Nick's Homebrew Bar and Entertainment Area - Page 25

Getting the projector seems to have livened up the crowd a bit. I really need to stay focused on the rest of the project (pun intended).

I did some research on oak veneers last night. I may just start with the veneer for the soffits to see how things work out before spending too much money. They sell the veneer I want in both 12" and 24" widths (8' long), but I sent them a note to see if I could get it in 18" wide so I don't have a bunch of waste (plus hopefully it will reduce the price). Need their response before I place my order.

All of my wiring keystones and face plates shipped. Unfortunately, they aren't scheduled to be delivered until Monday. That means I won't be able to wrap the wiring over the weekend as planned.

I found out that the veneer I wanted only comes in 4' wide and 2' wide sheets. I went ahead and ordered enough white oak to do the soffits. I didn't want to order the veneer for the columns yet. I want to see how the soffits turn out first.

I also got word that my Buttkickers shipped today. I found an amazing deal online several weeks ago, so I went ahead and ordered them. I had only planned on buying 4 to use in the front row, but they were significantly less than I had ever seen them, so I decided to pull the trigger on 8. I was a bit skeptical because they told me they were on back order, but my credit card company told me I would be covered if they charged me and never shipped anything. I got a note that they were in stock and then I received a UPS shipping notification directly from Buttklicker. They should be delivered tomorrow.

I need to get to work on the finish work on the soffits and painting the ceiling so that I can move on to the veneer. A friend of mine told me he will have some time to help me with the veneer the week of Christmas. I definitely want to take advantage of the extra set of hands.

Not to over simplify things, but at a high level I only have a few tasks left before the theater is finished:

• Terminate wiring
• Finish Ceiling
• Veneer soffits
• Build Columns
• Acoustic treatments
• Carpet
• Screen wall

Heck, that's not much. I might even be done by this weekend

Oops... Kind of forgot the gear. Theater wouldn't be much fun without it.

Speaking of speakers, I have made the decision that the budget just isn't going to allow me to buy the custom commercial speakers I really want. I have slowly drifted passed my original theater budget and still need to buy a screen, pre-processor and amps in addition to the speakers.

It is looking like I am going to have to go slightly over budget if I get the screen I really want. I still need to make a final decision on the pre-processor and amps, but I am planning to temporarily use my Onkyo until the budget recovers a bit. That leaves very little for the speakers. I originally budgeted a fair amount for the speakers, but if I go that route, it will delay the whole project. I made the decision to go the DIY route and see how I like them. More info to come soon.

Sorry Tim, I skimmed over that sentence a little too quickly the first time I read it and I thought you were talking about the outfit you were going to wear when you watch your first movie in your theater .

Now I know why Big made a comment about wanting to get out of Indiana as soon as possible.

Mike,

I have avoided deadlines up until now, but this sounds like a challenge. I have decided to set a goal of having the theater done by my son's birthday which is the week after St. Patrick's day.

Now, please excuse me while I get back to work...

Weekend update, although I didn't take any pictures because the theater is very dusty. I did take a break from the theater to go see the Hobbit with my son and wife. It's always nice to take a break to spend time with the family - even if it does slow the build down .

I now have most of the wiring in the closet routed and trimmed so that I can terminate them once the keystones arrive. I still have a little bit of work to do for the whole house sound wiring, but that is close as well. The keystones should arrive tomorrow.

I also started prepping the sides of the soffits for paint. I filled all of the screw holes and the gap between the soffit and ceiling. In most spots it was very tight, but in a few spots the drywall wasn't perfectly flat, so I wanted to fill that gap. the gaps were only wide enough to slip a piece of paper or two through, but I think I wanted the soffit and ceiling joint to be seamless. I have sanded about half of it and hope to finish the rest of the sanding tomorrow. I will probably give the screw holes one more light coat before finish sanding everything.

I want to have the sides of the soffits painted so that I can attach the bottoms next week while I have help. I think I may try out my new HVLP sprayer for the primer and paint. Lots to do between now and then, so this will be my primary focus.

99 days and counting...

That may be an option. Looking at the list of remaining tasks is a bit overwhelming. Hopefully I can pull it off.

98 days and counting...

There are a lot of things that can go wrong when terminating your own cable (poor connections, wrong pinout, etc). I think I may still give one a try. I have some cable testing equipment, so I will know right away if an issue is caused by the wiring or the unit itself.

Even with work being crazy and me scrambling to prepare for the holidays, I still got some time in on the theater. I made some good progress, but I have a feeling that the next steps are going to be more time consuming that I originally anticipated. I hope the results are worth the effort.

I was able to finish the final sanding on the sides of my soffits during the seek. Everything turned out great. With that done, I was anxious to get them painted. I originally was going to wait until this weekend to start painting, but i wanted to see how they looked. In addition, I was looking for an excuse to use my new HVLP spayer . I stopped and picked up some primer on my way home Thursday. Like the walls, I asked them to tint it as dark as they could. Ended up with a dark gray again. With the primer in place, it really changes the look of the soffits. The soffits and ceiling now look continuous.





I didn't want to shoot the black paint after the light tray was installed, so I painted the perimeter of the ceiling and the sides of the soffit using my sprayer. I have seen black Roscoe paint in person before, but I have never used it myself. It was really easy to work with. Diluting it per the instructions on the can worked really well in my sprayer. It seemed really thin, but I have read other reviews that said the results were not as good when not diluted per the instructions. The only other issue I ran into was spraying the paint too heavy at first. I dialed the sprayer down and then it worked fantastic. It was amazing how painting just the perimeter of the room sucks the light right out of the room. Even with two 500 watt halogen work lamps, it was noticeably darker in the room. That's ok - that's exactly what I was looking for.





With the perimeter painted, I wanted to try out my idea of veneering my light tray with oak. I did one of the small sections of the soffit in the rear of the theater to start with since it was easier to work with the smaller pieces. First I cut and attached the bottom of the soffit. I rounded over the edges before installing.



Next I glued and clamped the edge of the light tray.



While waiting for the glue to dry, I cut the hole for the can light and filled the screw holes.





After a final sanding, I wrapped the soffit in white oak veneer. In the past when I have veneered I have used contact cement, but I can't imagine trying to use it overhead. It is hard enough on a bench in front of you, but with gravity working against me, I just couldn't see it being very easy. I decided to go with a PSA adhesive attached. It ended up working out great. It made it much easier to work overhead.

Even thought the edges were rounded over, I was worried that the corners may be too sharp and could cause the veneer to split. Luckily, working it slowly, it worked out fine. I am still a bit worried about finishing the rest of the light tray, but I will just need to take my time and work carefully.

I have to admit, I am very pleased with the results so far. If the rest of the light tray comes out this good, it will be well worth the effort.

Thanks Tim. I think I got the idea for the sprayer from you, so thanks again for the idea. It is amazing.

By PVA, I assume you are talking about the vinyl veneer? This is actual oak veneer, but I had the place I bought it from apply a 3M adhesive to it. They also suggested that I not use a roller because they said I may not get as good of an adhesion. I actually used a scraper that they recommended. It worked really well. Even though I had rubbed it out with my hands first, I could feel the wood pressing down and flattening out. I know contact cement would have been the ideal solution, but I just couldn't imagine trying to get everything lined up overhead in one shot and not screwing it up.

Thanks Mike. My wife sure will appreciate that pass . Last night she asked me "you aren't planning to work on the theater on Christmas are you? You can take one day off". I got the hint. No theater for the next few days, but then back at it. I have a deadline to hit.

ps. Good thing she didn't say anything about reading AVS .

Thanks RTROSE! Merry Christmas to you and the rest of the AVS family as well. Enjoy the holiday.

Wow, that's a real bummer Mike. How hard is it going to be to run new speaker wires? Also, have you confirmed that you have a good ground on the RG6. Make sure the fitting on the end is properly grounded to the jacket on the wire.

I ran both speaker wire and RG6 just in case. I have one of each running to the front and two in the rear. That should hopefully cover all of the configurations I might need.

Have you started building your speakers yet?

There are two electrical circuits running to the front of the room through the same soffit as the speaker wiring (including the RG6 for the sub). One is for two electrical outlets that will be on their own circuit and the other is for the lights above the stage which will be on a lighting circuit. In addition, I tried to separate the electrical from the low voltage as much as possible. the electrical all runs through the lower/outer corner of the soffit and the low voltage wiring all runs through a plenum rated flexible conduit in the upper/inner corner of the soffit. Hopefully this combination will prevent problems. Worst case, I could run an amp off the rack and use the 12 gauge speaker wires I ran.

About your other question.... Was I supposed to be working on the theater this week? Maybe I will post a teaser photo later today. Santa did bring me my own digital camera so that I will stop borrowing my wife's all the time.