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[fondue_ 1]

I see i see. My kitchen is 5.35 x 2.9, shorter than yours. So I guess we can still do the facing cabinets like you, since our width are quite close.

But the thing is.. currently our bamboo sticks are hung vertically along the kitchen. So if we were to do the facing cabinets.. we cant hang our clothes up there and I don't dare to put them outside. Scare I drop them / drop myself.

Hi rasp, maybe you can consider shorten the facing cabinet? We shorten the dry area to accommodate the indoor poles. I don't have strength and fear the poles will fall if i place it outdoor too.

[pinkpetter 0]

Although in your floorplan, it shows that the wall is not a beam and is "hackable" in theory but HDB will check the approvals they have given to the flats in your block. If the neighbours above and below you have hacked quite a bit and you hacking yours will cause a risk, they might deny also.

Top floor flats tend to have most things approved.. some even beams can be hacked. Flats on lower levels really have to rely on HDB's ruling.

[Reiki 0]

I see i see. My kitchen is 5.35 x 2.9, shorter than yours. So I guess we can still do the facing cabinets like you, since our width are quite close.

But the thing is.. currently our bamboo sticks are hung vertically along the kitchen. So if we were to do the facing cabinets.. we cant hang our clothes up there and I don't dare to put them outside. Scare I drop them / drop myself.

Haha, your last part sounds [pardon me] funny though serious. Yup, it does pose some danger actually. I avoid hanging clothes outside.

If you are not hacking the wall and only to have one entrance to the kitchen [from the dining area], you can always have a U-Shaped kitchen cabinet. Think that would also be a good idea - at the far end, facing the kitchen window, will be the washing area. For me, we have the cooking area and behind it is a cabinet to place the cylinder gas.

I notice some units in my block have their bamboo hung above where my 'facing' cabinet is.

Alternatively, invest in washer/dryer machine

[Rasp 0]

Hi rasp, maybe you can consider shorten the facing cabinet? We shorten the dry area to accommodate the indoor poles. I don't have strength and fear the poles will fall if i place it outdoor too.

Hi fondue, thanks for sharing your idea. Shorten the facing cabinet might work. But the clothes will be hanging beside it on top. Don't know if it look weird to see clothes beside the cabinet. Currently, drying area (indoor) is an L shape on top cause we got quite a number of clothes to hang every wkend.

[Rasp 0]

Although in your floorplan, it shows that the wall is not a beam and is "hackable" in theory but HDB will check the approvals they have given to the flats in your block. If the neighbours above and below you have hacked quite a bit and you hacking yours will cause a risk, they might deny also.

Top floor flats tend to have most things approved.. some even beams can be hacked. Flats on lower levels really have to rely on HDB's ruling.

Hi pinkpetter,

Oh i see. So the hacking of wall also depends on the hacking of my neighbours. Learnt something new again. We are on the 3rd floor from the top. Hopefully, got more chances of hacking that wall.

By the way, can I email hdb to ask if that wall is hackable? Think its easier to plan. Cause now i don't know whether to plan with that wall there or not there. What do you think?

[Rasp 0]

Haha, your last part sounds [pardon me] funny though serious. Yup, it does pose some danger actually. I avoid hanging clothes outside.

If you are not hacking the wall and only to have one entrance to the kitchen [from the dining area], you can always have a U-Shaped kitchen cabinet. Think that would also be a good idea - at the far end, facing the kitchen window, will be the washing area. For me, we have the cooking area and behind it is a cabinet to place the cylinder gas.

I notice some units in my block have their bamboo hung above where my 'facing' cabinet is.

Alternatively, invest in washer/dryer machine

We are on the 11th storey. Each time I take down those poles near the windows, I close the window grills as scare they slip and drop out of the window.

U-shaped kitchen cabinet... sounds interesting. Is your cylinder gas beside the rubbish chute? Thats the place I intend to move my washing machine to. My washing machine is currently inside the common bathroom. Its there since the previous owner's time. But we thought its dangerous to have an electronic applicance inside the bathroom, so have been thinking of bringing it out.

I saw that you hide your washer in the 'cupboard'. Very innovative and neat idea. But don't think we can do like you as we intend to have a top load washer.

[Rasp 0]

Here's the more accurate floorplan of my place. I have done some editing to remove those walls that have been hacked by the previous owners and the wall that they built. The small red dotted portion is the recess infront of my entrance which we intend to purchase it.

By the way, any one know how to calculate the cost of doing kitchen and bathroom's floor and wall tiling? I was looking at those previous topic but cant find any that teach how to calculate the damages. I am trying to do up the rough estimate cost for my budget. Anyone know?

[Reiki 0]

Is your cylinder gas beside the rubbish chute? Thats the place I intend to move my washing machine to. My washing machine is currently inside the common bathroom. Its there since the previous owner's time. But we thought its dangerous to have an electronic applicance inside the bathroom, so have been thinking of bringing it out.

I saw that you hide your washer in the 'cupboard'. Very innovative and neat idea. But don't think we can do like you as we intend to have a top load washer.

Yes, we built a cabinet, perpendicular to the rubbish chute, to store the cylinder gas.

Actually, if our toilet is big like yours, we would probably have the washing machine in the bathroom. I have a friend who does that - cleverly designed away from the 'wet' area inside the bathroom.

[Smallboy 0]

hmm... your layout looks very similar to Ivy and mine. Check out ours.

[ivy 0]

Here's the more accurate floorplan of my place. I have done some editing to remove those walls that have been hacked by the previous owners and the wall that they built. The small red dotted portion is the recess infront of my entrance which we intend to purchase it.

By the way, any one know how to calculate the cost of doing kitchen and bathroom's floor and wall tiling? I was looking at those previous topic but cant find any that teach how to calculate the damages. I am trying to do up the rough estimate cost for my budget. Anyone know?

my kitchen floor tile cost $1200.

but still the price will depend on ur area. I am not doing wall tile, maybe smallboy can advise u.

my previous owner also bought over the recess area and it looks just the same as what u gonna buy!

a pity the wall in front of our entrance cannot hack...urs good.. already hacked...

[Rasp 0]

my kitchen floor tile cost $1200.

but still the price will depend on ur area. I am not doing wall tile, maybe smallboy can advise u.

my previous owner also bought over the recess area and it looks just the same as what u gonna buy!

a pity the wall in front of our entrance cannot hack...urs good.. already hacked...

Hi Ivy,

Thanks for sharing. I roughly estimate the cost of all the hacking + tiling (floor & wall for 2 bathrm and kitchen) to be around 10k. Not sure if its too low/ too high.

Actually I think the wall seems good to be there after viewing reiki's house reno picture. Quite unique. Hee.. not many flat layout allow such a wall at that position. The thought of building it back came to me after seeing reiki swee swee pictures.. hee.. but just a thought, think 70% will keep to the current layout. save $$..

[Rasp 0]

After reading some of the blog here, I think its a common trend with the young couples now to hide / conceal all the pipings, air-con, wiring etc.. So I feel like sharing my thoughts about this.

Before I move to my current place, I had the same thinkings. Conceal or hide whatever at all costs to make the place look neat and pretty. But after moving here, I realise that its not very practical to conceal. Just to share several incidents that we encounter.

Incident A : Water heater storage tank electricity trip occasionally

We encounter several occassion where our electricity trips whenever we turned on the water heater at the mbr. This water heater was inherited from the ex-owner. Its in working condition, but somehow it just trip 'occasionally'. So we are trying to find out which point will trip together with it. Called in several electricians but none are able to resolve as most of them claimed that they only check for electricity and not familiar with 'water' stuff.

Finally we managed to get hold of 1 good electrician who managed to solve the issue for us. Of course his bill is also 'good'

After this incident, hubby decided to do re-wiring of the whole house to clean the wiring up. We check with several electrician but most don't want to do. Why? Because our living room and dining room have cornices all over, the centre part of the living room is a 'dome' look-alike cornice. So if we were to do the rewiring, they need to tear down everything and its really troublesome and the rewiring doesn't include making the area good back. So we put off the plan until our reno.

Some kind uncle electricians was telling me its trendy to do false ceiling during reno nowsaday. Nothing wrong with it and they look real nice. But there are some electricians will try to cut their costs by instead of pulling a new line for the box, they just pull 1 line and interlink them to many points at the bedrooms etc.. and when the owners finally move into their new place, their electricity tripped all the time due to overloading. By then, usually they cant find the electrician already and even if they can find, need to tear down everything to redo, so very seldom people will do for them since its 'extra' work for them. So end up the owner need to source on their own outside, and that's when they are approached and learnt of these issue. But most of the time, they will reject such job as its like cleaning the sh*t for the one before and not so easy. So they told me to take note of this when doing rewiring and false ceiling.

I think they are really kind to teach me these, when I didn't engage their service. So now, im cracking my brains to think how to run my wiring to minimise the ugliness and whether to have false ceiling.

[Rasp 0]

Sorry for the lengthy post above. I'll keep this short and sweet. But since i am at the wiring part, I feel like sharing my parent's one also.

Recently, the singtel telephone line at my parent's place also having some problem. They ask the singtel technician to check and found out that the line was 'spoilt' because of its old age (10+ yr). So to resolve the issue, they need to redo the line. But the telephone line was actually hide in inside the cornice too. Think its really popular to do cornice last time.

So need to tear down the cornice to redo the phone line. How my dad regret on doing cornice last time. But the lucky part was.. my parents went through the upgrading last year to add on the new unit so a new phone line was pull for the new unit. Hence, he was saved in a way they can still have phone at home but the phone is at the utility room behind the kitchen. The technician suggest that they buy those cordless phone so that they don't need to run to the back to answer phone. The singnet modem is also currently at that rm behind, so the signal is pretty weak.

To think last time he do telephone line at all the bedrooms and living room, now all the telephone point doesnt work anymore as all of them run on the same line into the house.

[Rasp 0]

Going for my dinner now. Will share the part on toilet piping and air-con trunking later.

[poseidon_gal 0]

pictures!!!!... heee rasp i want to see your current house condition... =p