"Reel Time" Build Log-14' Scope, 9.7 17,000W Transducer Audio, Dedicated Stadium Room - Page 6

Thanks! Both side walls done now, but I will wait for my rope lighting supplies to come before I put up the crown. That way I can install the rope track much easier and the rope light itself. I can still get to the rope light if I need to adjust/replace.

Working on the back bar area right now. That gets a top and bottom baseboard before the crown is attached. Slower going though even without all those crazy angles. No wood studs in some of it so I'm gluing and nailing to hold while it cures. The crown can attach right into the baseboard trim.

Finished up the trim in the small foyer room and the back area of the HT. I figure that I'm about 60% done trimwork. Largest item to do will be the crown on the side walls and installing the rope light track and rope behind it. Should come in this week to have that to do next weekend.

Thanks for the compliments Moggie and MMan! I wish all those miter cuts where as clean as the ones I chose to take pics of. There are some that aren't as pretty, but most of them are pretty tight. It remains to be seen how well the side wall crown will go with all those damn angles. I'm not attaching to the ceiling (rope light behind) there, so I have some more room for error.

Hard to get from the pics, but there are a number of flat spaces in the overall buildup of the crown to help break it up. I agree the dental is often used to do this, but it didn't seem to fit the room and the other design.

As for the finish, I'm deciding between either a faux wood application or a two-tone color to help separate some of the crown - maybe deep bronzey gold with a deep gold accent. Something like that. Working on the wallpaper first and then taking off the wall and trim color from that.

Thanks Bryan.

Yes, you are remembering correctly. We were thinking about that at one time. Cost and level of work required pulled me away from it. I really wanted all the build up and with all that molding it would have been pretty expensive. I'm right at $1,000 just for this trim. But we are considering a faux mahogangy finish that might work. The wall bar and the sit down third row wall is all mahogany so there would be a tie-in.

That's was part of my decision! Keep at it, as I'm sure it will be beautiful when finished!

Thanks! I'm hoping to get to the side wall crown this weekend, but I've been deep into Chemistry helping my oldest get through it! Might be a long weekend in the books instead!

Side Wall Crown

Well, I put in a few late nights this past week to help the oldest with chemistry, and was able to get back in the HT to work on the trim. I finally moved forward and tackled the crown for the side walls. As I expected, it was not fun, and quite frustrating. It took a little while to get going and find the best way to handle it. Finally figured out that assembling multiple pieces on the floor then installing was the best route. This was especially true to make sure I could tack the inside corners from behind to keep the miters tight. This was necessary since I was keeping the crown off the ceiling by 2" in order to install rope lighting behind.

Which brings me to a new problem. I purchased my 1/2" incandescent rope lighting (from 1000bulbs) and received it on Friday. After putting up a section of crown, I layed some rope behind it and turned off the lights to see how it looked. Well, IT LOOKED AWFUL! All I can see is this very shadowy light. Getting up there and twisting the rope around, I can tell it's the tiny wires within the rope light (clear warm while by the way) that's causing the shadows. No matter where I positioned it, it didn't get better. They only thing that worked was laying a piece of diffuser over it that I had around. But it will be a nightmare to cut and slide all those pieces of diffuser around this trim and wall. Plus I'd be very concerned with it rattling with heavy sound. I called 1000Bulbs and the salesman said he's been selling it for 17 years and never heard of this problem. He wants me to take some photos for him to see it. I'm not sure if it's because I have dark ceiling, but this isn't very good. ANY SUGGESTIONS/IDEAS WOULD BE GREATLY APPRECIATED!!!

Here's the latest shots:












AND I was able to get back in there for a half-day on Sunday and build and install the steps. Wrapped the baseboard around on one side, but still have it to do on the other. Nice not having to step up 12" to get around!

Rope Lighting

First, thanks to all (SM2000, MMan, BH, & Skeets) on the responses and kudos.

Okay, finished up prep of the oldest for his chemistry midterm and went in to take some photos.

So here's the rope light held in the middle of the channel and at the top of it (highest point without being seen). You can clearly see all of the shadows the wires in the rope are making on the paint. By the way, the dark paint enhances it, but it's also visible when I hold the rope up against my white primed walls.




For the next pic, I pushed the rope all the way down into the bottom of the crown in the lowest part of the V. As you can see, almost all of the shadows are gone, but as BH commented, this produces a hard edge of light on the ceiling of which I don't like at all.




Here's a close-up with the rope in the bottom of the channel:



...and a close-up with the rope in the middle and on top of the channel:




The bottom of the channel is 4.5" from the ceiling. The top is 2". As one would expect, the closer to the ceiling you get, the better the dispersion, but the worse the shadows.


As for the blue incandescent, it's better at not casting shadows, but not by too much. It's also not very blue at all. Here it is held up...

...against the white primed wall:



...and against the dark ceiling:



Against the white wall, you can see that it still shadows very badly. The color is very light and more like teal.

Even against the dark ceiling you can see the shadows and the light output drops dramatically. Only the rope light itself looks more blue.

So... I guess I'll send my pics off to 1000Bulbs and see what they have to say. Something tells me that LED is in my future and MMan will be saying "I don't you so". I do hate LED lights when I see them out at Christmas time. Maybe rope lighting will be different somehow in that I'm not looking at the led lights themselves, only their output.

I did try lining a portion of the tray with aluminum foil. It helped a little bit to hide the shadows and amp up the light, but really not much at all. You had to look for it to see the difference. I added in a solid white thick, reflective paper on the wall of the channel, and again it helped in amping it up, but shadows were still heavily present.

So, there it is for now. Hopefully 1000Bulbs will be accommodating with returns should I go that route.

I'll keep everyone posted!

I understand, and if the crown was pretty much straight down the wall, I might agree. But when it is changing direction and angle like mine is, the hard edge doesn't look good at all. The wife would rather have the shadows then the hard edge.

If I could get the shadows to diminish, allowing the rope to be more towards the top of the channel, that would be the best. Not sure if going LED would give that to me.

Good to know. Do you happen to remember the seller's ID that you got these from?

Thanks Tony. I've actually been considering this. In playing around, I took a section of just the plastic channel they use for mounting rope light and turn it upside down on the rope. Other than the corners of the channel creating some darkness, it completely eliminated the shadows.

If I go with the diffuser, I have some issues to work out:

1) It's going to be a real pain to cut and assemble it to fit in all those ins and outs of the crown. I'm sure I'd have to overlap it in areas and glue it together and need to see if a double diffused area is noticeable.

2) I'm concerned of laying in the diffuser and then having it rattle with high bass/volumes. I don't want to glue it in, since I eventually will need to get it out to replace or fit drop outs.

3) I have to figure the best way to mount the rope light underneath of the diffuser. I need to play with gluing either clips or the channel to the diffuser itself and make sure that doesn't affect the light.

I might still need to go with LED to gain some brightness and to decrease the heat, especially if I'm going to cover up the channel with the diffuser. I have to change the blue as well since I'm not happy with the color it is creating.

Thanks!!

Thanks! Waiting to hear back from 1000Bulbs as it was referred to a supervisor on what they'll do.

Thanks for the input. I have a feeling I'm going to be going the LED route and the incandescent will be going back. Neat idea of the blue tape, I might have to try that one. I guess I might be able to do something like frosted shipping tape on the white.

I'm hoping to get back in there tomorrow, but came down with a nasty stomach flu yesterday and have been out for the count ever since!

A little more progress. Came down with a stomach flu, so I didn't get a lot of time in the HT this past weekend. Coming down the home stretch on the trim and was able to finish off the entrance door, add trim at the front of the room, and trim out the AV closet around the racks.

AV Closet - left about a 1/4" around the rack to allow it to slide out on the platform I've previously photographed and talked about. The bottom baseboard is removed as it just sits below the rack.

Front Wall - I took the baseboard up the wall on both sides to "frame" out the screen a bit. I turned it to look more like a casing. I added a large 7-1/4" 5/4 trim board at the top which will get a decorative 18" tall corbel placed on top of it.

Remaining Trim - I have a baseboard and crown to install after I put up the star ceiling panels. I'm hoping to accomplish that this coming weekend!

Front Wall/Masking System - I've also ordered all the parts, motors, cloth, etc. to build a very, very large 4-way AT automated masking system. Total screen area behind will accomodate the 15' wide scope and 81" tall 16:9 image, so it's got a lot of size to cover all the way down to 4:3. Went with an ILT-based Somfy system which will give me 16 programmable stops per motor which will more that cover it. More to come on that!!!