Bicko

Good idea Bicko. I did a trip down to Kanchanaburi in Nov 06 and was thinking this would be a great place to come for Anzac day. Unfortunately I am back in Oz (under sufferance) and wont be able to participate in you idea. I should be back living there permanantly in about 2 years or so and if it is still on then will partake.

Sezzo

(Ex Rasigs 79 - 99)

Bicko

ex

Royal Australian Navy (National service) 56 to 58

Papua New Guinea Volunteer Rifles (62 to 72),

16 Battalion Royal West Australian regiment (72 to 74)

13 Field Squadron RAEngineers (74 to 77)

Are there any ANZACS in the Buri Ram area? I am thinking about doing a run to Kanchanaburi for the Dawn service this year. Apparently the Australian Embassy arranges a contingent of currently serving personnel to attend and provide the traditional service. I would be happy to take a couple of extra people in the car. Please let me know.

Cheers.

sorry to hear your son could only get a game at carlton, now if it had been the crows that would have been summat

the Issarn region is populated predominantly by soccer fans so I wouldnt hold my breath, you maybe better setting a satellite up

Carn the Crows

Last time i was in Perth they were all screaming for that team.

I live near Buri ram so count me in for an afternoon of cold beers and a game.

Ok, Enough time in bkk

Time to get back to the house building, Will be back in two weeks with the finished product photos.

Thanks for all the input and help with building my house.

Super photos. Good effort.

That looks excellent.

2000B a square metre?

If so you have hit the gold lode that many Thai can do already.

Except they can do it in concrete and steel, and it looks rather better inside and outside.

But carry on with your promotiion, seen here many times. Amusing...........

I have been playing with a number of dish options in Surin. The Sat guy near the Farang Connection is very good, and also speaks a little bit of English.

I have a 7 foot steer dish, that goes from Pas 8 to Pas 7 for Free to Air. Pas 8 carries ABC Asia, and as you scan across the sky you can get BBC News, CNN Al Jazerra, Russia Today, NHK English etc etc, on a number of Satellites all for free.

The really impostant thing is you need to know a little about Satellites , their positions etc and then you can enjoy for more the free services. Movable dishes are not perfect, but they will offer you a good choice.

A moveable package typically would be 15 - 20 k Baht.

Gdau khutan,

I am interesed in getting PAS 8 but have been told by the guy that installed my dynasat dish that it cant be done. Surely if you are in Surin and I am in Ubon I should be able to get this satellite. Where can I find out some info to realign my sat dish to pick up this PAS 8 sat.

Sezzo

Cheers

I have been playing with a number of dish options in Surin. The Sat guy near the Farang Connection is very good, and also speaks a little bit of English.

I have a 7 foot steer dish, that goes from Pas 8 to Pas 7 for Free to Air. Pas 8 carries ABC Asia, and as you scan across the sky you can get BBC News, CNN Al Jazerra, Russia Today, NHK English etc etc, on a number of Satellites all for free.

The really impostant thing is you need to know a little about Satellites , their positions etc and then you can enjoy for more the free services. Movable dishes are not perfect, but they will offer you a good choice.

A moveable package typically would be 15 - 20 k Baht.

I have had PSI for some years and never had any problem. I live in Buri Ram province near Lam Plai mat.

We paid a once off fee of about Bt16,000 and that included a large screen TV set, setting up the huge moving dish, receiver box and access to about 200 channels (8 satellites) Most channels are in Chinese, Arabic or Indian but i do get BBC, Australian network (The old ABC) and about 10 english speaking channels plus about 10 Thai channels.

I don't watch much TV but like to see the evening news on Australia network and BBC. ESPN is in Chinese but then I am quite happy to watch car or motorbike racing, tennis, football etc. without commentary.

On two occasions after a storm we have lost the signal because the dish has moved and the guy will come and set it up again for a couple hundred baht.

Happy new year to all my old friends on here

Bicko,

so the exterior walls were reinforced concrete block....

1. How thick were the blocks?

100mm hollow blocks

2. What was the spacing on the rebar both for the verticles and horizontals?

Verts either side of each opening and then 1 metre centres and in 300mm from each corner, full height and tied into the footing.

One horizontal bar at about 600mm above floor level and a second bar above openings

Were the verts grouted into the hollows of the blocks?

Verts passed through the hollows of the blocks and hollows were progressively filled with a sand/ cement slurry

Were the hors grouted into the hollows of the blocks with ends knocked out?

The blocks are purpose made with a groove to accept the horizontal bar.

3. Was a strip foundation built under the entire block wall?.

Concrete strip footings were cast under the walls. Strip footings were cast on top of 600mm deep stone grouted foundations in most instances - depending on soil conditions.

..was the floor slab reinforced at the perimetre to serve as a foundation for the block walls?

One full layer of mesh in the floor 50mm from the bottom membrane lapped into the footing

4. Why did you use a steel internal frame?...just to hold up the gyprock?

Yes - quicker and cheaper and these were non load bearing walls. The roof is full width steel trusses.Chownah

What I want to know is what is the cost, say for an internal wall of this ....steel frame, pu foam, plaster board and paint, compared to ....superblock, render and paint per square meter.

The last 2,500 houses were built with core filled, deformed bar reinforced, hollow concrete block outer walls and steel frame, gyprock clad internal walls. We used steel framing in the roof, single length pressed roof sheeting and CFC infill panels in the gable ends. Floors were concrete and ceilings gyprock. All internal and external surfaces were primed and then given two finishing coats of paint. The house was fully wired with GPO's and lights in every room and a power meter. The bathroom had a fibreglass 100 litre aung naam (Mandy in Indonesia)and squat toilet, plastic door and fully lined to 1.2 metres with ceramic tiles. The septic tank system consisted of a primary tank, a grey water tank and then an overflow into a gravel filled concrete open topped, below ground level tank with vegetation to transpire off the water. The total cost of this house averaged US$12,000 across about 25 contracts.

These houses were built to a very high standard and complied with Australian/US building codes.

The cost of steel framed internal walls is about 60% of concrete filled external block walls. Hope that helps you and others MrSquiggle.

I would also like to repeat a statement that i made earlier for the benefit of the knockers. If someone had come to me with a full steel frame kit a couple of years ago i would have used it without hesitation. I have built many steel framed buildings in Afghanistan. Pakistan, East timor and Australia and it is the way to go for efficient, quick and sound buildings. Maybe not an architectural masterpiece but highly recommended and suited to earthquake and storm prone areas.

Happy New year Bpriam and enjoy your very good house mate.

I have taken my Thai wife to Australia 3 times over the last 5 years and prior to us getting married. We have never experienced any difficulties and found the Australian Embassy visa staff to be very helpful and courteous.

When I submitted her application I included a photocopy of our return air tickets and a current bank statement. I advised that we intended to stay some time with each of my grown up daughters from my late wife.

On the first two ocassions we applied for and were granted a single entry 3 month visa. On the third time they granted a multi entry 6 month visa although we only asked for 3 months so doing the right thing obviously counts. Also on the third ocassion we needed the visa on short notice as my Mother had passed away. A senior Officer met us at the front gate of the Embassy and we had my wifes visa within a couple of hours and flew out that same day.

Have a look at the Bangkok Australian embassy website. They do have a couple of times a week when you can make an appointment and go in and discuss your visa needs.

Is this more for chickens to live in??

See my earlier post about the OP and the recommended supplier Same Same...

Wire.....Foam....prefabricated plastic??

One guy chose to knock and ridicule everything that has been said. That speaks for itself

Joe

Under all connections on the roof is a 35cm strip of flashing, plus a foam insert that is formed and glued to the surfaces. The ends of the roof is also curled up to add protection is all else fails. At the ends of the roof I still have to install the gutters. I will try to find you a photo of the layers of the roof.

I also questioned at first. But after completed I am more then happy. We used a pressure washer to spray to the joint and no water entered the build

I used foam only in the outer walls because it allows me to completely seal my house and accoustic batt in the interior walls just to deal with sound from room to room. The foam was sprayed at 75mm thickness to walls and roof, I will also add some extra accoustic batt the the roof/ceiling to help with sound from the 6am news broadcast station 100m away. Walls are completely filled so no more sound dampening can be added.

As for the wires, They are just ruffed in right now and will be cleaned up before ceiling is added.

Are the silver spiral tubes conduits for the electrical cables. If yes that is an excellent idea because I have seen PVC pipe eaten by rats.

Also termites will enter conduits and eat cable. It is a good idea to block the open ends with a hard setting 2 part epoxy and mix in some termite killer powder when you do the 2 part mix.

Did you get the new style license with magnetic strip and both Thai/English language?

This one is well worth knowing.

Initially you will be issued with a 1 year driving license. When that expires and providing you have not had any problems you will automatically be issued with a 5 year license. Here is the tricky bit which i still do not understand but I love LOS so accept whatever comes my way. You must wait until after the license has expired before applying for a renewal. If you apply before expiry they will only give you another 12 months. If you wait until after expiry, say 5 days, you will receive a 5 year license. Effectively you will be an unlicensed driver for a few days. I do suggest that you don't leave it too long!!!

Well its now time to expand my Topic and report on village life in Petchabun:

There is a great divide in the Khmer culture and Central Thai culture: (This is my personal observation)

Now that I am living in Petchabun wife my friends for the time being, immediately I have found that the people are more friendly and the culture is softer. I get the impression of a more genuine friendliness when people greet you and there is more social caring, this view is only my view and based on living in my village in Issan for nearly three years : This does not mean this is a blanket statement ;

Let me clarify my comments : There are Issan people that although born in a Khmer village move away and work elsewhere for a long time then they experience the Thai Culture as apposed to Khmer culture:

My view now is Khmer culture very abrasive and hard where as the Thai Culture is much softer and cleaner for want of a better expression , certainly up here in Petchabun I have experienced.

You can walk through the village here and local folks greet you and immediately ask you to there house and the welcome is very warm and genuine, and you don't get people asking for beer immediately.

But then this part of Thailand is more prosperous than Issan and local folks are more enterprising when it comes to farming of course bearing in mind the climate here is different

Your observations about sub cultures within Thailand are interesting. Until you talked about this i had no idea that we had Khmer people in our province but of course it makes perfect sense as we are so close to the Cambodian border and of course some will be the descendants of the original population of Phanom Rung, Muang tam and Phimai.

You've met my wife and will be aware that she is a smart, switched on lady and also very caring and gentle and yet we live just 30 or 40 kms from your previous abode. The people in our village are not Khmer and I experience life in pretty much the same way that you have described where you are now. I am treated with the greatest of respect and often invited into peoples homes for a drink or to share food when i am out walking or riding my bike. If people see me mowing the lawn they will come in and start cutting or raking and so on without asking and have no expectations of a handout when we are finished.

Sawai tells me that she is of Lao descent but a long time ago and she does speak Lao, as well as Thai, English and Indonesian.

However to add some reality to the story i am pleased that her old man had passed away before i came along. Apparently he spent a large part of his life in the Buri Ram lockup. One brother-in-law who lives close to us has a huge scar on his midriff where the old bloke shot him with a shotgun for belting up his missus and one of my wife's suitors from many years ago when she was a teenager has a scar across the back of his head where the old fella hit him with a bush knife for similar reasons!!!!!

So he didn't muck around when it came to protecting his daughters not that i ever have or ever will put a hand on my wife in anger but it certainly would have been a threat to have the old bloke lurking in the background.

Sawai and I and my 22 year old grandson Nathan will be in your area early in the NY so will contact you and catch up for a beer or two.I plan to take him up your way and also to look at Sukothai. It must be pretty cool in the highlands near Petchabun this time of year.

Cheers mate and have a good Christmas and New Year. We have booked in to Martins for Xmas lunch.

Mornin tru Bicko! Yu save tok pisin gut tumas!

Mi na meri na piccinini meri blong mi stap finis long New Britain and Niu Ailan long faipela yias, me wok finis wantaim Ausaid....

But that's just about the extent of my tok pisin....back to tok ples....

Thanks for your reply - it'd be good to meet you sometime. I've been following another forum where you mentioned building the Tindall airbase - and we are now living in Katherine! The wet arrived two days ago - you'll remember what a relief that is!

If you'd like to meet up around New Year sometime, PM me a phone number and I'll be in touch when we are in Thailand. Otherwise I'm sure we'll catch up when we move to Thailand for good.

Lukim yu!

Wontok

I have been with Catholic Relief Services (CRS-US) for several years and worked with CARE Australia in ET.

My contract is finally finished (until the next situation-you know what i mean) and I fly home to Bangkok and then drive to Buri Ram next Monday. My wife accompanies me on my postings. She went home 2 weeks ago to supervise the rice harvesting on our farms near Lam Plai mat.

Yes i loved Katherine and i know a lot of people there. A lot of the old timers are ex PNG. We were there 86 to 91 and I did a lot of Barramundi fishing. If you catch up with an old Aboriginal bloke named Billy Harney please give him my regards. He lives in Katherine and runs a refuge for orphaned Aboriginal kids. Great man.

Look out for the salt water crocs in Katherine. Years ago we had a huge flood which was a metre deep in the main street and we had a couple of salty's in the main street looking for lunch.

Will PM my phone number.

While I was having lunch outside the house with some local boys in Amphor Si Bun Ruaeng, Nong Bua Lamphu in mid-November one of them spotted a snake in a palm about twenty meters from us. It was probably 20-25 feet up a large coconut palm and I didn't see it move the entire time. It was probably about one meter in length or a bit more, and judging by the pictures in the earlier link (thank you!) I thought it might have been a green pit viper.

Two shots of it with my telephoto lense:

I got the expected response from the teelack about whether it was poisonous/non-poisonous :

"If it bite you, you die for sure!"

Any guesses gentlemen?

I moved my car just to be on the safe side, since I was parked only feet from the base of the tree!

~WISteve

Wise to move your car. It is not uncommon in Australia for snakes to get up into the engine compartment at night to keep warm and then be transported to the next destination- if they don't get caught up in the fan and wreck your fan belt.

Glad to have u.

Are u in the city or one of the many villages in the area. I am just a few clicks from Huairat,Which is about 15 clicks from Buriram on the East side.

I asked the same spelling question and you will find all of the spelling in use. Forum spell checker uses Buriram.

I am also searching for a supply of DVDS, English have a few leads and when i make it to town will PM u with address and or phone number of store. Not for certain that info can be given in an open forum.

Do welcome u and hope to see u.

Hi Ron, thanks for that welcome message and please let me know how you get on with the DVD's

We are living in Ban Talat Pho, not far from Lam Plai Mat (15/20 minutes), Buriram takes 30/40 minutes, we are renting a house and will start building a home May/June next year.

Regards for now

Mike

Cheers

Finally we are getting ready to move to Thailand. After years in Australia and PNG we (wife, five year old daughter and me) should be moving to Roi Et sometime next year. Seems like we've been getting ready for this for ever! But this time we'll be there only for two weeks just after Christmas, and it'd be good to meet any of you Roi Et folks who are around then. My wife's family are in town and we usually stay with them, but this year their place is full so we'll be in a hotel, probably the Roi Et City which always seems an OK place that could do with a few more customers. (The wife's always very keen to give our money to someone who's business is struggling!). The family have also have a small house in their yard which we'll use when we finally make the move, and eventually we'll be building our own place - we have a few rai ready and waiting. So, I hope there's a few of you there to have a beer with?

cheers for now

Wontok

We live in Buri ram province but have family in Roi-et.

My late wife and I and our daughters lived in PNG for 12 years pre-independence so i am lapoon too much but me got gutpela savvy!!!

2 pela picanniny belong me bai he camup long Mary belong me long haus sick Pt Moresby.

If you are in the Uk & need to send money often then getting a nationwide account & posting over the cash card will save you a lot of money in the long run as withdrawals from overseas are free.

This is what I have done, I opened another account with Nationwide My GF has the card and I manage the account on line. (Free withdrawels with good rates)

/quote]

Great advice Tafia.

I've been using travelex.

Depending on how much you're sending you pay a fee (I've been paying AUD$25.00).

Then I give them Australian Dollars which they convert to US Dollars and then transfer to the gf's account.

That's when a further conversion takes place to Thai Baht.

GF's bank then charges her 300 baht for their end of the transaction.

Lose AUD$25.00 fee.

Lose on conversion to US$'s.

Lose 300 baht on Thai bank fee.

I just looked into your opening up a new savings account with an ATM card as you described.

Costs are:

Free Savings account.

Overseas ATM Withdawal = AUS$4.00 plus 2% of withdrawal amount.

GF gets cash.

Much cheaper than Travelex.

I'm headed to my bank tomorrow.

This morning I transferred this amount from my Australian bank account to my Bangkok Bank account. Fee was AU$30.00 by my Australian bank and no fee by Bangkok bank. I received better than 1% above todays quoted Australian dollar/Baht exchange rate on Yahoo finance and OANDA.

I withdraw at the ATM at my own branch of the Bangkok Bank and there is no fee.

i feel very safe

matt

Please, do not bring Yank culture to Isaan, thank you.

Cheers

jb

Someone should send him home to his Mum and tell him to put his toys away, buy a shirt and grow up.

Glad to have u.

Are u in the city or one of the many villages in the area. I am just a few clicks from Huairat,Which is about 15 clicks from Buriram on the East side.

I asked the same spelling question and you will find all of the spelling in use. Forum spell checker uses Buriram.

I am also searching for a supply of DVDS, English have a few leads and when i make it to town will PM u with address and or phone number of store. Not for certain that info can be given in an open forum.

Do welcome u and hope to see u.

What on earth is a stick built house? i have worked in the construction industry for more than 50 years and I have never heard this term used.

why bother with "cheap" construction methods better suited to the Australian Outback?

Ahh, ignorance is a bliss & a curse.

Only a Pom could come out with a pearl like that.

There's an old saying in the outback that if you stand still long enough the white ants will eat the soles off your boots. They demolish timber structures in no time. They will even eat through electrical cable heavy duty plastic conduits.

These steel or aluminium frame buildings that we built back in the 80's are still going strong, they are clean, comfortable and with ceiling fans and insulated walls and ceilings are certainly cooler than being outside in 45degree ++ temperatures.

In more recent years (2002 up to the tsunami) i worked in Afghanistan building schools and clinic and we had a British engineer who came up with the idea of building a steel frame building, complete with internal and external cladding and then to simulate traditional buildings to put 50 cms (1.5 feet for the Americans) of the normal straw/mud mixture all over it to insulate it and make it look like a traditional local building. At least the Taliban couldn't burn them down!!!!

what's the cost per square meter?

Yeah, what's the cost per square metre? The unanswered question....wonder why?