Thread: A "not so Grand Design" in Ubon Ratchathani

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Originally Posted by Edmond

We went for those teardrop hanging chairs for the verandah. Lubbly.

To hang on your imaginary verandah at your imaginary "villa".

Ohhh, hi Joe. :-)


Tardin' in the top half of the forum again eh. :/

Originally Posted by Edmond

We went for those teardrop hanging chairs for the verandah. Lubbly.

The kid really loves hers.




But who wouldn't.

Shure tiz hard to beat island villa verandah living.

Originally Posted by mikenot

irst up was explaining that nowadays just having wires stapled to the wall is not the way to go, they are buried in the wall which is why we have to decide on locations.
"Why so many power points in kitchen?" ..."One for fridge, one for microwave, one for freezer, another for toaster/blender/whatever, Rangehood"...the last: "we need electric for that?"
"Why you want power outside on verandah?

Good to see the progress Mike.

You may also want to consider where the switch board / consumer unit goes. Thais tend to have it mounted prominently in a main living area, which looks less than aesthetic.
Also, a trick for mounting power points and light switches is to use a piece of conduit with two pieces of insulation tape on it. One to show the height of the power point from the floor, the other to show the height of the light switch from the floor.
It saves having various heights for both through the house, something that Thai's don't worry about. Odd heights don't bother them.
Another thing to consider is mounting the light switches above power points. This reduces the amount of conduit drops.

Have you / are you considering Solar PV & batteries? Worth thinking about where the combiner box and inverter will be located in relation to the main switchboard.

Originally Posted by mikenot

We will probably have a water tank and pump at the left rear corner, so will also run conduit outside, down from soffits for that....out of sight and mind there for 99% of time so not too worried about aesthetics for that.

Mike, re air conditioning drains. Worth cutting these in while still at the render stage. Makes for a more aesthetic look...out of sight and mind... Getting these put in now can also avoid having to use a pump for the drains too.

Originally Posted by mikenot

The rendering crew started work on Monday, and promptly started rendering over a wall where he was supposed to be cutting out a channel for the electrical conduit.

Mike, I recommend you get the builder to put stainless steel mesh over each conduit & water pipe channel before it is rendered. Also put it diagonally across each window and door corner.

Originally Posted by peciacake

Mike, re air conditioning drains.

And electronics.

I previously found it odd that a lot of the walls in the villa had an electrical socket at the top, just under the ceiling.

It took a while to click that when they built it they had put them in for aircons, but in 3 walls of each room, so the owner could easily choose which wall he wanted the aircon on. The result is an aircon on one wall, and an electrical socket 30cm under the ceiling on the other 2 of every room.

OOPS...double post

Another week done, just more and more rendering. This "should" be the last delivery of render mix:

The builder rang up yesterday asking for the next progress payment so he can "give the workers a Songkran bonus". The wife pointed out that payment was due after the rendering was done, and that the previous progress payment was for roof completion...something still not done, probably a few hours work to finish. So when we went out to the site at 6pm this evening we found 2 guys still working on the walls, only 2 small walls and a couple of columns to finish tomorrow. And roof crew "will" be back to finish their work, so that the boss can get his money.
Looking a lot better with plaster on the walls:

I am still not 100% happy about the idea of rendering the walls then cutting out the holes for switch and power sockets boxes, or the 3 small windows that didn't get done for some reason.

Originally Posted by mikenot

I am still not 100% happy about the idea of rendering the walls then cutting out the holes for switch and power sockets boxes,

Understandable.

When we made our first build, I just let them do it their way/tradition and was quite impressed that those..."farmers" could put bricks on top of another.

Occured to me that it was nasty, unfair and bordering......predudicial (ahem) of me.

Demand what you were promised !!!!!


Have you considered doing a lot of power socket boxes and then use wireless switches for some of them ?

Will set you back moneywise, but I have done a few and is very happy with it.

Did the first one 8-9 years ago and haven't changed the battery yet

Coming along well all things considered Mike.
What's the full pallet of AAC blocks for?

Originally Posted by peciacake

Coming along well all things considered Mike.
What's the full pallet of AAC blocks for?

Builder still has to do the kitchen and bathroom counters so I suppose some of them are for that, but still going to have several left over. I guess he will use them on another project. It's a fixed price contract so over-ordering is his problem.

Originally Posted by helge

Have you considered doing a lot of power socket boxes and then use wireless switches for some of them ?

I wanted to, but it was a firm "NO" from the wife for any of that fancy stuff. Back in Bangkok I had Google Home assistant set up with the TV, lights, fan in my condo. She just refused to use it. I did research digital door locks available here that are compatible with Google Home so that I could just group them all together and lock up at night easily, but came up blank.
I will be splurging on a robot vacuum, a Roomba or similar.

Originally Posted by mikenot

Builder still has to do the kitchen and bathroom counters so I suppose some of them are for that, but still going to have several left over.

not sure i'd use AAC for that application

Originally Posted by helge

Have you considered doing a lot of power socket boxes and then use wireless switches for some of them ?

Anyone thinking of doing this needs to know that you will need both an active and neutral at the switch to power the unit . Many light switches and fan controllers will only have active wires.

Originally Posted by mikenot

metal roof with 35mm PU foam but no ceiling, nor doors or windows.

Good R-Value ceiling batts will bring that down again. We just did a townhouse with a ceiling area of 130sqm for around 20k.


I'll do the pun, the difference is night and day.

Originally Posted by mikenot

Maybe we will not need to spend money on ceiling insulation as well

Mike, we have Bluescope ZACS insulated roofing. I wanted to see if it would provide sufficient insulation on its own with a gabled roof. The size of the AC unit was speced on an insulated ceiling / roof cavity. It struggles a bit to keep the living room / kitchen below 25 without the ceiling insulation, which I will need to install at some point in the future. Otherwise the AAC blocks, wide verandas and good ventilation keep the inside temp at 28 when its 37+ outside. Once the trees grow it should be even better.

Money talks ....even the promise of money.
After yesterday's "discussion" about the next progress payment we went out this morning to find that they are finally cutting out the missing windows !
The hole for bathroom window is complete :

And starting on the others:

And the painter continued with the primer:

Meanwhile the site cleanup continued outside by the two women. One is, shall we say, rather on the large side...twice the size of most of the guys working here. And the other is small, even by Thai norms. Definitely the odd couple but they made quick progress in cleaning up all the scrap AAC and spilt concrete. Got them to tip a lot of it where I plan to build some steps when I get around to the landscaping after moving in. That will save a bit of time and effort with fill. Anything sellable, such as a decent sized pile of metal scrap, naturally gets sold by the workers. Apparently the plastic strapping around the AAC blocks is worth quite a bit, another big bundle of that.

Been a busy last few days on the project ! 2 days ago we went into the city with the builder to select paint colours and tiles, the paint part was easy as we had already been looking up the TOA palettes online and had the code numbers ready. Looking at the fans made us change our choices slightly but it was still the easy part of the day.
Thank goodness tiles last for ever ... or at least as long as the house. I never want to go through that selection process again, the choice was just overwhelming. And not helped by the wife saying "up to you" ... no dear, I am not falling in to that trap. Up to me....but if I make the wrong choice I will never hear the end of it ! You are going to be living there too dear so give me some input !
The kitchen is on the same level as the main living area, just flows through from one to the other, so we wanted the same tiles throughout. Natta insisted on large 60*60cm tiles too. But I didn't want anything too glossy and slippery in the kitchen either, so we ended up with a light grey tile with a bit of texture. It's not a full on anti slip tile as in the bathroom, but definitely more grip in bare feet than the usual shiny tiles. I am not getting any younger, and after getting knocked off my bicycle a couple of years ago and fracturing my pelvis I certainly don't want another nasty fall, so grippy is good.
Trying to match bathroom floor and wall tiles took ages, not really helped by the showroom having floor tiles 50 meter away from the wall tiles (or so it seemed). by the time we walked there I had forgotten what we had chosen for the floor. Back to the floor tiles to grab the demo sample, and i could not remember which one we had chosen ! So start again, this time taking 4 favourites over laid out on a trolley. Then repeat for kitchen wall tiles. And laundry tiles. Oh, and don't forget the kitchen counter. And bathroom counter. And the verandahs. Never again will I subject myself to that trauma.
Then yesterday it was back in to the city, this time to HomePro for fans and stove. With a background in commercial catering I was on more familiar territory now especially when it came to the range hoods. I have cleaned enough of them to look and see which are missing an essential part...a drip tray for all the oil and grease which gets sucked up. Even some of the most expensive choices didn't have one.
And when it came to the hobs, plastic knobs were a no-no. Who would ever think that heat and plastic is a good combination ? A couple of the more expensive brands apparently. As well as some cheaper ones, which you could expect.
Anyway, despite the best efforts of the sales staff for an hour or so I over-ruled the wife's choice of the "suay" one and took a mid-range Mex brand combo.
Then off to the fans aisle to get a couple of wall fans for the bedrooms. i had already picked them out online but dithered a bit to make the most of the store air-con while testing out all the fans....it was stinking hot outside! A bit of window shopping filled in another hour or so before heading to the checkout. I don't know if he had been waiting there for us all this time but the kitchen guy pounced on the wife to ask if she had a Homepro club membership. "No"....sign up and you get a discount, he says. My wife will never resist a discount, so he sits us down and we wait for ages while he fixes all that up on her phone. Then does all the warranty stuff using the QR code on the packaging, which also took ages. But we did get a couple of thousand baht discount and get to enjoy the shop aircon for longer before stepping out into the furnace.
Meanwhile the workers had finished priming the walls, getting the outside area ready for the apron/path around the house, and the electrician had finally put sockets where I wanted them for the workbench not where he thought they should be down by the floor.
Prepping for yet more concrete:

Then today the first concrete truck turns up around 2pm long before the form work has been finished, so half the crew are spreading concrete around on one side of the house while the others are hammering in stakes, placing formwork, compacting, and cutting mesh to size on the other side of the house. The preppers had a narrow win over the spreaders, getting the last of the mesh laid just as the truck was reversing into position for the final pour.
And in the middle of all this the guy doing the decorative moulding around the windows and posts turned up to start his work, drilling holes and hammering in pieces of rebar to anchor the moulding to the wall.
Is that all that holds it on ?

Meanwhile the electrician was ignoring everything outside and doing his thing, putting conduits and junction boxes up in the roof space. He seems to be thorough in his job, everything is neat and tidy. When he starts connecting wires will be the real test....proper connectors or twisted wires and electrical tape?
We had bought a heap of energy drinks and a case of Chang for the guys today, they deserved it in this heat. When we left around 5.30pm they were still doing the finish work on the concrete, at least an hours work left before they could crack open a beer.
Tomorrow the tiles are supposed to be delivered, paint the day after, the pace is picking up again.
The weather forecast for this weekend is 43 degrees, sounds like a good time to do some more airconditioned shopping for the house

Originally Posted by mikenot

Thank goodness tiles last for ever ... or at least as long as the house. I never want to go through that selection process again, the choice was just overwhelming. And not helped by the wife saying "up to you" ... no dear, I am not falling in to that trap. Up to me....but if I make the wrong choice I will never hear the end of it ! You are going to be living there too dear so give me some input !

I was conveniently out of the country 2018 when it came to tile and paint colour selection.

Dec/Jan I repainted the exterior walls, boundary walls, in a scheme more to my liking, kitchen last month. I wanted a little more 'colour' than what i thought were fairly bland and inoffensive pale pastels she chose. Tiles are OK except for in the bathroom wall darker than I'd have preferred.

Had a man and his son arranged to paint the roof but they're now both fulltime working in durian harvest season till June/July; really don't want to do it myself.

Six years here as of last week; painting noticed a few hairline cracks in the plaster but nothing to worry about; house maintenance costs have been limited to one minor roof leak - 1000b for repair, the long-life lightbulbs have I think all been replaced at 4-5yrs (is that long?).

Things I'd change - and this was covered in an earlier post - more power points; different aluminium window joinery with security stays (whatever they're called) so they could only be opened to maybe 15cm; aluminium frame and door rather than the one wooden door we have to the outside from kitchen; a bigger high/wide window in the bathroom for improved ventilation; extended and re-roofed the carport a further 4m in December - waiting to get that walled-in for extra storage space. Nothing to complain about and no horror tales of bad house building.