richardt1808

Good morning all,

On the weekend, one of the breakers in our house tripped and on opening the panel, I realised it is not a straightforward case of an appliance tripping a breaker. As you can see from the pic, the wire from the second (20A) breaker has actually fried and the insulation has melted. This indicates to me that the heat was coming from the breaker itself, and not a short elsewhere in the wiring. Any opinions from electrical gurus on this ?

Background info: Although the breaker is rated at 20A, the only things running on the entire circuit was a 42" LCD TV, a cable TV set-top-box and two lamps. The house was built by a very reputable Thai building company 4 years ago and we have been in it since day one. The wiring is very professional - European style with proper earthing on all circuits. Do I just replace the breaker and see if everything runs okay ? (obviously we will need to trim the burned section of wire and feed it so that it reaches the breaker).

Thanks for any ideas !

In my opinion, you cant go wrong with Honda in Thailand. The dear network and standard of service is excellent, and Honda have the top resale value. For a family run-about, going second hand will save you a ton of money and you will be able to 'buy-up' in terms of features.

Look at unseencar(dot)com and you will find plenty of one-or two year old cars there at significantly cheaper prices than new models.

The actual fees charged by the Labour department have already been given in a post above. However, many companies use agents or Lawyers to execute all of the required steps as it is a very time-consuming process with loads of documents required and many hours standing in queues. My company has HR staff who are well qualified and able to all of the tasks, but because of the pure time involved, we prefer to just pay an agent to do the job as it saves a lot of headaches and many of the agents have a good relationship with the officials concerned so things just go smoother.

Any reputable company would not pass this charge back to their staff as it is a tax-deductable expense for the business, but many companies don't seem to have a problem with doing it. It is not illegal, and since you have already agreed to the deduction, you don't have much recourse now. Fees are not refundable, so the short answer to your question is, no.

It's all very well blaming the drivers - and I agree that drivers in Thailand are amongst the worst in the world. But, a lot of the blame also goes to:

1. The police for never enforcing traffic laws

2. The metropolitan authority. Many crossings don't have any warning signs or traffic lights.

3. Idiotic pedestrians themselves, who simply don't bother to keep a lookout when they are crossing.

I have taken some time to read your post and also your replies to some of the other posts.

I see a big inconsistency in your story: On the one hand you say that you are simply 'helping' your gf and that she has the skills and ability to do the job; and that you will just be providing guidance and money. BUT you are the one posting all the questions on this forum, and it is clear that actually your gf does NOT have the skills and ability for this, or else she would have done the research already and she would have the answers for you.

It is clear that you are an essential part of this business plan because you are the one doing the research and will be the one who does a lot of the planning and important duties for the proper running of this business. You are not permitted to do any of this on a Tourist visa - you will require a work-permit. Note: even unofficially 'helping' your gf would be considered as work, so it is a must. Any suspicion on the part of immigration that you are in fact working, while pretending to be here as a tourist will result in you being denied entry, or possibly being deported if you are found to be working, so if you have serious intentions about stable future here, you will seriously need to make sure that you have the correct visas and work permits. And no, just being married to a Thai does not automatically entitle you to this. I think that the visa issue is going to be more of a problem for you than the business side, so you need to factor this in your planning.

In order to get a work-permit, you or your girlfriend will need to establish a Thai registered company and employ the required number of staff. Then you can apply for a work permit, either as a company manager or director. If I remember correctly, the actual job of 'Tour Guide' is a restricted occupation in Thailand, so you would need to make sure that your job description is something more to do with company admin etc.

Best of luck

It doesn't matter what the vehicle type is, one of the golden rules for highway driving is that one should, at all times, try to match the speed of the cars around you. When we are all travelling at a similar speed, the risk of running into a slower vehicle is much lower. That is why minimum speeds are also enforced in most first-world countries. There is nothing more dangerous than a stationary or slow moving car on a highway.

Now, also factor that a cyclist is totally unprotected. In the case of an accident with a car or truck, there is nothing between his body and 10 tons of fast moving metal, except a cycling vest and a plastic helmet. One mistake and you're dead.

It just takes just a second of lost concentration on the part of a truck driver for his vehicle to move a few centimeters into the other lane - and those cyclists are all toast!

Whether or not Thai traffic law permits them to use a highway instead of the frontage road, I'm not 100% sure, but what I am 100% sure of, is that if they valued their lives, they would be as far away from the main highway as possible. Forget about the frontage road even - take the scenic route; enjoy the views and arrive alive.

In my opinion, the key point is not so much the fact that the car wasn't assembled in Thailand, but rather that you have on your hands what is now a 10 year-old car, and it stands to reason that maintenance costs will begin to kick in and escalate. From this point on, the longer you keep it, the less value it will have and the harder it will be to eventually sell it when you are ready to buy something new. The fact that it is an import, only exacerbates the maintenance costs involved and if it were me, I would definitely be looking to replace it.

Honda has an excellent re-sale value in Thailand and you should have no problem selling it on the second-hand market and buying something new, or at least newer. I sold my 7 year old car a few months back by advertising on Taladrod (dot) com which is a website for private sellers. I got 300,000 more than what the dealer was offering as a trade-in, so I was able to get a new Honda for cash.

beTV was showing absolute rubbish and unlimited repeats. Anything new would be a step up!

Go to RC Groups here: www.rcgroups.com/forums/index.php

Scroll down to the forum called Multirotor Talk and spend a week reading up as much as possible.

You can probably pick up a Phantom 1 or Phantom 2 off ebay for around 500$ and there are plenty of camera gimbals sold separately too. The video from Phantoms is borderline professional if edited well, so that may do it for you. Post your questions in one of those threads and you will get advice from plenty of guys who spend a lot of time on this hobby. If you go to the DJI website, you will find loads of videos and tutorials too which will give you plenty to think about before you part with your money.

Go to RC Groups here: www.rcgroups.com/forums/index.php

Scroll down to the forum called Multirotor Talk and spend a week reading up as much as possible.

You can probably pick up a Phantom 1 or Phantom 2 off ebay for around 500$ and there are plenty of camera gimbals sold separately too. The video from Phantoms is borderline professional if edited well, so that may do it for you. Post your questions in one of those threads and you will get advice from plenty of guys who spend a lot of time on this hobby. If you go to the DJI website, you will find loads of videos and tutorials too which will give you plenty to think about before you part with your money.

I have several of these for various types of video work. The first thing to realise is that it is a very expensive little hobby. The costs do not only relate to the copter itself, there are also batteries, battery chargers, test equipment for when faults occur - and they occur often. You also need tools and spare parts for when crashes occur - and they occur often.

As a rule of thumb, the value of equipment on the ground, will more or less equal the value of the equipment that is actually in the air. Depending on your technical skills, you will have to balance two things: a) buying a ready-made and all inclusive kit, or buying or building something more modular, with interchangeable parts. Option a is initially easier and perhaps cheaper, but option b will be far and away more cost-effective in the future as you will always be able to upgrade, make repairs and swap out pieces of gear.

My advice to someone who has never flown an RC model before: buy something cheap that you wouldn't mind damaging and eventually throwing away; and use it to hone your flying skills until you can control it well, no matter whether it is flying away from you or towards you. There is flight simulator software available which is very useful, but that's another cost for you. After you are comfortable with you little cheap one, then you can move to your more expensive piece of kit with more confidence and with much less risk of crashing it it on your first flight.

One final note is that this is really a two-man hobby, especially if you plan to take serious video. Many flyers have an actual two person set-up where one person does the flying, and a second person does the camera work and this requires two radio transmitters. Even with a single transmitter, you really do need a buddy to keep an eye on where you are flying in relation to buildings and people, and generally for keeping a look-out. In the event of a crash or un-planned descent due to a faulty battery, you as the pilot will need your eyes on the controls and it is very easy to lose sight of your craft in a brief moment of panic. Aside from those obvious things, just having a second pair of hands for carrying all the flight-cases, camera's, chargers, video goggles etc is a must.

Best of luck

MLB is available on Fox Sports

That's really open-ended...

There is a fairly steep learning curve with Logic Pro, but Apple provides extensive support online, including tutorial videos. As with most things in life, if you want to reap the benefits, you need to put in the time to study it. I'd suggest watching the many tutorial videos as a start and work through the example songs they give you.

Dashboard rattles are notoriously hard to fix; and common sense tells us that the only way to pinpoint the source, is to drive the car. A Honda City should be getting around 10-15km per litre; so that's what, about 50 Baht in petrol ? If it were me, I'd cut them some slack on the driving part.

I've driven 3 models of Honda for years here and had nothing but excellent service from Honda thanon Sri Ayutthaya. It's a warranty repair, so maybe you should try a different branch.

Hi,

The music functions and radio all work great - just plug in your ipod. For phonecalls, you can connect your phone via bluetooth and it will also use Siri's voice commands. However, according to the US Honda website, the navigation function only works in the US. I'm loathe to fork out 60 $ to check whether it does, in fact, work here.

Cheers

Hi,

I took one of my Landlords to court for a measly 20,000 deposit which they didn't want to return. The Lawyer cost me 10,000; and although it was half of what I was owed, the satisfaction of having the judge deliver the verdict and then being able to watch the stingy bastards counting out the cash in front of the court was worth a million bucks.

See a lawyer and sue. They cannot deduct anything for normal wear and tear and if they don't have receipts or proof that they actually incurred real costs to repair your 'damages', then they have to return the full deposit to you, less any unpaid utilities.

Good luck

What a totally rubbish article. In fact, why did Admin even bother to quote it ??

Two options:

1. If all of your clients are outside of Thailand and you receive all your payments outside of Thailand then you may consider locating the business in your home country. You could do your design work in your own private room and not have to worry about opening an actual office here. I'm sure that a lot of Journalists or others who do 'online' work do things this way. Obviously, you then will not have a work permit, so you would need another reason to justify your visa here, so perhaps continue with some limited studies to get another ed visa. You would then need to find a way to get your living expenses transferred into Thailand, plus you would obviously have to worry about your tax payments back home. Not an ideal scenario as nothing is fixed and you can't keep living like a student forever.

2. This is the legal way. You will need to open a Thai company as described above. This requires at least 3 people as signatories and the foreign shareholding cannot be more than 49%. To qualify for a work permit, you will need offices, Thai staff and 4 Million Baht in registered capital if you are not married to a Thai. This is probably way beyond what you can afford to do at this point, but hey, if it was easy then everyone would be doing it !

What about owners of Samsung and Blackberry - don't they all have the same functions and get used by exactly the same demographic ??

You could get professional quality footage using a Blackmagic Pocket Cinema Camera, along with a digital recorder and you would absolutely not raise any eyebrows. No need to carry lights as the BMPCC can shoot in really low light with the right lens. Any place with indoor lighting would be fine and audiences have no problem watching indie-style film making as long as the camera is steady and audio is good. The biggest thing you would need to carry would be the tripod.

Hundreds of thousands of tourists are shooting video on the streets of Thailand every day and most of them post their videos on YouTube so no-one is going to have a problem with that response if you are asked any questions. If you are carrying a giant Red camera or something that requires loads of lights and other gear on a shoot as you describe, you are not doing it right.

Best of luck.

Yep, it needs a bit more detail. Chonburi is both a city and a province, so there are a lot of possibilities. Things don't bode well for this meeting already; given that there is a lack of basic English involved

Yes, the reply above is correct. The requirement for a WP does not depend on whether there is money involved or not; it is based on whether you are carrying out what the labour department defines as 'work'. Any kind of consulting, business meetings, giving business advice or even just signing company documents would be classed as doing work, so you have probably been 'working' illegally already...

Do a search for NPE. They are a component and AV retailer and have a branch in Ban Mor area. They do sell sensors, but perhaps not a very large range of them. Their staff are very knowledgeable, but don't speak English, so best have a Thai person go with you.

You can also check out http://www.es.co.th/index.asp

For this kind of dedicated item though, I'd personally prefer to order from overseas and ship it over. It does take a few days longer, but at least you will get exactly what you need without hours of walking around Ban Mor - only to find that they don't have everything in stock.

Cheers

Asking an advertising agency to shoot a corporate video is the most expensive way to go, and completely unnecessary for a start up. What you need is a local producer or production house.

For example, visit www.xstreamstudio.net These guys have done work for my company, which is a large telecom based in Bangkok.

For domestic flights, the carry on rules are often relaxed with regard to weight, size and liquids, and yes, the Thai interpretation of the 100ml rule, is that this refers to the size of the container, not the amount of liquid in it.

Generally speaking though, the rules in Thailand are the same as everywhere else on the planet - it's just that sometimes they are not as strictly enforced. TIT stands for the Tripura Institute of Technology but in Thailand it has another meaning which I'll leave you to discover on your own