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It's been 1.5 years since my renovation in Jun 2016. Well, any major disaster with any of the service providers or products? I'm glad to say that we have not encountered any major disaster. In fact, I can't really recall there were any minor hiccup.

To sum up,

• Our aircon system, Mitsubishi Starmex System 4 (MXY-4A28VA, MSY-GE24VA & MSY-GE10VA), is working pretty well since installation. I don't find the compressor to be noisy. In fact, I find it rather quiet when it's compared to my 10+ years old aircon system, haha... but seriously, I don't find it noisy as what some people had commented on forums. We felt rather cold in our bedroom even after we had set the air-con setting to Econo Cool, which was set at 26 degree celsius. The bedrooms were cooled down rather fast as we usually switched on the air-con for only 1 bedroom, at most 2 bedrooms concurrently. It didn't take very long to cool down the living room too and it can even get a bit cold with a crowd of more than 10 persons. Any problem with the workmanship? Well, we have past the 1 year workmanship warranty for half a year now and we have not contacted Harvest Aire during this 1.5 year, so what do you think?

• How's our electrical wiring so far? We had a minor incident whereby I had to climb up to reach the new circuit breaker to get back my electricity... I forgot what triggered it but it goes to show that the circuit breaker works, haha...

• What about carpentry works done by our ID? The platform, cupboards, display cabinets, doors, hinges, etc are still intact and working, phew... lol!

If you asked me would I recommend the service providers whom I previously engaged, I would honestly tell you yes for air-con and electrical, as for ID, err... (go figure out what this means, lol!) To be fair though, the ID was at least responsible enough to complete the renovation works that we engaged him to do so and within a challenging period of 4 weeks for most of the works to be done, except that he didn't make good the bedroom doors that his contractors had spoiled (still a bit sore on this, haha...). Well, still considered ourselves lucky to be able to move back to our nest that we can still live comfortably in.

Our Air Con Installation

Our new air cons piping was installed on on 17 Jun .The FCUs and compressor were supposed to be installed on 25 Jun but we had to postpone it as the FCU in MBR was supposed to be installed on this wall... 

Who caused this problem? Was it the electrician when he was removing the old wiring casing or was it the air con guy when he was drilling the hole where the fan coil was supposed to be installed? Anyway, we were not able to pin point the culprit and no point finding out whose fault is it, not as though the party at fault would make good... A good example is our ID himself, who isn't going to make good our bedroom doors that his guys had destroyed, which we are pretty sure about this as his contractors were the only ones who dismantled the doors when they were hacking the laminated flooring and laying of new floor tiles in the bedrooms. No one else has touched our bedroom doors! How irresponsible our ID is, right? Want to know who is our ID and the company name? Well, you're welcomed to email me at bunnybluey@yahoo(dot)com(dot)sg and I'll be glad to share more details with you!

We told our ID to get someone to repair it and we'll just pay for it, just like we're going to pay for new bedroom doors, hiaz... What exactly happened to the doors? Well, the bottom of the doors was bloated, probably soaked in some wet works or stuff as the contractors just anyhow chucked our doors. We should have taken photo of the doors when we saw them chucked in a corner of the bedrooms where hacking, cement, tiling works were done, and cautioned him that he would have to make good if our doors got spoilt but isn't he the PM whose supposed to oversee the whole renovation and prevent such thing from happening in the first place? We can only blame ourselves for trusting him too much, yes, indeed, we trusted him to give us sound advice and ensure that our renovation is in good hand, and our trust was taken for granted!

Sorry for deviating out of topic, need a venue to rant, haha... Coming back... the wall was repaired, yay!

We managed to arrange for the air cons to be installed on 9 Jul. This guy was the main installer of our FCUs and compressor that day. They are a team of 3 and this guy's brother is the boss of the installation company. They do installation mainly for the company that we bought our Starmex. Well, at least, they bother to take care of our carpentry by laying cardboard on it and also, sweep the area/room after they finished the installation, very very rare of a contractor who would clean up their mess!

Oh yay! We tested the air con in one of the bedrooms that very night, cold!!!

Now, here's to share some details. We engaged Harvest Aire to provide and install the air cons. It was recommended by a friend and she shared with me that she did not encounter any problem with the air cons after they had been installed for coming to 2 years, so it means installation wise should be fine, we pray that our installation will be fine too. Price wise, their quote was cheaper than the few air con installers you could find on Renotalk forum. Materials wise, we had requested for the better quality ones, e.g. G22 copper piping, 1/2 inch Armaflex Class '0' insulation, etc. Our experience with Harvest Aire wasn't that good in the beginning but we cleared our misunderstanding, and subsequently, we didn't really face any major issue with them. They would call the day before to reconfirm the installation and arrange timing with you, just that they may be late if you're not the first installation of the day as they may be held up at the earlier customer's house. Installation had been smooth and installers were friendly chaps. Well, at least, they were friendly to us as we bought them lunch and drinks when they came to install the piping, hee... "bribe" them to do a better job for us. :-)

Air Con Installer - Part 5

This should be the last part of my "Air Con Installer" series posting. It would be about the company that we had "re-awarded" our installation job. I would not name the company yet since works have not yet started, so I would just call it HA.

I only started to look into HA seriously after SC disappointed me. A friend introduced it to me much earlier on but I didn't really look into it as I could not find the company name when I googled it previously. When I was researching on the Internet again, I came across a rather familiar name but the company's name was spelt slightly off from the contact that my friend gave to me, with an additional letter "e" in one of the words. Hence, I decided to give it a try and whatsapp the person. I asked him if he's still in the aircon business and still with the same company. Well, he replied yes, so my friend's contact and the one I came across online were actually referring to the same company. 

Therefore, I asked him to give me a quote based on my specifications. When I saw the amount quoted, I could not believe it and asked "are you sure this is the price?" and told him that his quote was the lowest so far. He asked me if most of my quotes where somewhere just slightly under 4k or above 4k, so apparently he knows his competitors' rate, haha... He told me that they are having promotion and that's why they can quote such a price. While I'm aware that All Best or Best Tech could provide a very attractive quote, I didn't approach them to quote as I read many bad reviews about them.

Subsequently, I also asked him if he's able to do three trips at no extra cost, which he replied that it can be arranged but they would have to bring back all the old aircon stuff and I told him that I expected the installer would bring them back. If you're not aware, the old aircon stuff could be sold off for a bit of money. He said that this is to help them to recover the cost for making another trip.

A site survey was arranged to discuss about the piping route, especially we have concerns for the one that's going to be installed in the living room. Well, he may be a sales executive but he knows his stuff. He told us that the best route for the living room unit, is to install the piping through our master bedroom (MBR) toilet. Now, he's the second installer who told us this besides the one from NC. It is the shortest route with minimal bendings, so it can cool down the room faster. When NC told my hubby previously about this route, I was kind of skeptical. Toilet will have moisture and we bathe there, will there be condensation problem??? Hence, after probing this guy from HA, he told us that we have to avoid bathing in MBR toilet when the aircon is on... He explained that when aircon is on, the gas (coolant) pumped through the copper pipes is cold and when we bathe, the hot water would heat up the toilet. It's not good to have hot and cold in the same area at the same time as it would cause condensation. Now, this will pose a great challenge for me!!! Sometimes I bathe after my kids are asleep, don't tell me that I have to bring my toiletries to go to common toilet to bathe. If not, I have to off the aircon and let my kids "suana" in long wears with the fan on but it's not good that they perspire during the "suana" and cool down again in aircon environment, hot and cold don't go well for kids too! 

Well, after much discussion, we decided to install the living room unit on an alternate location. It would take a longer time to cool the room as the copper piping route is longer but still within 15m and it goes through more bendings. However, the drainage pipe is still short as it will be routed to my balcony's floor trap. We're hacking away our sliding doors and convert the balcony as part of the living room with a box up for the drainage pipe that will have a door or open access panel.

My friend told me that her aircons had been installed for coming to 2 years and there is no leaking problem so far. She was recommended to this guy/HA by her neighbour. Well, if there's no leaking problem within the first year of installation, the workmanship should be quite alright. With a real friend's testimony, not gathered from online sources, I decided to try out HA. Also, hubby is comfortable with this guy as he's able to share with us on quite a lot of things regarding aircon installation. Now, we may not know if there's any part that he's "smoking" us based on a commoner's understanding, I think it does make sense for some stuff like hot and cold don't go well together.

To summarise, we decided on HA based on the following considerations.

• They quoted the cheapest so far, which was lower than what CE and SC quoted.
• They provided a free no obligation site survey and we were satisfied with the sales executive's replies to our queries.
• They can do a third trip without any additional charge.
• They could do according to our proposed schedule for all the three trips.
• There is a real friend's testimony.

For now, I pray hard that all will go smoothly for my house renovation. I would share my reviews on HA after the installation works have completed. Hope you have enjoyed reading my blogging about my house renovation and that the 5 parts Air Con Installer series has been a helpful or interesting read for you. I'm not sure if you have counted the number of air con installers that I've approached for quotation but I did... a total of 10! It's even more than the number of IDs I've approached for quotation, which was only 6.

Meanwhile, stay tuned and see what's my next topic...

Air Con Installer - Part 4

In this second last part of my "Air Con Installer" series posting, I'm going to write about the company that we first choose to do the installation for us and why we subsequently decided to switch to another installer. Guessed which company did we choose first?

*drum rolls* It's Star Cool Air-Condition Engineering - Aron & Ah Boon! Do note that they are different from StarCool Aircon Singapore. I read many good reviews about them on online forums and even individual blogs. They quoted the same price as Cold Engine (CE) except that they only provided 1 year warranty for workmanship. I did ask Aron if they could match the warranty offer but he replied "we believe in good workmanship and materials use for the installation at the very beginning, that is why we give only a year of workmanship warranty."

While I was planning the renovation schedule with my ID, I thought perhaps it's good that the installer could remove the old piping/aircons but without installing the new piping before painting starts. I was thinking in long terms, in case, I need to remove the old piping due to unforeseen circumstance and need to install new piping via another route in the future. If there's no painting on the wall where the piping (or trunking) is going to mount against, that part of the wall would look very ugly after the piping is removed. Not forgetting that the trunking used nowadays is quite big as compared to the current trunking that was installed 16 years ago. Hence, I asked Aron if they could do three trips for me instead at no extra charge. First trip is to remove the old piping/aircons, second trip is to install new piping and third trip is to install new FCUs/compressor. He replied that they could do so without extra charge. He asked me to arrange a site survey with Ah Boon as he was not in town, which I did, and the site survey was done quite fast. Ah Boon said he would confirm with me again on the piping route when the actual installation starts.

When I met Ah Boon during site survey, I asked him when would Aron be back, he replied that he's in Malaysia as he has another business there but he would still reply to emails. To be fair, Aron was quite responsive to my emails, which he usually replied within a day. After discussing with hubby, we decided to get them to do the installation based on the following considerations. 

1. They could do three trips at no extra charge.
2. Ah Boon, the head installer, who came for the site survey, would also be the one doing the installation for us.
3. They have many good reviews.

After informing Aron that we would like to engage their service, he asked me to liaise with Ah Boon on the installation and so I did, which was when my "nightmare" began...

My correspondences with Ah Boon via iMessage:

• On a Monday 8+ am, I informed him on what Aron and I have agreed, and my proposed installation schedule, which he replied that day noon time, saying that he would check and update soon. 
• On a Wednesday 12+ am, Ah Boon finally replied me after I prompted him twice and emailed Aron that Ah Boon did not get back to me. He proposed to install piping / dismantle old unit on another date. I messaged back to tell him that I could reconfirm with my ID about removing the old piping/aircons on his proposed date. However, I wanted the installation of the new piping on another day after the painting has completed and that was why I asked Aron for three trips. Ah Boon didn't reply me. Hence, I messaged him again on that same night to let me know if he could make the necessary arrangement and could call me the next day if speaking over the phone was easier.
• On a Thursday 7+ pm, he messaged saying that he called me but could not ring me. I didn't quite understand what he meant, so I replied asking him what he meant because I had been receiving a few phone calls on my mobile that day but none from him. My phone also never recorded any missing call from him. He replied saying that he called me at 7+ pm but could not contact me, maybe due to line problem. At this point of time, I had actually started to look for another installer as I felt very uncomfortable with Ah Boon's response time. Now, I could understand that he might be busy during the day doing installation works. However, I felt that he should be able to confirm with me on the installation schedule, can do, cannot do, etc, within 3 full working days, which I think it's quite a reasonable time frame. After he failed to contact me via phone call, he did not follow up with any message to say anything about the installation schedule, even up to this point when I was blogging this post, which today is a Sunday with 2 full working days passed by. That's it, I gave up!!! Luckily we didn't place any deposit, nothing to lose on our end except for time loss but I'm glad that it happened earlier so that I still have enough time to find alternative.

For those considering to engage them, do think thrice, not just twice! I do believe that their response was much faster in the past when Aron was still doing this full time with local presence, and hence, all the past good reviews about them. No doubt Aron's response to my emails was quite fast but the lack of his presence here and leaving only Ah Boon to do the coordination works made this a sucking experience for me! It's just simply too difficult to get Ah Boon to respond. My hubby and I did try to call him as well but no one picked up the call. I didn't bother to email Aron again as I can't be going through him all the times just to get Ah Boon to contact me. After going through this experience, my guts feel telling me that they are either no longer as keen and active in keeping their bustle aircon business or they're simply too popular that they can't handle every deal that they agreed to. Should you decide to go ahead with them, I wish you have a much better experience than me when trying to get in touch with Ah Boon.

Air Con Installer - Part 3

I've also gotten quotation from a few other companies, which I would briefly share here. The quotation is based on my specifications that I mentioned in my previous post (looked at the wordings in blue) and also requested for two trips installation. 

Please note that the pricing mentioned is only for reference purpose as companies may run promotion from times to times, so you may get a better or worse deal than what I've gotten. The points that I mentioned were based on what I've found out/understood and the decision to drop them was based on our evaluation criteria and experience while dealing with the various companies.

They are listed according in alphabetical order and not in any order of dislike.

1. Aircon Citi - $4,350

• They do provide free no obligation site survey.
• Dropped this company due to pricing not really that attractive. For this price, I would rather pay a bit more to engage more established companies. 

2. Cold Engine - $3,950

• They provide 2 years warranty for workmanship. Most installers provide only 1 year warranty for workmanship, so this seems attractive to us.
• They do provide free no obligation site survey.
• Scott, who is highly recommended based on a number of online comments that I saw, is no longer doing the installation himself. He now does mostly site survey.
• We did consider them when we decided to give up on the first installer that we choose to do the installation for our house. The pricing was comparable but they could not do a third trip for us without charging additional. Also, I asked if Scott would be the one doing the installation for us but was told that he can only do the site survey. The good reviews about Scott were on his installation, so we were not sure how the workmanship would be if he's not the one doing the installation. I feel that installation is much more important than the site survey because no matter how good the person can advise during site survey, ultimately it depends on the installers' skill to do a good installation job for you to minimise possible issue from happening. Of course, the person doing the site survey has to be experienced enough to provide sound and convincing advice; if he cannot convince you, you'll probably strike his company off the list. Hence, between this company and another company in the running of our second choice, we decided to go for the other company instead. I would write on a separate post why we gave up on the first installer of our choice and why we wanted a third trip.

3. Cool Serve - $4,590.30

• Supply and install 1 no. of Normal L or opening bracket, if any - $160.50
• $60 for site survey, which can be waived off at the final bill upon confirming order.
• Dropped this company due to high price and no free no obligation site survey.

4. Cool World - $4,230 

• We can request for a site survey if we confirm that we're engaging them.
• Dropped this company due to no free no obligation site survey.

5. Dynomatic - $4,500

• It was recommended by my ID, so the person came down with my ID for a free no obligation site survey. 
• Dropped this company due to high price.

6. Natural Cool - ???

• They do provide free no obligation site survey and we arranged for one. The person doing the site survey was late and did not inform us he would be late.
• They did not follow up with a quotation. I'm not going to bother chasing after quotation because to me, if a company doesn't follow up with a quotation automatically, it means they don't really care if they get your business and if the company isn't proactive during pre-sales, it left me wondering what will happen during post-sales.

Recommended Materials for Air Con Installation

Before I moved on to share more about other air con installers, let me share about the recommended materials so that you know what I'm looking for versus what's available in the market by default without upgrading the materials. 

These are the default materials quoted by most installers (I put most as I didn't get quotation from all available installers):

• 3/8 inch Armaflex (or can be Thermaflex or other brands offered by installer) Insulation Class 1 
• G23 Copper Piping
• 3 Core 40/70 Wire Cable
• 16mm PVC Drainage Pipe

Insulation
Armaflex is a rather popular and safe/reliable brand to be used for insulation in air con installation. It is a black rubber foam, which goes around the copper pipe. 3/8 inch is usually used for the copper pipe but many people opt to upgrade it to 1/2 inch to provide better insulation against condensation. The class (class 1 and 0) refers to the fire rated properties of the insulation, so some people comment that it's not necessary to upgrade to class 0.

If you see the picture, the insulation that wraps around the pvc drainage pipe is 1/4 inch. The insulation that wraps around the gas inlet and outlet, the set in the middle next to the pvc drainage pipe, is 3/8 inch. The insulation for the extreme right set of gas inlet and outlet is 1/2 inch.

Copper Piping
Copper piping is the one that carries the coolant gas. There are 2 pipes. The bigger pipe is the one that carries the gas from the indoor unit to the outdoor unit and the smaller pipe is the one that carries the gas from the outdoor unit to the indoor unit. G (guage) 23 or 22 refers to the thickness of the copper pipes, so G23 is 0.61mm and G22 is 0.71mm. I read that copper pipes should be bent using a pipe bender so that it will a nicely bent pipe, and that if the copper pipes are not installed properly, it may cause condensation of the pipes at certain area. 

I checked with an installer and was told that they have the tool to bend the bigger pipe but there is no tool available to bend the smaller pipe, so it will be bent using hand. They cannot use the tool provided for the bigger pipe to bend the small pipe. He also shared that since the copper pipe's length is 15m, it is best to keep the running of the copper pipe within this length to avoid joining two copper pipes, this is to minimise condensation happening around the joint. Also, the longer the copper pipe runs, the longer it will take to cool the room, and if there are many bends along the piping route, it will take even longer to cool the room.

Hence, besides looking at the thickness of the copper pipe, do take note of the piping route. The shorter it is, the less bends there are, the better it is. It's not that installer wants to cut cost or do shortcut and hence, propose the shortest route.

Wire Cable
3C70 is usually used to wire up the outdoor unit to the power point while 3C40 is usually used to wire up the indoor units to the outdoor unit. Brands that people usually recommend are like Keystone and Sigma. Important thing to note for wire cable is to check if they are manufactured in Singapore, and not China.

Drainage Pipe
There are 2 sizes, 13mm and 16mm. Most installers would propose 16mm drainage pipe. Some installers (I'm not sure if all do so, it's best that you check with the installer) also install insulation for the drainage pipe, which 1/4 inch is more commonly used. 

The points that I shared here were mostly what I gathered from my online research and what I learnt from the various installers whom I spoke to (I'm not an expert in this area). I'm not sure if all the points mentioned above are 100% accurate but I've learnt a lot about installing an air con system. On the surface, it looks so simple but once you start looking into the details, you would realised that there's actually a lot of information to absorb. Based on what I've learnt so far, these are my specifications for the materials to be used for my Mitsubishi Starmex System 4.

• 1/2 inch Armaflex Insulation Class 0
• G22 Copper Piping
• 3 Core 40/70 Wire Cable (Keystone Singapore made)
• 16mm PVC Drainage Pipe with Armaflex insulation

Air Con Installer - Part 2

In part 2, I'm going to share about what I've gathered on Gain City (GC). To get similar specifications as what I asked from AD for MXY-4A28VA / MSY-GE10VA X3 + MSY-GE24VA, I would have to pay around $4,584. The price includes upgrading to 1/2 inch insulation (class 1 Armaflex) at $160, G22 copper pipe at $80 and $85 for additional trip.

Usually two trips installation is recommended as the first trip is to remove old piping/aircons and install new piping, and second trip is to install the new aircons after renovation has completed. The reason is that if you install the new aircons before renovation is completed, they may get very dusty and it won't be good for us when the aircons blow out dusty air. By default, GC only offers one trip, so you would need to top up if you need another trip.

While the 5 years extended warranty doesn't have catch like you have to buy servicing package from them, it does have other catch... We were told that the extended warranty would only cover up to a certain amount and once you reach that amount, the extended warranty would cease. If we want to have unlimited amount during the 5 years period, we would have to top up $129.

GC is one of the popular choices that many people go for but still, we decided to drop them from our consideration because

1. The price is on the high side.
2. I read quite a number of "horror stories" about GC on online forums and blogs. Example, I saw some comments talking about they pushing from one party to another party when something happened, so pointless to have warranty when you cannot get them to do the repairs. I also read how the installer damaged wardrobe/cupboard and another case whereby installer damaged the floor tile, and they cannot complain to GC to ask for compensation as the installers are the ones having to pay for any damage.

Please read my reviews/findings with a pinch of salt as your expectation and budget may be different from us. What we find expensive or not good, you may not feel so.

Upcoming next, I'll share with you about the recommended materials to use for air con installation based on what I gathered from my online research before I share more about other air con installers.

Air Con Installer - Part 1

I have been "hunting" around for a reliable and responsive air con installer to install a Mitsubishi Starmex System 4 for my house, so I started to ask shops/companies to give me a quote based on the following requirements. As my house's existing air-cons were serviced by Aircon Designs (AD), I asked my hubby to call them up to give us a quote. The company told him that they would first need to do a site survey before giving us a quote, so we arranged for a site survey. Subsequently, the sales executive quoted us the following.

MXY-4A28VA / MSY-GE10VA X2 + MSY-GE13VA + MSY-GE26VA at $4,450 nett.

To supply labour & material to install 1 set of Mit StarMEX inverter multi split wall mounted type A/C complete with 1/2" Thermaflex class "O" insulation, refrigerant G23 copper piping, diameter 16mm drainpipe, 3 core 40 Keystone control wire, 2.5mm wiring from condenser to isolator, PVC casing at expose area, vacuum system, charging in refrigerant gas, testing and commissioning

Compressor 5 yrs, Fancoil/Spare Parts 1 yr warranty by agent.
Installation workmanship 1 yr warranty.

I asked the sales executive to quote me for MXY-4A28VA / MSY-GE10VA X3 + MSY-GE24VA and the price was $4,390, which is only a savings of $60 for downsizing the 13VA to a 10VA and the 26VA to a 24VA. I also asked him if he could bundle in any free servicing since we have been their customer for so long (they installed our existing air-cons and been doing the servicing for the past many years), he told me "NO"! Oh well, so we gathered that there is no need to be loyal to any particular company.

As I've been researching quite a bit on the materials used for air-con installation, I asked the guy why G22 is not used. The reply was that it's because G22 is 0.71mm and G23 is 0.61mm, is 0.1mm thicker and for HDB, there is a lot of 90 degree bend, so G23 holds up better than G22. Well, I'm not quite sure if the reply was exactly correct... I found out from the web that G22 is harder to bend, so an installer needs to use a pipe bender to bend and the result will be a nicely bent pipe. If the installer uses hands to bend the pipe, it may result in some acute angle. Hence, are they trying to avoid using G22 so that they can do the job instead?

If we want to upgrade to G22, we would have to pay an additional $50 per set of piping. I figured it would probably end up to be around 4.5k if we were to engage them. Well, since they don't appreciate customer's loyalty, we decided to get more quotations for comparison. After comparing AD with few other companies, we decided to drop them from our consideration because

1. The price is on the high side.
2. There is no freebies to sweeten the deal for a long time customer.
3. The reply on why G22 is not used doesn't fully convinced us.

I'm revealing the company name for some of the air con installers since we have already ruled them out based on our evaluation. Up next will be Part 2 of the Air Con Installer Series, and it will be on Gain City (GC), so stay tuned...