A wardrobe to the ceiling around an AC bulkhead
What sits inside the boxed section under your ceiling, what the Dubai Building Code says must stay reachable, and how a wardrobe is drawn under it or beside it.
By the Ajusteur team7 minute read
What is inside the bulkhead
Most Dubai apartments are cooled by chilled water fan coil units hidden above the ceiling, fed from the building's plant or from district cooling. One maker's UAE built range gives the size: a unit of about 3.1 kW, right for a bedroom, is 260 mm high, 550 mm wide and 890 mm long with its plenum, and weighs 20 kg. The next sizes up, 4.3 to 4.7 kW, are 300 mm high, 600 mm wide and 990 mm long. Add the supply duct, the drain with its fall and the plasterboard, and the soffit under all that sits well below the slab.
The Dubai Building Code asks for fan coil units in residential apartments to be installed in wet areas, to limit damage from leaks. That is why the unit usually sits over the bathroom or the corridor and the duct runs into the bedroom through the boxed section fitters call a bulkhead. The code itself calls the underside a soffit and anything below the clear height a protruding object.
Why the ceiling can drop there
The code sets the clear height of a living or bedroom space at 2.7 m, measured from the finished floor to any structural element or ceiling soffit. It then allows protruding objects below that height in not more than half of the ceiling area, as long as 2.03 m of headroom remains. So a bulkhead may legally come down to 2030 mm above your floor, and in older towers they often do.
That number matters for a wardrobe. Our tall boxes stand 1940 mm high on a 100 mm plinth, so their top is at 2040 mm. Under the lowest legal bulkhead even the tall box does not fit, and the design moves to a lower one.
Source: Dubai Municipality: Dubai Building Code, 2021 edition (PDF)
Access comes first
The code is plain about service. Heating, ventilation and air conditioning equipment shall be accessible for inspection, service, repair and replacement, and access shall not require disabling a fire rated assembly or removing permanent construction, other appliances, or ducts and pipes that are not connected to the unit being serviced. It also asks for a level working space of at least 762 by 762 mm in front of the control side of an appliance.
A wardrobe screwed over the access panel fails that test the first time the drain blocks. So before we draw, we find the panel, measure it and note which side the unit's controls and filter are on. Then the wardrobe stops short of the panel, or the top box under it is drawn without a back and with a loose shelf, so a technician reaches the panel through an open door. Which of the two suits you is a conversation at the visit, not a surprise after.
Source: Dubai Municipality: Dubai Building Code, 2021 edition (PDF)
Under it, beside it, or both
Three ways a floor to ceiling wardrobe meets a bulkhead, with the numbers from our workshop's rules.
What we measure before drawing
The height at the left, middle and right of the recess, and separately under the bulkhead and beside it. The depth of the bulkhead from the back wall at both ends, because they are rarely square. The position and size of the access panel, and of the supply grille and return grille, which need their air and must not be boxed in. Then the usual: widths at three heights, depth at floor, middle and top, both diagonals, sockets and switches. We build to the smallest of each.
If the ceiling beside the bulkhead is under 2300 mm, the design starts from a lower tall box. If diagonals differ by more than 10 mm, the plinth is shimmed and the fillers scribed top to bottom. The boxes are never racked to follow a wall.
Fixing, and what never carries weight
A wardrobe stands on its plinth and its weight goes to the floor. Two angle brackets per tall box into the wall stop it leaning, which is what the US safety commission's anchoring campaign is about: furniture with doors and drawers fixed to the wall so it cannot tip. Nothing is fixed to the bulkhead itself. It is plasterboard on light framing, it carries a unit full of water, and a screw through it finds a pipe or a cable.
The top boxes under a bulkhead are screwed to the tall boxes below them and to each other, with a 10 mm shadow gap to the soffit so the plaster never takes a load and the doors never rub it.
How we get there with you
Send a photo that shows the bulkhead and the access panel, with the height under it and beside it, roughly. We reply with which of the three arrangements we would draw and an estimate. At the free visit we measure as above and draw every box with its own code, and you see the step, if there is one, before anything is made. What goes inside the bays is in wardrobe internals by width, and the price lines in how much a built in wardrobe costs. Start on our page for fitted wardrobes.
Quick questions
Can a wardrobe be built over the AC access panel?
No. The Dubai Building Code requires the unit to be accessible for service without removing permanent construction. The wardrobe stops short of the panel or a top box under it is left open at the back so the panel is reached through the door.
How low can an AC bulkhead be in a Dubai bedroom?
The code gives bedrooms a clear height of 2.7 m but allows protruding objects over up to half the ceiling area down to 2.03 m of headroom. So a bulkhead may sit at 2030 mm above the floor.
Does a wardrobe under a bulkhead have shorter doors?
Yes. Each bay's door runs from the plinth to just under its own ceiling, so doors under the bulkhead are shorter and the step lands on a bay joint.
How big is the fan coil unit above the ceiling?
One UAE made range lists a bedroom sized unit at 260 mm high, 550 mm wide and 890 mm long with its plenum, and 20 kg. Larger units are 300 mm high and 990 mm long.