5-Room Resale (Light Industrial) Learn & Share

[eaglegg 0]

On 18/04/2017 at 6:03 PM, ilkl said:

That time during Cyber Monday Amazon stated that it could ship to Singapore, but I guess they changed their policy. You can buy directly from the official Click & Grow website. Shipping to Singapore is free if purchasing more than USD 50. Can use my referral code to get 20% off first purchase: link here

Hi ilkl, any issues with the voltage since it requires to be plugged in?

[kstoh 3]

On 4/12/2017 at 1:21 PM, ilkl said:

Fibre Termination Point Hoo-Ha

Now I'm not an electrician and I didn't study electrical engineering, but I think distance and length of the fibre optic wire should not affect the connection (because then in Singapore you will have difference in speeds according to area?) so placing the fibre further in the house is not contraindicated. The fuss that the electricians kicked up was the fact that the further the distance the fibre wire has to travel, there is a higher chance of the wire breaking and getting lost in the false ceiling, so they said it cannot be done to save them the hassle.

Luckily all went smoothly and our Internet connection is totally fine.

It is not true that you cannot conceal lay long fibre optic wires. The OpenNet people laid more than 40m for me (although he kindly charged me only 40m), around my car porch, along the boundary wall, through my garden, up the kitchen wall, through the false ceiling, down into my utility room. But because of the length, you cannot lay a single continuous wire. You need to break up into sections. Pull the wire from Start to Point A, A to B, B to C, C to Termination Point.

But it is true that if the wire breaks, you are in trouble. So, you cannot have sharp corners.

Speed wise, it is not affected. I still get exactly what I subscribed for. 

[ilkl 6]

19 hours ago, eaglegg said:

Hi ilkl, any issues with the voltage since it requires to be plugged in?

The adapter for the Smart Herb Garden has an inbuilt transformer, the label states voltage range is 110-240V so voltage not an issue. Just need to use a converter.

Speaking of voltage issues, just to share, I bought a toaster from Amazon because it looks really interesting! But unlike the Smart Herb Garden, the toaster only works on 110V so I had to get a transformer. When I went Sim Lim Sq to get one, the salesgirl I spoke to asked for the wattage. When I told her the toaster is 1100W, she said the type of transformer I had to get was this ridiculously massive one that can support up to 1500W! And it costs S$189 while the toaster was a measly USD 40. So I just bought a small travel-type transformer (S$23 supposedly 80W) and used it. The toaster was working but smoke came out of the transformer! Siao!

Moral of story: Don't buy toaster from USA! 

[snoozee 98]

3 hours ago, kstoh said:

It is not true that you cannot conceal lay long fibre optic wires. The OpenNet people laid more than 40m for me (although he kindly charged me only 40m), around my car porch, along the boundary wall, through my garden, up the kitchen wall, through the false ceiling, down into my utility room. But because of the length, you cannot lay a single continuous wire. You need to break up into sections. Pull the wire from Start to Point A, A to B, B to C, C to Termination Point.

But it is true that if the wire breaks, you are in trouble. So, you cannot have sharp corners.

Speed wise, it is not affected. I still get exactly what I subscribed for. 

Actually a whole continuous length of fiber optic cable can be run but it depends on what type of cable that is being used. if using those small flimsy yellow cables that is connected from the ONT to the TP, then chances of breakage is higher. I've seen opennet/netlink trust contractors using a different type of cable to run from the riser to the TP and these are normally thicker and they do a continuous run instead of cutting and joining since the joints will cause some signal loss.

[ilkl 6]

3 hours ago, kstoh said:

It is not true that you cannot conceal lay long fibre optic wires. The OpenNet people laid more than 40m for me (although he kindly charged me only 40m), around my car porch, along the boundary wall, through my garden, up the kitchen wall, through the false ceiling, down into my utility room. But because of the length, you cannot lay a single continuous wire. You need to break up into sections. Pull the wire from Start to Point A, A to B, B to C, C to Termination Point.

But it is true that if the wire breaks, you are in trouble. So, you cannot have sharp corners.

Speed wise, it is not affected. I still get exactly what I subscribed for. 

Good to know!

For landed probably they are more willing to conceal the wire for you. HDB different story.

Just curious, since you laid fibre network into your house, are you able to get good WiFi connection on the top floors? I ask because my in-laws' house (where I was previously staying at) could not get fibre because the StarHub rep says the fibre termination point can only end on the first floor and the 3rd floor won't have any WiFi at all.

[snoozee 98]

5 minutes ago, ilkl said:

The adapter for the Smart Herb Garden has an inbuilt transformer, the label states voltage range is 110-240V so voltage not an issue. Just need to use a converter.

Speaking of voltage issues, just to share, I bought a toaster from Amazon because it looks really interesting! But unlike the Smart Herb Garden, the toaster only works on 110V so I had to get a transformer. When I went Sim Lim Sq to get one, the salesgirl I spoke to asked for the wattage. When I told her the toaster is 1100W, she said the type of transformer I had to get was this ridiculously massive one that can support up to 1500W! And it costs S$189 while the toaster was a measly USD 40. So I just bought a small travel-type transformer (S$23 supposedly 80W) and used it. The toaster was working but smoke came out of the transformer! Siao!

Moral of story: Don't buy toaster from USA! 

if you are into buying cheap appliances from USA, then the 1500W transformer would be a good investment since you would be able to use other appliances with the transformer as well.

I had bought a polisher and 750W transformer from amazon which worked well.

of cos, warranty issues will come into play so sometimes better to buy certain appliances locally when there's offer/discounts.

[snoozee 98]

4 minutes ago, ilkl said:

Good to know!

For landed probably they are more willing to conceal the wire for you. HDB different story.

Just curious, since you laid fibre network into your house, are you able to get good WiFi connection on the top floors? I ask because my in-laws' house (where I was previously staying at) could not get fibre because the StarHub rep says the fibre termination point can only end on the first floor and the 3rd floor won't have any WiFi at all.

WIFI and fiber are separate issues.

the fiber terminates at the TP and then connected to another ONT and router to provide the internet access.

if the TP and WIFI routers are on first floor, the WIFI signal would not be strong enough to penetrate up to the 3rd floor.

to resolve this besides the normal drilling and running cables, you can buy those home plug and connect one end to where the router is and then the other end to the 2nd or 3rd floor. if the home plug does not come with built in WIFI, then you would need to connect another WIFI router or access point to the 2nd/3rd floor home plug to provide extended WIFI access. however, most home plug devices can only work on the same phase of power lines so if your first floor and other floors are using different power phases, you are out of luck unless you can buy those which work off different power phases.

another method is to use a WIFI extender. how the extender works is that it would connect to the existing WIFI and then rebroadcast the WIFI connection. this is basically a bridging device which allows your to extend WIFI coverage without needing to pull cables. there's some performance penalty since the WIFI signal is rebroadcasted but it's hardly noticeable.

for my in-law's landed house, I used a WIFI extender on the 2nd floor to connect to the WIFI router on the 1st floor and this enabled the signal to be broadcasted to the 3rd floor. without this WIFI extender, there is almost no WIFI coverage on the 3rd floor. I had explored using home plug but unfortunately the house was wired using different power phases for each floor so home plugs would not work.

the most optimal solution for multi story houses would be to use enterprise access points with one on each level to provide the full WIFI coverage.

[kstoh 3]

5 hours ago, snoozee said:

Actually a whole continuous length of fiber optic cable can be run but it depends on what type of cable that is being used. if using those small flimsy yellow cables that is connected from the ONT to the TP, then chances of breakage is higher. I've seen opennet/netlink trust contractors using a different type of cable to run from the riser to the TP and these are normally thicker and they do a continuous run instead of cutting and joining since the joints will cause some signal loss.

Apologies. I did not explain clearly. OpenNet did lay a continuous length of optical cable from the OpenNet distribution box outside my house all the way into my house up to the TP. What I meant by "breaking up into sections" is that you cannot lay one wire or string, and try to pull all the way in. You need to have a few "manholes" in between to pull the wire in, one section at a time. But I did not see what kind of fibre cable they used to pull all the way in. I don't think it is those flimsy yellow cable.

5 hours ago, ilkl said:

Good to know!

For landed probably they are more willing to conceal the wire for you. HDB different story.

Just curious, since you laid fibre network into your house, are you able to get good WiFi connection on the top floors? I ask because my in-laws' house (where I was previously staying at) could not get fibre because the StarHub rep says the fibre termination point can only end on the first floor and the 3rd floor won't have any WiFi at all.

Like what snoozee explained, fibre and Wifi and two different things. Fibre is laid to only one termination point (TP) in your house, most likely on the ground floor. If you want internet access on another floor, you need to cable up to that floor or somehow extend your WiFi signal to that floor. There are several ways to do it. I wrote about it at length on my blog:

My Network Diagram
Optical Fibre Termination Point (TP) —> Huawei Optical Network Terminal (ONT) —> StarHub D-Link DIR-850L

D-Link DIR-850L (WiFi 1)
Port 1 --> Store —> D-Link 8 port Gigabit Switch (A)
Port 2 --> Hall —> D-Link 8 port Gigabit Switch (B)
Port 3 --> Porch —> D-Link HD Cloud Camera DCS-5222L
Port 4 --> SamKnows Device (Internet Speed Monitoring)

D-Link 8 port Gigabit Switch (A)
Port 1 <-- D-Link DIR-850L
Port 2 --> Dining
Port 3 --> Yard —> D-Link HD Cloud Camera DCS-5222L
Port 4 --> Room 1 --> HP PC
Port 5 --> Room 2 —> Buffalo WCR-HP-GN (WiFi 6)
Port 6 --> Study —> D-Link DAP-1665 (WiFi 3) —> Canon wireless printer / scanner
Port 7 --> Master —> Airport Time Capsule 2TB (WiFi 4) --> (1) Apple TV (2) D-Link Cloud Camera DCS-942L (3) D-Link HD Cloud Camera DCS-5222L
Port 8 --> Roof Terrace —> Buffalo WCR-HP-GN (WiFi 5) —> (1) D-Link HD Cloud Camera DCS-5222L (2) D-Link DCS-6010L Cloud Camera (3) Wii (4) Xbox

D-Link 8 port Gigabit Switch (B)
Port 1 <— D-Link DIR-850L
Port 2 —> Smart TV
Port 3 —> SoundBar
Port 4 —> Seagate Central 4TB (network drive)
Port 5 —> D-Link Network Video Recorder DNR-322L
Port 6 —> Airport Express (WiFi 2) —> (1) SoundBar (via AirPlay) (2) Xiaomi Mi Robot Vacuum Cleaner 

[kstoh 3]

5 hours ago, ilkl said:

The adapter for the Smart Herb Garden has an inbuilt transformer, the label states voltage range is 110-240V so voltage not an issue. Just need to use a converter.

Speaking of voltage issues, just to share, I bought a toaster from Amazon because it looks really interesting! But unlike the Smart Herb Garden, the toaster only works on 110V so I had to get a transformer. When I went Sim Lim Sq to get one, the salesgirl I spoke to asked for the wattage. When I told her the toaster is 1100W, she said the type of transformer I had to get was this ridiculously massive one that can support up to 1500W! And it costs S$189 while the toaster was a measly USD 40. So I just bought a small travel-type transformer (S$23 supposedly 80W) and used it. The toaster was working but smoke came out of the transformer! Siao!

Moral of story: Don't buy toaster from USA! 

Actually, it is NEVER a good idea to buy a 110V appliance for use in Singapore where the electricity supply is 240V, unless this device is one of a kind which you cannot get in Singapore. If it is a simple non-heating device which consumes little power, a small transformer will suffice. But if it is one with heating like your toaster, you need a transformer that is 2 to 3 times the wattage. This means a ridiculously big, heavy and expensive transformer.

Using an underpowered transformer can cause the transformer to blow up, like in your case. It can cause a fire, so be careful. If you plug your device into the power socket carelessly without the transformer, your toaster will be toast!

[ilkl 6]

21 hours ago, snoozee said:

WIFI and fiber are separate issues.

the fiber terminates at the TP and then connected to another ONT and router to provide the internet access.

if the TP and WIFI routers are on first floor, the WIFI signal would not be strong enough to penetrate up to the 3rd floor.

to resolve this besides the normal drilling and running cables, you can buy those home plug and connect one end to where the router is and then the other end to the 2nd or 3rd floor. if the home plug does not come with built in WIFI, then you would need to connect another WIFI router or access point to the 2nd/3rd floor home plug to provide extended WIFI access. however, most home plug devices can only work on the same phase of power lines so if your first floor and other floors are using different power phases, you are out of luck unless you can buy those which work off different power phases.

another method is to use a WIFI extender. how the extender works is that it would connect to the existing WIFI and then rebroadcast the WIFI connection. this is basically a bridging device which allows your to extend WIFI coverage without needing to pull cables. there's some performance penalty since the WIFI signal is rebroadcasted but it's hardly noticeable.

for my in-law's landed house, I used a WIFI extender on the 2nd floor to connect to the WIFI router on the 1st floor and this enabled the signal to be broadcasted to the 3rd floor. without this WIFI extender, there is almost no WIFI coverage on the 3rd floor. I had explored using home plug but unfortunately the house was wired using different power phases for each floor so home plugs would not work.

the most optimal solution for multi story houses would be to use enterprise access points with one on each level to provide the full WIFI coverage.

Thanks for the info @snoozee!

My in-laws house is like yours, have different power phases for different levels. Shall try the WiFi extender!

 

16 hours ago, kstoh said:

Actually, it is NEVER a good idea to buy a 110V appliance for use in Singapore where the electricity supply is 240V, unless this device is one of a kind which you cannot get in Singapore. If it is a simple non-heating device which consumes little power, a small transformer will suffice. But if it is one with heating like your toaster, you need a transformer that is 2 to 3 times the wattage. This means a ridiculously big, heavy and expensive transformer.

Using an underpowered transformer can cause the transformer to blow up, like in your case. It can cause a fire, so be careful. If you plug your device into the power socket carelessly without the transformer, your toaster will be toast!

Yes, when we smelled the smoke we quickly disconnected everything. The toaster is fine, transformer is not. But we got another toaster from Courts to save the hassle. So we now have a small white elephant sitting at home - 110V toaster which looks nice but cannot be used. Any takers? Shall giveaway especially if someone already has a big transformer at home?

[ilkl 6]

Fan Installation
Got our fans from Phylux – their showroom is one of the better ones we’ve been to (less claustrophobic) and the prices are reasonable enough, esp with promotion.

We chose Relite’s Helix 52” without light for the living room, and Elmark’s Bumbee 48” with tri-color LED for the bedrooms.

 
^{Elmark's Bumbee (Left - ORB without LED light, Right - OAK with LED light)}

Their promotion included a free installation for the Relite fan, while the rest were chargeable at $50 each (total damage $150). The electrician was going to charge us $70 each for the installation (total $280 since 4 fans) so we thought we be cheapo and get Phylux to install the fans for us. I clarified with the salesperson about installing the living room fan with the false ceiling in place (the flat came with existing false ceiling in the living room so we are keeping it) – he was the one who told me they can install directly onto the concrete ceiling, extend the stalk longer past the false ceiling, OR add wooden support to the false ceiling and install the fan flushed to the false ceiling.
I kept having the impression that adding a piece of wood to the false ceiling is not a very sturdy option (false ceiling material is notoriously flimsy so how does adding a piece of wood inside it help much?) so I opted for the fan to be installed on the concrete. So when the ID modified the false ceiling, they did NOT add a wooden support for the fan according to my wishes.

When the fan installers came, they said installing the living room fan to the concrete ceiling is a BAD idea, and even if you extend the stalk past the false ceiling, you must leave a gap around a stalk because the fan will wobble and will crack the false ceiling. WHY NO ONE TOLD ME THAT BEFORE?? They actually packed up and left because they said they can’t install without a wood support, best ask the ID to do it up for them first. I called them back and asked them to install the bedroom fans first, then asked them what they can do about the living room fan. I also called my ID and got him to speak to them, somehow he managed to convince them to install the wooden support for us on the spot, just need to top-up $100. Since we don’t want the issue to ding-dong back and forth anymore, we just pay la!

I watched them create the wood support and finally understand what they mean by “adding a piece of wood to the inside of the false ceiling” – they actually open up a hole in the false ceiling, fashion a caterpillar-like wood panel where the legs are steel brackets bent like insect legs, drill and fix the steel legs to both the concrete ceiling and also the false ceiling “skeleton” such that the wood panel is flushed with the false ceiling, and then install the fan on the wood panel (which is of course a lot sturdier than the gypsum board of the false ceiling). Interesting! However, being a HDB flat, having a fan with a false ceiling resulted in the fan being rather low, so if my husband were to stretch his hands out, will sure kena the fan blades (and he is an average 175cm tall). We are ok with it, but if I were to do it over again, would have created a recess at the living area for the fan (so no false ceiling at the sofa area, just L-box at the sides for the lights).

^{Living room fan with false ceiling. The fan installer has placed back the gypsum board around the base of the fan which can be easily patched up.}

Sorry I lor-sor with my story. That’s not the end though.

So I thought all good right? Installed fans and then let electrician come in and connect for us. Well, the electricians complained about how the bedroom fans were installed because the brackets supporting the fan was blocking the access of the wires in black PVC pipes! I definitely told the fan installers there will be pipes leading to the fans but obviously not their problem so they just suka-suka installed it anyhow as long as position correct. The electrician boss told us that they had to reinstall the fans, but he did not charge us for it. On hindsight, probably better to just let the electricians install the fans for us.

^{Another issue the electricians made noise about...}

^{They managed to fix it though!}

Master bedroom fan had to do a L-shaped pipe to connect due to presence of wardrobe.

Feedback regarding the fans:
The Relite fan is very powerful and quiet, and looks pretty modern and minimalist which is what we like, so we are very happy with it. But like I said, it's a little low due to the false ceiling present, so we need to be careful not to stick things up too high! We can't comment on its light as we got one without the light kit.

The Elmark fans are good enough for the bedrooms. The light is dimmable and tri-colored, and it's sufficiently bright for bedroom. However, for reading, think it's best to get another light source. Also, the fans seem quiet enough, but not as quiet as Relite.

Edited April 24, 2017 by ilkl

[ilkl 6]

Doors, Main Gate & Digital Locks
We went to My Digital Lock/One Last Hope after we saw this gate on their Facebook page and I really wanted this wire-mesh gate because 1) Industrial-look 2) Very practical for pets especially cats or small dogs

Their company specialises in digital locks and they offer very competitive prices when you get them together with their gate and doors. I wasn’t planning to get digital locks as I am very old-school and prefer normal lock-and-key systems but husband was convinced to because they cost just extra $300 versus a conventional mortise lock.

The fire-rated 4x7 solid veneer main door costs $1350, while the mesh gate with laser-cut unit number is $1080. Add $120 for sliding arm door closer and $600 for digital locks for both main gate and door.

^{Can choose many colours for the laser-cut part of the main gate. We got #55 - Navy because that's the boss' favourite colour!}

^{Epic Digital Locks. Choose card+code type. Can use remote to unlock both at same time, very convenient!}

We also got solid core veneer doors for the bedrooms ($299 each), and top-up ($45 each) for black lever handles. They have laminate doors too, but that will be $100 extra per door. 

^{Chose this veneer pattern for all bedroom doors and for main door. Had to top-up for black lever handles for the bedroom doors.}

That said, their service is pretty good (everything installed in one day by 3 different teams) and we’re very happy with what we got!

Fire-rated veneer main door with stainless-steel strip (supposed to add $100 but salesperson forgot to write down in the invoice lol - maybe cause we add-on too many things)

<sup>Our lovely industrial gate!

Bedroom door! Love the veneer colour!</sup>

Roller Blinds
We got our roller blinds from One Last Hope as well. Mainly cause too lazy to look around. We were served by Norman who personally came down twice to let me look at the samples, really nice guy!

The cheapest price they had was $5 per sqft and I thought the $5 range actually looks pretty decent. Chose a non-black-out type (dim out) for the living room full height windows and black-out for bedrooms. Also went for the pelmet type:

^{Chose this $5 psf dim out light grey blinds for the full height windows in the living room.}

^{$5 psf black out blinds for bedrooms. Alas, no stock available!!}

We have about total 8.7 feet wide of full-height windows and about 12 feet wide of half-height bedroom windows and the total cost quoted was $1200. Not too shabby, I thought.

Sadly all the $5 black-out stocks were not available and Norman was very apologetic. I end up choosing the $10 black-out range (the other options were not impressive) but Norman gave me a discount so had to top-up $300 more. All-in-all $1500 for blinds.

^{$10 psf which I chose after the $5 psf ones were not available.}

No regrets as they look great!

^{Living room blinds}

^{Bedroom blinds - quite like the understated pattern. Not too sterile/boring. Pokemon-approved!}

Edited April 26, 2017 by ilkl

[ilkl 6]

Vertical Garden Part 2 - Installation & Planting
Go here to read about Part 1: 

As excited as we were in getting the vertical garden, it turned out to be the biggest HEADACHE for our renovation.

When I first contacted Vertical Garden, I spoke to two different staff and was very happy with their service and the information they gave me, and that was why I convinced the boss to pay for my garden. The salesperson, Mr A was very friendly and would happily reply my messages when I have questions.

The project manager, Mr M, who is from Bangladesh, did not speak very good English and he was the one we and our ID had to liase with. I don’t want to sound racist or xenophobic so please don’t think of this post as something complaining about FT or FW or whatever, but OMGWTFBBQ Mr M was a pain to deal with. 

He came down a couple of times with my ID to co-ordinate the plumbing requirements and he kept saying different things which resulted in the delay of vertical garden backing installation because the pipes were not done in the way he liked. Made our plumbers very unhappy also because had to trouble them to come down and change the pipes.

This is an example of Mr M’s poor communication: The one in blue is what he sent to my ID. The pink one is what he sent to me after I whatsapped Mr M to clarify further.

It came to a point that we could not move in on time because the iQuartz countertop measurement was dependant on the vertical garden backing and frame to be up, but that got delayed. Mr M was also busy with other projects, but he didn’t even inform us about his other projects, he just says that he cannot come on this day. (This one also partly the fault of my ID, he didn’t co-ordinate the vertical garden earlier when the carpentry was being manufactured. There was minimal work done during that period so this should have been settled earlier)

And then there was the lights. When we signed up and paid the deposit, we specifically asked for recess lights as there is an existing false ceiling and we wanted the growth lights to be as unobtrusive as possible. The salesperson said he will order 2 x 40W lights for us.

^{LED 40W recessed light}

Mr M just told us they don’t have the lights so they cannot install on the date we wanted. My husband was so angry, he called up Mr M and SHOUTED at him. I messaged Mr A to complain and he acted promptly and arranged for us to get a 150W halogen light (which is more expensive, at no extra cost).

Backing, frame and drainage tray done. The brown stuff are felt pockets which will hold the plants and their media, while the white part is the absorbent layer acting as the water source.

Finally we pushed them to get the backing and frame installed. The rest of the renovation could then proceed. The planting is to be done after renovation works. One fine day we decided to test the drainage tray to see if the water will flow out passively, and we noticed that water pools on the other side of the tray because they didn’t install the proper gradient. SIGH.

^{Water pooling on the right side. The outlet pipe is connected on the LEFT.}

On planting day, they fixed the tray and I insisted they show me if water will flow out properly (it did). The two workers then planted the plants according to the design we had confirmed with their designer earlier. So even though they don’t speak very good English, they were quite happy to get feedback from me and planted more of those plants which I preferred. Even gave me two extra pots of ferns and money plants hehe.

^{There was a designer who did this up for us after asking us what we liked. I don't really know any specific plant species so these were all chosen for us.}

^{The pre-grown plants brought in from their nursery.}

^{Planting in progress...}

^{Tidying up}

In spite of the drama, we are very pleased with our vertical garden!!

(Left) Immediately after planting. (Right) One week later - the ferns are less lush but the rest looked like they're grown, especially the red ones!

Some of the plants will take some time to adapt and may die, but Vertical Green provides a complimentary maintenance visit at one month to prune and to replace the bad/dead/dying plants. So far the garden is doing rather well (2 weeks post-planting), only 5% of the plants are not doing so well. We’ll see in another 2 weeks’ time how many need to be replaced.

The light is super strong, at first we asked them to turn it on in the daytime but that was a bad idea as it made the dining area very obnoxiously bright and hot. We got them to change it to night time and it’s much better! The water turns on itself twice a day for 3 minutes, and we just need to add liquid fertiliser into the fertiliser tank once a month.

In summary, despite the bumps we encountered (mainly due to communication issues with some of the Vertical Green staff), we are still very satisfied with the end result and have no regrets. 

[my3rmflat 9]

Nice!

[CZL 0]

Wow, the vertical plant make your place so welcoming and fresh. Love that feeling of fresh air in the morning.

Me too also has a wall, now thinking if possible to install as renovation already half way.

Is there many company doing this? Can Pm me the cost?