. We have a few bits brought (i.e. some lights and oven) over and very minimal carpentry and we will get in at around 45K I would guess inc sanitary wares / lights / electricals etc. RB

Oh, and oh number 2....... For any other English people out there..... when life is getting a bit too stressful ........ RB

Oh, almost forgot..... It is my youngest 3rd Birthday today. He got ice cream cake last night and he was very happy...... RB

Ovens are quite pricey even in the set with a hob and extractor. As mentioned we only needed the extractor as we have taken our oven and hob (agreed with buyer when they bought as they would just throw them away). We bought Sims toilets and they are one flush wonders . Sinks (pictured in a previous post) were just over S$200 each, taps added around S$160 each. We mainly went for Sims stuff as it is reasonably cheap and we have good experience with it. Yep our accessories added quite a bit to the cost as well. RB

And then there was projector. This really was a bonus as the bracket would not hang the projector flat and level so I complained to the shop. One of the guys came round and installed it for me (for S$80 rather than the usual S$350+) as a show of good will. For this level of service I can only recommend KEC notably Clarence and a very special thanks to the guy who came to install whos name I did not get. I then installed the wall mount for our living room TV and you can see the projector screen hung above. Items still outstanding; The kitchen cabinets (should be finished tonight) Kitchen granite top Plumbing of sinks (kitchen and two upstairs toilets) Proper cleaning of the master bedroom toilet as there is some paint and plaster on the wall tiles. Hanging of the pendant light in the stairwell (see below). Glass wall for study room and shower screens. Touch up plaster for ceiling of blue bedroom. Light for the green bedroom (nned to buy). The town council came and drilled the ceiling as a temp fix to stop the leak to our blue bedroom. This seems to have worked but the patching plaster is terrible. Henry will be arranging for it to be smoothed over so it will become invisible. We seem to have had a communication error with the lighting people and they failed to turn up when the electricians were there to deliver the lights and fix the fans. The reno electricians were going to fix the other lights but could not as they didn't arrive. We finally got them delivered on Friday but after fixing the fans we were told they could not do the fixing of the pendant light in our stairwell. We had a 'discussion' and after a phone call they quoted us around S$260 to fix the pendant light as they would have to hire scaffolding to do so. We are considering. Anyone else have any good contacts for fixing a pendant light around 5+ meters off the ground . Here is what it looks like now (more pics of the rooms with my decent camera later when I take them). RB

Thanks JCase, Ours came in at around S$3K (including the kitchen hood for cooker but not oven or hob). We did not choose particularly expansive items at all with the rain showers coming in at S$650 or so and the toilets at S$200 each. It all soon adds up. RB

Trunking in the living room for all those cables. With the cables put in trunking, I was not so happy with the finish (a few big gaps etc) - You may have to click the image to zoom... So I cut and put in a couple of black pieces and used some filler to give this... The smaller size study room fan installed (all the network cables route to the study). One of the speaker cables and the HDMI cable for the projector.