The 'I can't believe you want the largest room in the house' HT build.1 - Page 11

Amazing isn't it.... When you need some help, so called friends claim to go away for the weekend or break their rib. Mention scantily clad women and everyone is keen. I am beginning to think that AVS relationships are very shallow indeed.

Managed another couple of hours tonight. Got all of the wiring in for the two pairs of surrounds and four of the six sconce lights. The last two sconce lights are close to the dimmer switches so they will be fairly simple to wire up... Just ran out of cable. Back to Bunnings for a roll.
I have marked all of the cables for simple identification when they are run outside of the room to the equipment rack. I still need to run conduit from the room to the rack but that's a job for getting under the house and would rather do that when there is more light. I also still need to install a conduit for the 10m HDMI cable from the rear of the room to the rack. In terms of wiring for the Danleys and LCR speakers, I will be running the cables in conduit and under the house. This will be facilitated through the floor behind the screen wall (with copious use of caulk) so there's no need to worry about that pre-drywall. Hope that will be ok.
I will buy some ply for the mounting platform for the projector when at Bunnings next.
Happy just to keep moving, even slowly.

I have been looking at the classifieds and Ebay over the past 3 months or so and there has always been a second hand drywall lift for sale. I kept putting it off, not sure whether I would be contracting out or DIY with the sheeting. Now that I am going to do the job myself, there is not a single second-hand unit for sale in Sydney. They were usually going for about $80-$100, which is half price.

Bit the bullet this morning as I do need to get one in the next few days. Picked up a new lift on Ebay for about $215.00 posted. Not too bad and if I can get half of it back at the end of the job, then I guess it's a reasonable purchase.

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/280731458...84.m1439.l2648

Hopefully it should arrive later this week.

And before you ask Peter M and Ellil, yes, you can use it .

Greg

Hey there Big,

That's one impressive looking drywall lift. Whatever works I guess.

I am ashamed to say that I don't know your first name Big...

Cheers

Greg

I surely will!

He is referring to the Miss Indy beauty contest at the car racing. You know, the whole throw the head back, talk about world peace and then proceed to thrust their chests in your face while wearing almost nothing. I find it demeaning, sexist and absolutely inappropriate. I'm gonna miss it though!

Gday Peter,

Thanks for the offer of your left....., however something tells me that the Captive Breeding Program requires that you have both intact!

Thanks for the offer. Will let you know about Sunday if the offer's still good. Will all depend upon whether the lift arrives. It has been despatched from Melbourne this morning so I doubt that it will be here in time. Thanks also to Peter M. I am hoping to get a good whack of the sheeting done on Saturday 22 October.

I may just spend some time on getting the lighting wiring sorted. Need to re-route the power supply from the current switch to where the dimmer switch will be located. The location of the current switch is going to be behind the new drywall. You are most welcome if you want to join me for wiring and conduit 101. Beer will be consumed after the electrical connections are made

Grabbed the conduit yesterday with the extra lighting cable. Managed to finish off the last light and that was enough for the day. Decided to take the dog for a long overdue walk, pour a wine and relax for the night.

Cheers

Greg

Boys, we have an American living amongst us! Lets get him converted to the metric system quick smart so that he can spread the good word

G'day David,

I am also a fan of horsepower.... Why else would I drive a pumping 2001 Holden astra 1.8 litre. Believe it or not, that baby will get you from zero to one hundred in a gnat's nut under two hours. Truly impressive!

With regards to power points, I did have 2 x 20 amp points installed in the room behind the screen wall but these are unlikely to be used. I will pull the cables through the new gyprock but can't imagine what I will need them for. I put them in when the plasma and audio equipment was in the room. There are a couple of other power points that I will pull the wiring through for using a vacuum, laptops etc in the room but in terms of new plugs, I don't think this will be necessary.

I am lucky that there is already a power point in the floor which will go under the riser. This is for the Buttkickers if I need them. Apart from that, I don't have any other electrical equipment inside the room. I need to get a couple of 20 amp supplies for the equip rack but that's an easy job down the track. I have access under the house and I basically have a new meter box from when I put solar on the house and it's a matter of 5 metres away from the equipment rack.

Have a good one
Greg

Bought some more shelves for the equipment rack and loaded in the amps, CD player and other components. That Emotiva XPA-5 is hernia inducing. Sure has a lot of metal in it! Anyways, need another shelf and then I will get it completed. This is how it looks right now.



Sorry, you will have to turn your head to the side... had trouble rotating then posting the image from Photobucket. Will take another shot when the rack is complete.

Spent a full day today doing what I thought would take about an hour. Funny in this game how the things you think are going to be difficult happen fairly quickly and the things that should be simple take forever....

I ran the conduit from the room to the equipment rack, which is outside the room in a little nook about 5 metres from the back wall. Drilled the holes, ran the flexible conduit, got under the house, pulled them through and then do you think I could get the cable through? Not a chance. That ribbed flexible conduit is a bugger to work with. Any slight kink or curve just would not allow the cable to pass. In the end, I have a 9m length of stainless steel wire which was a leftover from the decking job. After much swearing and the assistance from a mate who dropped in, managed to get the three lengths of conduit wired up. I have the 4 surrounds in one conduit, the LCR's in another conduit and the 2 x Sub cables in the third conduit. Worked out well having the false wall running down the side of the room. Meant that I could drill in the floor without worrying about sound leakage.





Went to Spotlight Fabrics on Saturday and bought two lots of material... One black piece to block out the window inside the new stud wall (so that outsiders can't see the stud wall and insulation and also a 4 metre wide piece of white material so that I can work out the size screen that I want. Will black out the window at the last opportunity so that we can get the ceiling and three walls of drywall up with some natural light. Won't take long to stick some batts in the wall and then staple the material up. Then we can get the final wall up and work under flood lights for the second layer.

So, finally getting there and am really itching to get the drywall up. Next weekend can't come soon enough. Hoe that you have your ticket booked Big and Ted.

I've lined this one up for you Big.. Looks like she was a wonderful personality and a great sense of humor. Quite the conversationalist too, I am lead to believe.

G'day David, Aussies were outplayed all over the park. All Blacks won 20-6. probably a fitting result really considering the way that the game went.
I am using a 2.75kw split system unit for the room for heating and cooling. Hope you had a good weekend.

Now don't you guys start getting into a football code war in my thread.... that one will never end. And I have fought hard to get my four subscribers....
Having said that, I am a mad Dragons, Swannies, Tahs and Wallabies supporter... haven't had a huge amount to cheer about.

Well, kind of finished my rack. Still need to do all of the wiring, which will be an absolute treat, but managed to get the shelves and all of my required kit in the rack. Wish that I had bought a larger rack but beggars can't be choosers and for $25.00 I think I have done pretty well (well, $25.00 for the rack and about $500 for the shelving. Still, I am happy with the way it's turned out... excuse the fingerprints etc...need to give the gear a nice wipe over.





In case it's not clear, order of components (from top to bottom) is:

Behringer EP4000 Sub Amp for 2 x Danley DTS-10 kits
Behringer DCX-2496 Crossover / EQ for subs
Toshiba HD-A2 HD-DVD Player
Sony BDP-CX960 400 Disc Blu-ray Changer
Emotiva UMC-1 7.1 Pre-Processor
Emotiva ERC-1 Reference CD Player
Emotiva USP-1 Stereo Preamplifier
Emotiva UPA-2 2 channel amplifier
Emotiva XPA-5 5 channel amplifier

I was originally going to sit the 400 disc player on top of the cabinet but found the room to put it inside. At 6RU, it's a fairly large unit. This left me with three 1RU steel blanking plates left over. If anyone local is after some, I have some spare!

Will obviously need to introduce some forced ventilation for the gear. Plan is to build it into a gyprock/drywall framed enclosure with exhaust fan, and cover up some of that gorgeous stone wall I have near the rack. Final finish will be some nice moulding to cover the rack screws and make it look like an integrated cabinet.

Next project.... assemble the drywall lifter

Yes mate, they certainly are. I waited and waited for Emotiva to relist the rack ears into their range but no news from them. They were a bit pricy at 59 bucks a pair but shelving is not much less. Found a place in Alexandria if you are after any rack mount kit. They were about the best that I could find.
Picked up some alarm cable today as well so going to run all my cable, mount my sensors and get the alarm system installed as much as I can myself. Also found out today that I am off to Darwin for work for a week or two. Barramundi, lobster and beer... These are a few of my favorite things....