Kitchen buying and fitting

Hixxy said:
the work is sectioned and you must be qualified to do each section. pipework + meters, water heaters, gas fires, cookers, central heating, LPG etc. each has an exam and practical assesment and of course a fee and a days lost work. this only covers gas saftey and has nothing to do with plumbing a tap.

so a corgi guy who has done the pipework and central heating assesments would be qualified to work on the meter, gas pipework and boiler but not on the cooker, gas fire or any LPG. the list of what the oprative is allowed to work on is on the back of the corgi ID card.
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Corgi guys may well be 'qualified' to do other things but the only work that requires it is Gas instalation. For example you can perfectly legally install the entire central heating system in you house then mount the boiler on the wall and plumb everything in but the gas which must be done by a 'competent Person' in a domestic situation or a Corgi registered installer in a business environment. There has yet to be a court case to define a competent person.

Anyone is alowed to work on the plumbing in a house the government has not got hold of this one yet but no doubt soon will as they have with Electrics and Windows.

Sadly these schemes are not exactly fool proof the two worst boiler installs I've seen were both done by Corgi registered 'Engineers' one was just poor but the other was out and out dangerous. corgi has sadly become a private members club out to make it's members money the situation with electrics with lots of certifying bodies is much more apropriate.
 
$loth said:
kef, where you did the sink, what type of cabinet did you put underneath? Could you get a link for it please?
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It's a 1000 cabinet from B&Q, had to carve a section out of the back panel to fit it around the existing pipework and also to accomodate the sink bowl.

The cabinet goes back under the worktop (towards the far wall), i moved the centre post to take a 600 door rather than the 2 x 500's it should take to give more access, the part nearest the camera is an open space for the washing machine to go back into, with the worktop being ficed to two steel brackets underneath for stability.

I can take a few more piccies when i get home if you want to see.

Kef
 
Hixxy said:
OP looks like your getting on great with the kitchen glad your getting a mate in to do the gaswork, well worth it. btw that cuboard or the boiler is crooked :p
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I'm not the OP! :)

Boiler is a bit crooked on the wall, but you wont see that when the cupboard is back on the wall, plus i'm not great at using cameras either!
 
a1ex2001 said:
Corgi guys may well be 'qualified' to do other things but the only work that requires it is Gas instalation. For example you can perfectly legally install the entire central heating system in you house then mount the boiler on the wall and plumb everything in but the gas which must be done by a 'competent Person' in a domestic situation or a Corgi registered installer in a business environment. There has yet to be a court case to define a competent person.

Anyone is alowed to work on the plumbing in a house the government has not got hold of this one yet but no doubt soon will as they have with Electrics and Windows.

Sadly these schemes are not exactly fool proof the two worst boiler installs I've seen were both done by Corgi registered 'Engineers' one was just poor but the other was out and out dangerous. corgi has sadly become a private members club out to make it's members money the situation with electrics with lots of certifying bodies is much more apropriate.
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ive seen qualified electricians doing equally as bad a job - wall mounted cooker switch used to isolate an electric shower in a bathroom, well within reach when you were standing in the shower and on a fuse not a breaker, wall sockets right next to a kitchen sink bowl - IEE regulated so hopefully the other certifying bodies are doing a beter job. how you can say corgi is a members club i really don't know. if you have a complaint phone corgi up and they'll send an inspector round.
 
i got my kitchen from b and q was the cheapest and a good kitchen,

focus and a few others have smaller wall cabinets and the worktops looked a bit better.

the corgi thing they are no such things as corgi registered plumbers corgi only deals with the gas side the only time corgi get involed with plumbing is when you change your bathroom and have to inform building control which corgi has taken over.

when fitting all new gas appliances i think you will find now that if you have a problemw ith the warranty and dont have the cert from corgi which the engineer has to apply for you to get then you may not get it fixed.

also yes you can fit a new heating system all pipe work except the gas connections and the flue pipe.

when swapping a cooker over just make sure you use the correct sealing paste and make sure the hose isnt leaking and you fit a safety chain or stab bracket. not that you should fit your own cooker of course.
 
howdens are the cheapest of the lot and comparable quality to B+Q but they are trade only so you'd have to get someone to buy them for you.
 
not being funny but why do people try save a few pennies....Youll regret fitting it yourself....people see these damm tv shows and think its a piece of **** to do.....it is if youve been doing it 20 odd years.....a little bit of friendly advice would be to get someone you either know or a professional as you will not get nice tight clean mitres on your worksurfaces as you probably dont have routers or the jigs, seeing as your mate had the equipment your lucky.....most pros would probably tell you it would take them a week to fit a kitchen which is true, so for amatuer god knows how long.....you think you'll save some money, youll probably end up spending more from **** ups made.......getting the units all level and plumb isnt a doddle if your a DIY'er especially the wall ones.....Your best bet would be to get a tradesman in to do the job, go to magnet order the kitchen through the tradesman and get them to fit it....as simple as!
 
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kingo15 said:
even with are trade account they were more money than b and q tbh
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dipends on how much discount they are willing to give you off the trade price i suppose. got a base unit, doors, ss sink top, tap and waste for under a hundred quit not long ago.
 
Hixxy said:
dipends on how much discount they are willing to give you off the trade price i suppose. got a base unit, doors, ss sink top, tap and waste for under a hundred quit not long ago.
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72% is the max discount they can give, i would look for at least 65%, i got 72 becuase i knew someone that worked there
 
We got a quote from MFI for kitchen 10ft by 10ft, in the toscana range. It came out at £4200 with free integrated fridge, and 25% discount on the units as its their offer at the moment.

Their fitting charge is £1460 dry fit, which means they will remove the old kitchen units but charge extra for removing tiles/cooker etc..and same for fitting, gas/electric work will all be extra.

We are really struggling on what to decide. We dont have a lot of tools really, and not an awful lot of DIY knowledge but it seems like such a lot of money to spend, especially when we are planning to move in 2/3 yrs max. How much extra do u think the gas/elec work will be?? I guess it'll be £2000 or more for fitting. Is it worth it?

How do i go about finding an independent fitter? Maybe they will be slightly cheaper. We are in Surrey by the way, near Kingston Upon Thames.
 
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platypus said:
My girlfriend has just spent £30,000 on a new kitchen, the fitting cost around £5,000, which is a ridiculous amount. Now, I could have easily fitted the cupboards, cooker, dishwasher, sink etc, and probably done the tiling.

You need qualified people for the wiring, and a corgi rated gas man to sort out gas pipes, connect the cooker, and possibly a plumber if you need any water pipes moving.

MFI and B&Q have their fitting service that doesn't seem that expensive in comparison.
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I cant get my head round this. How the hell do you spend £30k on a kitchen? How big is it ? And is it made from 24k Gold or something???
 
Arite mate, I havent read this thread but I see your in Manchester and if you're interested in saving a few quid you might wanna try CK Home Appliances in Bury, very good value for money and great service, I know cos I used to work there and they used to make sure we were so polite and normally knocked a few quid off the more stuff you bought.

they have a website if you search for it although its just an amateur job and your better off goin down and havin a look yourself.
 
We paid £1200 labour for the old kitchen ripping out the new one putting in all appliences putting in (new oven hob , dishwasher fridge freezer and washer-dryer) and the floor tiles laid , all in all maybe £2500 including all the new appliences, small kitchen though :)
 
Chabsy said:
72% is the max discount they can give, i would look for at least 65%, i got 72 becuase i knew someone that worked there
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Rubbish. 65% - 74.5% - 88.2745% ignore the discount rates as they can be fiddled easily, it's all about margins in those places - which is how they can magically trim another 10% when you go between price matching howdens/magnet branches.
I should know, I used to work in one.

...and I could never work out about how people say the thicker the kitchen unit the better? surely the more compact and less fluffy the better...
 
Tourm said:
Rubbish. 65% - 74.5% - 88.2745% ignore the discount rates as they can be fiddled easily, it's all about margins in those places - which is how they can magically trim another 10% when you go between price matching howdens/magnet branches.
I should know, I used to work in one.

...and I could never work out about how people say the thicker the kitchen unit the better? surely the more compact and less fluffy the better...
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Rubbish.......... 10 posts to your name and you think you're William large testicals ?
 
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