Well sort of...I did use a few staples.:)

Wanted to share my acoustical panel build for others on here. My thought process going into these was to make them stapleless for ease of installation and also offer the ability to change out the fabric if my color scheme or mind changes. These were not the easiest or least expensive way to frame them up but it does what I want it to do. Build process and pics follow.

But first might as well start at the end with the finished product.

First I used 1"x2" pine for the frame, rounding the edges with my router. I cut flat butt joints for each corner and used a staple gun to temporarily join the four corners.

I then used aluminum screen door framing, cut to match each edge of the pine panel frame. I made 45 degree miter cuts on the end of the screen framing material and cut it short by about 1/4"-1/2" on each end. This will come into play when attaching the material.

I attached the screen door framing to the pine frame with some screws and staples. I first drilled 2 1/16" pilot holes in the left and right side screen framing at each corner. Since the screen door framing is hollow aluminum, I widened the first hole to allow a screw to fit thru leaving the lower pilot hole alone. I made these holes one on each side of the butt joint. These attachment points will be what holds the frame together. See the Raw Corner pic.

I finished attaching the aluminum screen door framing to the pine with a pneumatic stapler. You could drill holes and use screws if you so choose, but the stapler was a lot quicker. I stapled every 16" on the longer sides.

Once the screen framing was attached to the pine framing, the panel was ready to be moved about and have the material attached. At this point I just measured out the material and used the splining rubber to attach the material to the frame.

I then laid in my 1" linacoustic material. You can adjust on this design if you are using 2" OC or whatever. I laid the material with the unfaced portion facing the audience. This allowed me to attach the facing to the inside edge of the pine boards. I cut the linacoustic about 1" long on each edge. I then separated the facing from the 1" extra lengthe and removed the fiberglass material below it. I then stapled the facing to the pine.

I finished off the material attaching by cleaning up the corners. This is where the 45 degree miter cuts and shortened length helps. As you notice the aluminum framing material extends about 1/4" above the pine boards. I took the excess corner material, bundled it up and pulled it thru the opening. I then stapled it on the inside edge of the pine frame. I also put on or two staples on the side edges to hold the excess material on the sides. This provides a little protection to finished walls as the material will cover the aluminum framing and keep it from scrathing the paint.

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Now to hang the frames, I used someone else's variation on the french cleat. I bought some 144" carpet edging and cut it to 18" size to fit between two studs. I then attached one piece to the wall and one piece to the frame. I had to drill some holes in the edging as the holes provided do not always land where you need them to.

Please note. prior to attaching the material to the frame, I hung the frames to determine the mounting points. Once the material is attached it will be much harder to try and gauge the correct mounting points.

So that's it. Hope this helps someone out there.

Now, if I ever decide to change fabric, all I have to do is remove 10 or so staples, the splining, and then re-attach. This also allows me to take the frames to a new place. The particular frames in these pictures were actually made to specific dimensions for my front wall, but you can modify the design to make say 2'x4' or 4'x8' frames that can be used for first reflection points etc...

Very nice frames, and cool idea. However, for me, it was so much simplar ripping MDF in to 1x2s and making the frame, inserting the OC 703 and wrapping with fabric and stapling. I also thought about "What if I want to change the color". Well, if I do, it won't be for a long time, and would probably be the only other time I'd change it, and I'd just take what I have off, and staple new on. I didn't think that step was very time consuming.

But, I don't mean to knock your idea as it's very cool and useable if you plan on changing out the fabrics many times throughout the life of the theater.

Thanks for sharing. I'm sure there are many who will find this idea very useful.

Great idea and nice work. Thanks for sharing.