teevee

Gormley glass might to do it even though they mainly do commercial jobs.

Looking to lease 100 - 150 talang wah for 10 years for small office/warehouse.

Must be within 10 km of Ban Chang in any direction. 

Preferably on a main or good road. 

5 years up-front lease payment for the right land at the right price.

I asked around a few months ago and ended up contacting a german guy who ended up doing an outstanding and quite complicated (changed out 3 phase consumer unit) job for me at what I thought was a fair price.

Contact is Plattek Reinhard on Line

I need a small Backhoe (“machro” in Thai) to remove a 3m + 3m x 0.3 m concrete slab in the corner of my garden - and take away the rubble.

Even one of the small ones should be able to do it from the street so its not a big or complicated job -and its just too much to do it by hand.

Any contacts would be appreciated - I see them occasionally on the back of a truck or on a trailer behind a pick-up but lately have not seen one that I can pull over and molest ????

thanks 

We moved from BKK 2-1/2 years ago and now live on Eastern Sta in Vintage 1 Village. The  rental rates here are around 35,000 for a three bedroom house. The village is very well maintained and very quiet.

Currently there are two houses with rental signs (including telephone numbers) in the village and I assume its the owners as no agent mentioned - rents may be more negotiable right now. so its probably worth a drive down here and call the owners - thats exactly how we got this house although we ended up buying instead of renting.

My 14 year old son goes to Garden and loves it.

Susco,

Thanks very much, I’ll give it a try and actually know exactly where to go to get the batteries done.

as for the other reply ???

Does anybody in the Pattaya / Rayong area service the Zodiac SWC. 

Mine is 12 years old with a 2 year old cell and rund fine except that it loses its time / timer settings whenever there is a power cut. 

From what I have read its very likely that the “backup battery” inside the enclosure is dead. The problem started a few weeks ago after several long power cuts (2hrs+).

I don't feel competent to rip it apart and change the back-up battery as the manual - and ab Australian forum - says they are soldered in.and not particularly easy to change.

Right now am running it on an external timer but still will not start without going out to press the start button but it does stop on the external timer - also chlorine production reverts to 10% so have to jack that up as well.

Any advice or help would be appreciated.

Thanks

Molasses is a fixture of my pantry, have bought this very good Australian brand at Villa many times over the years.

Does anyone have a recommendation regarding use of an AntiVirus/Malware app on my Mac and iPhone. I have used Mac and iPhone and iPad for the past 15 years and never felt the need to have additional protection but my online bank account was recently hacked (big reputable international bank in Bangkok) and I think it may be time to beef up my security.

I have used them for 3 years with one claim handled very well. To date for me, a very good outfit.

Their app is worth having as it reports the location - very useful if uour Thai is not very good.

I had my Macbook repaired last year by Pattaya2U (at their shop near the Tukcom car park) and they did a good job at a good price. Also, my son recently had his Acer notebook repaired under warranty at JIB in Central Festival and they did a good job and he (14 years old) was very impressed by the very helpful techs at JIB. 

So both places worth considering . . . 

My 13 year old son goes to GIS and loves the school and his diverse mix of friends at the school (he went to a BKK british curriculum school for 8 years before we moved from BKK).

I personally looked hard at all the local international schools and choosing GIS 2 years ago has worked out very well. Based on the last 2 years, I think its a very good school with some great teachers.

Its worth pointing out that both the Head of School and Head of Secondary are both leaving at the end of this academic year which is pretty strange and a bit of a worry but time will tell.

As for fees, for this past year for Year 9 the fees were +/- 140K per term for 3 terms per year. 

Also worth noting, I prefer GIS’s IB programme for years 12 / 13 over the A Levels at most of the other British Curriculum schools. 

I need to relocate the 3 phase consumer unit in my new house as 1) its underneath the stairs and you have to crawl 3 meters on hands and knees to get to it and 2) its a Square D Load center with 18 ways of which 4 are doubled up. I also need to upgrade by installing an RCBO.

It seems to me there are two ways of doing this,

1. buy a new Square D 3 phase 63 amp 24 way load center along with a new 3 phase 63 amp Safe T Cut RCBO and install both on a convenient wall about 3 meters from the existing load center.

2. buy 3 new 63 amp (50 amp ?) 8 or 10 way single phase consumer units and use one for each phase, installed together on a convenient wall about 3 meters from the existing load center. I was at Global House this morning and single phase 63 amp consumer units with RCBO and 10 MCBs (16, 24 and 32amps) are readily available. 

 I do not want to re-locate the existing Square D load center as that will mean at least 2 days without power whereas installing a new one will mean a few hours without power. Also, I’ll keep the Main breaker in the existing load center so you can isolate the house with one breaker. 

The cost of the 63 amp single phase consumer units ranges from 2,500 to 4,000 baht - my choice would be a Siemens unit as opposed to other “unknown to me” brands like Racer, CEO etc even though they appear to be OK. 

the cost will be about the same for either option but I think the second option will be the is most effective with three separate RCBOs so if one trips I still have the other two phases working. I will need to “balance” the three separate phases but thats easy enough to do and really involves no extra work.

Any comments and/or advice appreciated . .. 

The only short crust pastry I make these days is Rose Levy Beranbuam’s cream cheese pastry. Just google it and you’ll find the recipe. Easy to make, very easy to roll out and very tasty, cant adk for more . . . 

I am re-plumbing my pump room and cant find any plastic high pressure 45 degree 40 mm elbows anywhere around Pattaya / Ban Chang including two Home Pros, two Thai Watsadu, and Megahome). They all have the low pressure (drain pipe) elbows but not the high pressure elbow.

Pretty strange but thats the situation so would appreciate it if anyone could help. I tried to order online from Thai Pipe but they wanted a 600 baht delivery charge for two elbows and thats far too much. 

I may use the low pressure elbow and see if it holds up as pump pressure is only 10 psi ?

I have two comfortable old teak Planters Chairs and I need to replace the rattan which has broken on both chairs.  Does anyone know any place where they make / repair traditional rattan ? (We had the rattan replaced in Bangkok 15 years ago at a shop in Jatujak Market but live in Ban Chang now so would prefer somewhere local).

Was driving south from Pattaya along Sukhumvit the other day and saw a really good looking beach buggy on the back of a truck (it looked brand new). From a quick glance, it looked like a VW based beach buggy kit car and it occurred to me that it would be a pretty useful way of getting around - safer than a motor bike and nearly as much fun. 
Anybody know if it could have been built / available in LOS ? 

Rengboon Auto In Bangkok is a good place to start. The workshop/showroom is on Pattanakarn Soi 35 and is always worth a visit as typically there are 20+ classic cars undergoing restoration and 10+ classic cars stored there. The owner is Khun Yo, an extremely nice guy who speaks fluent english and is both passionate and knowledgable about classic cars. He typically has and/or knows of a few cars for sale. Additionally, he is the best man in the kingdom to talk to if you want a classic car and are prepared to pay the Thai price for same (the cost of classic cars here is most certainly well above that in the UK, US and Oz).

We have lived in "early" Ramkamhaeng (Soi 43/1) for 13 years and like it very much, particularly these days as loads of good new restaurants and good small malls have opened in the past 5 years. Also two very good British Curriculum schools very close (good thing); Triall School and the Singapore International School. Our 6 year old goes to Triall, which I consider to be an excellent school by any standards, and the cost is quite a bit less than other similar schools in Bangkok. Not too many farangs (good thing) can be time consuming getting to Sukhumvit at peak traffic times (bad thing) but we dont need to so it really does not matter. Also easy access to the expressways (good thing). The boats along Klong Sam Saep are good for travel into Sukhumvit, cheap and run every +/- 15 minutes from 05.30 - 21.00 hrs every day. Rents are probably quite a bit cheaper than most other parts of central Bangkok but choice is limited so finding what you want may take quite a bit of time.

However, "late" Ramkamhaeng is another matter entirely as the traffic on Ramkamhaeng is always very busy/very slow so getting to/from home would be a nightmare.

I lived in Ram soi 65 gor a few years.

Great place to love if you are young and single with all the uni girls. Most of the Ram uni ones are very friendly, coming from Isarn. The Abac ones are not so.

Great for the Mall Bangkapi. Klong saen saeb is great for getting into pratunam.

Much better than Bang na, and cheaper.

No RAM is NOT better than Bangna, at least not in year 2013 anymore. I lived at Ram near Lamsalee for 6 years, and while I enjoyed to live at the end of a dead-end-road-Soi in a surprisingly quiet environment, I really got p*ssed off with the traffic in the end. Plus the area is prone to flooding, and during rainy season, my Soi was flooded every other day, so no Saloon Car or Taxi could go to / from the building I stayed at. only a 4WD or truck. taking public transport could take hours in the evening to get back home, the entire RAM road is stop-and-go for hours. Even though the non-Farang-surrounding was quite pleasant, I decided to move to Bangna and did not regret. Bangna is developing at a fast pace, with shopping and dining options popping up every month. Even though the distance to downtown - let's say SIAM Square - is not less than from my Soi at RAM, it is much much easier to get there, and, even more important, get back home. The Bus never takes longer than 12-15 minutes to the UDOMSUK BTS STATION, even though I am at KM 7 of Bangna-Trat Road. Plenty of shopping and good Supermarkets around ( 2 x Big C, 1 x Tesco, 2 x TOPS, 1 x Villa), and Mega Bangna in particular is a pleasant low-story-place of a Mall with plenty of nice Resto's and Pubs / Wine-Bars, where you could easily spend a full day - plus it has IKEA if that's your kind of thing (mine it is not). Suvernabhumi is very easy to access, as are High-/Motorways to any given direction. Plenty of new Condos are being built now in this area (Lumpineeville, for example), so this area will even improve further in the future, no doubt about it. And for kids it is certainly much much better as well....Several international schools are in the vicinity (Suk Soi 107, Bangna Trat around KM 3 and at Soi Parkland). I was wondering if I would like it here in Bangna, but I wouldn't wanna go back to cramped and overcrowded Ramkhamhaeng.

My dealings with the Australian Embassy and the Visa Section have always been pretty easy as they are very approachable and straightforward. Dont leave any blanks - put "unknown but approximately xxx" and I'm sure they will sort it out without anyy hassles.

I understand the problem as I've spent two years planning our house and looking at numerous builders. We finally chose a small Bangkok-based builder who was introduced by friends who worked in Phuket for a long time as the project manager on some major jobs prior to starting his own company a few years ago. The builder, his right hand man and myself have designed the house (no architect) and the very impressive 3D software they have used has made that pretty easy.

As for speaking English 1) that's not going to happen with the builder we have (we speak Thai) but his wife speaks reasonable English and she helps run the business as well as being the interior designer and 2) thats rule out a Phuket-based builder we very nearly used who built a friend's house and did a great job on it.

We intend to start building on a headland in Kamala in a month or two so feel free to pm me if you want to talk as the house design and builder are critical decisions and Thailand (like other places) is full of horror stories of jobs that went seriously wrong.

I've eaten there many times and, in my opinion, the food is great (based on many years of indulgence in good Tex-Mex food in Houston & San Antonio) and the quality consistent.

In simple terms, its worth a visit even if that includes driving across Bangkok like we have to.

See below for two specific "older" condos which are well managed, and in good condition, als much bigger than most new dinky condos. The prices are accurate and current to the best of my knowledge but its a buyer's market so may be less.

Asok Towers on Asok +/- 260 m2 for +/- 15 million baht

Tower 33 just of Sukhumvit 33 +/- 320 m2 for +/- 16 million baht