Demolition Of Walls & Erection Of Walls (In-Between Bedrooms)

[edenstrauss 3]

Photos of new skirtings...

The contrast is quite minimal when the new tiles were used as skirtings. Because Ah Cheong had done a very good job in demolishing the wall, none of the existing floor tiles require replacement apart from the skirtings that were flanking both sides of the new door frame as seen in the first 2 photos under post #29 of this thread.

In fact, we were left with 3 pieces of spare tiles!

Edited May 12, 2011 by edenstrauss

[edenstrauss 3]

The door installer was called in at the last stage of Ah Cheong's renovation at our home to dismantle an existing HDB door from one of our common bedrooms and re-install it in the newly restored common bedroom.

This same door company who was supposed to send down an installer, provided the door frame earlier on. However, it was quite a pain making this door company have their installers keep to their appointments when we required a switching of door.

Anyways, the door installer reinstalled the door for us and since he did a decent job when he finally arrived, it is case closed but we would avoid using this door company in the near future.

As for the replacement of our bedroom door, we have decided on Yontat Doors & will be starting a separate thread on this. So keep a look out for it if you are interested in reading more about our shopping trip for wooden bedroom doors

Edited May 12, 2011 by edenstrauss

[edenstrauss 3]

Now that Ah Cheong has finally completed our mini-renovation, he had arranged for his worker to drop by at our place a couple of days after to clear away all their personal effects such as equipments, unused raw materials, etc.

The worker was very careful when clearing away heavy stuff.

And he did a very thorough clean-up of our MBR prior to peeling all the corrugated paper off our floor tiles.

Edited May 13, 2011 by edenstrauss

[edenstrauss 3]

Payment was then collected over weekends after he had inspected what his team had done for our flat. An extremely busy but responsible person.

Post-Renovation Advice:

He had also given us post-renovation advice and we are very grateful for having benefited from his initiatives.

(A) Timing of painting fabricated walls

Ah Cheong had strongly recommended that we paint the newly fabricated walls a month after its completion by Ah Ming. That's if we could spare the waiting time - we could since it's DIY.

As this would allow the walls more time to "cure" completely.

I imagined that since it is freshly built, after the water evaporates from the walls, they would definitely start shrinking abit.

And that is when we will actually know how good the quality of the fabricated wall is...

(B) How to deal with cracks at the "Joint" edges

Ah Cheong had assured us that there will be no cracks coming from the smooth & flat surfaces of the fabricated walls except the edges where the fabricated walls are "joined" to the existing (HDB) wall when the wall cures (contraction as most fluid contents would have evaporated from the walls by then).

We are to use brown silicon (I saw it in hardware shops & it comes in the form of a brown putty that's used for sealing up cracks in walls; also shown in NIPPON's online videos) to mend the cracks at the "joints" prior to repainting it.

http://www.nipponpaint.com.sg/advice/diy-painting-tips-videos/mending-walls

[photos pending upload - still waiting for those "cracks" @ joint areas to appear]

© Using an oil-based primer

And he had also given clear instructions that the wall must be painted with an oil-based sealer prior to a fresh coat of paint, etc etc etc.

We decided to purchase a 20-litre calibration of NIPPON's Vinilex 5170 to prime the fabricated walls in the bedrooms, all the rooms & the ceiling. We are hoping that the painting would last longer even though the old coats of paint turned patchy after 8 years of application.

[photos pending upload - had it stored away deep beneath other stuff... out of reach at the moment. but once it's been "freed" from the mountain of items, will upload a photo of it here]

Our verdict for Ah Cheong's services & workmanship is SUPERB & EXCELLENT!

And should we require reno services in the near future, he would definitely be a top priority in our list of renovators.

Edited May 13, 2011 by edenstrauss

[edenstrauss 3]

This is how one of the fabricated walls & the door frame looked like now (20 days from completion date of fabricated walls i.e. DAY 23 of reno start date):

[Note: walls in the photos looked distorted becox of the angle in which they were taken based on natural lighting in the bedrooms. Actual walls were upright & very straight as seen in earlier photos in this thread.]

There are another 10 more days or so to go before we could prime it for painting. But we will be shelfing the painting of these walls further becox we still cannot find time to DIY painting & many other stuff in our flat yet.

We're also waiting for the "joints" to crack, which until today, we haven't seen any yet. So to play safe in ensuring that the wall is further aired dry, we shall wait beyond 1 month before we start painting.

And this gives us time to stretch our muscles & relax too!

(We'll also upload photos showing how they looked like eventually after they've been painted.

[photos pending upload]

Meanwhile, I would be starting a new thread on bedroom doors & door knobs from Yontat Doors & Hardware Pte Ltd. For those who are interested in reading up on this new thread & looking at some photographs of their doors, please visit my thread at this link:

http://www.renotalk.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=40652&st=0&gopid=637288entry637251

And I've been talking about installing sliding kitchen doors from Han Fong Aluminium in this thread. Please refer to these links if you are interested in taking a look at what Han Fong Aluminium has done for us:

http://www.renotalk.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=40661&st=0&p=637398&fromsearch=1entry637398

(Topic: Vanity Drawers By Han Fong Aluminium Pte Ltd)

http://www.renotalk.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=39552&st=0&p=625118&fromsearch=1entry625118

Edited May 24, 2011 by edenstrauss

[indira 0]

Hi Edenstrauss,

Care to share your contact with me?

[edenstrauss 3]

Hi Edenstrauss,

Care to share your contact with me?

Hi indira,

I PM-ed u Ah Cheong's contacts already.

Have u bought the flat u've mentioned earlier on? The one with amalgamated rooms?

Edited May 13, 2011 by edenstrauss

[rctk1 0]

Hi indira,

I PM-ed u Ah Cheong's contacts already.

Have u bought the flat u've mentioned earlier on? The one with amalgamated rooms?

Dear sir,

may i have the contact too ? thanks.

[indira 0]

I still considered it, still many have to see

[edenstrauss 3]

I still considered it, still many have to see

If you can, try to get one that doesn't require a restoration of rooms. Unless there are special reasons like you really liked the flat or it's near the amenities or say, parents' home, etc.

In fact, I couldn't help it even till today, but regretted purchasing this current flat. We were the silly ones who fell for it when the rest shun or we weren't clever enough to pick up signs of its lack of popularity among buyers when the other Indian buyer offered a $2k COV.

It goes to show that the Indian buyer was very property-savvy: at least, he knows what this flat was worth *sigh*

Edited May 13, 2011 by edenstrauss

[indira 0]

that's what we afraid of....we still have to look for some other areas (prefered areas I have to say )..

[edenstrauss 3]

I think the market has cooled off quite abit.

try to get the best deal. But do take note of the "history" of resale flats. e.g. be wary of those flats with freshly or newly painted gates & doors - there are chances that they might have been harassed by loan sharks.

check the neighbours' gates, including those directly above & below.

Those loan sharks are alot worse than ghosts according to a friend of ours who had bought both of such flats.

have u ever thought of applying for a new flat from HDB? If u can, try to take advantage of that. We were dumbos, didn't & were told that if we were to sell off this current one & purchase a flat direct from HDB, we have to pay levy becox of the first-timer's subsidies applied to our current flat. *sigh*

[SimpleMinds 0]

lol .. it's my first post here and oh my god .. ah cheong and ah lor will have their hands so full and my team will be nagging at them soon. lol. How are you edenstrauss? guess you should know who i am .. cheers and have a good weekend.

[edenstrauss 3]

lol .. it's my first post here and oh my god .. ah cheong and ah lor will have their hands so full and my team will be nagging at them soon. lol. How are you edenstrauss? guess you should know who i am .. cheers and have a good weekend.

Hi welcome to my thread!

I'm so happy to hear from you

Yes I know who you are now & please continue to stay in touch with me

I enjoyed our mini-reno stint with ah cheong & his team mates becox both my hubby & myself have had such valuable opportunity to learn so many things from them.

We learnt many technical things from their team, through the way things were done & explanations given. And indeed, we have the honour to learn from maestros (great masters in their industry) like yourself, Ah Cheong & his team mates.

But both my hubby & myself are very sympathetic towards them becox it's indeed manual labour. It involved plenty of hard work. And we marvel at their perseverance in having to commute from JB to Singapore every single day. All in the name of earning a livelihood.

They have done us alot of good, not just with their workmanship but we started counting our blessings becox we realised that we were alot more priviledged & fortunate than them.

I simply cannot imagine myself or my hubby doing what Ah Cheong & his team mates have done. I cannot even lift up the demolishing hammer, let alone hack off the walls with it.

And we also realised that such manual labour has its own life span of worthiness becox aging is a factor too! Nobody can expect an old man to be playing with the hammer anymore so many had called for an early retirement. So we believe that this type of occupation is somewhat shortlived. Poor things!

Depending on their clients (owners), it might even turn out to be a thankless job. There will always be all kinds of clients in any industry. So if our renovators are able to do a decent job, we are grateful to them. U would agree with me that reno is very stressful and all the more when we do not have an ID or project manager to fall back on, so I get "hit" firsthand with anything. It's very "xiong" (meaning for hectic & stressful in hokkien language).

We were genuinely sorry to see them slogging to earn the $. which is indeed very hard-earned. The guy who built our walls - ah ming, poor man. we saw that it was very tough work. But he was very committed on his job & hardworking too. Very monotonous & manual, involving alot of handiwork.

And when we looked at the amount we were billed, we wondered how the entire team earn enough $ at all.

Anyways, I still want to reiterate that we are eternally grateful to everybody (yourself inclusive), for making my mini-reno a great success!

P/S:

To all readers,

Please do not underestimate the scale of our project here on this thread becox it involved a great deal of technical skills & connections in getting things right the very first time. And especially we are owners who are still staying in the flat while the reno is on-going AND when our tiling is already in place.

Alot of "gong-fu" is required to do such a brilliant job!

Edited May 15, 2011 by edenstrauss

[xrv750 0]

Hi welcome to my thread!

I'm so happy to hear from you

Yes I know who you are now & please continue to stay in touch with me

I enjoyed our mini-reno stint with ah cheong & his team mates becox both my hubby & myself have had such valuable opportunity to learn so many things from them.

We learnt many technical things from their team, through the way things were done & explanations given. And indeed, we have the honour to learn from maestros (great masters in their industry) like yourself, Ah Cheong & his team mates.

But both my hubby & myself are very sympathetic towards them becox it's indeed manual labour. It involved plenty of hard work. And we marvel at their perseverance in having to commute from JB to Singapore every single day. All in the name of earning a livelihood.

They have done us alot of good, not just with their workmanship but we started counting our blessings becox we realised that we were alot more priviledged & fortunate than them.

I simply cannot imagine myself or my hubby doing what Ah Cheong & his team mates have done. I cannot even lift up the demolishing hammer, let alone hack off the walls with it.

And we also realised that such manual labour has its own life span of worthiness becox aging is a factor too! Nobody can expect an old man to be playing with the hammer anymore so many had called for an early retirement. So we believe that this type of occupation is somewhat shortlived. Poor things!

Depending on their clients (owners), it might even turn out to be a thankless job. There will always be all kinds of clients in any industry. So if our renovators are able to do a decent job, we are grateful to them. U would agree with me that reno is very stressful and all the more when we do not have an ID or project manager to fall back on, so I get "hit" firsthand with anything. It's very "xiong" (meaning for hectic & stressful in hokkien language).

We were genuinely sorry to see them slogging to earn the $. which is indeed very hard-earned. The guy who built our walls - ah ming, poor man. we saw that it was very tough work. But he was very committed on his job & hardworking too. Very monotonous & manual, involving alot of handiwork.

And when we looked at the amount we were billed, we wondered how the entire team earn enough $ at all.

Anyways, I still want to reiterate that we are eternally grateful to everybody (yourself inclusive), for making my mini-reno a great success!

P/S:

To all readers,

Please do not underestimate the scale of our project here on this thread becox it involved a great deal of technical skills & connections in getting things right the very first time. And especially we are owners who are still staying in the flat while the reno is on-going AND when our tiling is already in place.

Alot of "gong-fu" is required to do such a brilliant job!

Hi Sis,

Really appreciate your good effort in continuously updating us on your reno.

If you dont mind, could you pass me the contact of the contractor.

Thanks