Nick's Homebrew Bar and Entertainment Area - Page 27

Quote:

Originally Posted by BllDo 

Is muslin transparent enough to be used for acoustical purposes?

I was wondering the same thing.  Also, I am guessing it would be better to use something that is fire retardant.

Thanks Spaceman.  That looks like it would work well.  It says "good acoustical qualities".  How thick is it?  Would it pass the "blow" test?  I also didn't see where it says that it is fire resistant.  If it is, I think I will order it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by BllDo 

That looks like good stuff. Thanks Spaceman.

Edit: Ouch, shipping is little much, but still cheap for FR.

How much were you quoted for shipping?  My quote was $15 for 10 yards (haven't ordered yet).

I didn't have much time to work on the theater this weekend. I am going to be extremely busy between now and the beginning of next week.  I am using the bits of time I do have to do some planning.

My GOM samples should be in today.  I want to make some color decisions soon so I can start ordering the last of the materials.  I also ordered the cloth to cover the treatments behind the screen.  I went ahead and ordered the Rose brand speaker cloth.

One other decision I am trying to make is on my soffit lighting.  I would like to do a rope light, but I can't seem to find exactly what I want.  I would like to use color changing LEDs, but most of them are only 12 volts and have a very short length limit.  The 120 volt versions I have seen are extremely expensive.  I may have to use a standard rope light until I can find a better solution.  Does anyone have any suggestions for LED rope lights?  I would like to have one continuous rope around the entire room.

Thanks Scott.  I will give you a call later.

Well, the super bowl is finally over and I actually have time to think about the theater again.  Time to kick this thing into gear or else I won't have anything done by my deadline.

Yesterday I started on the front wall behind the screen.  I framed out the wall with some 2x2 strips so that I would have something to staple the fabric to.  I then primed and painted the soffit area that will be behind the screen.  I want everything behind the screen to be black so that nothing shows through the AT screen.  I ended up using the Rosco black paint.

Once that was dry, I applied 2" OC 703 across the entire front wall.

I fastened the OC 703 using 3" screws and fender washers

I then covered the entire wall in speaker cloth.  I ended going with the Rose brand since it was wide enough to cover the entire wall with one piece and was a lot less expensive that GOM.  I stapled everything in place with an upholstery stapler then I went back and trimmed the entire wall.  Sorry for the poor picture quality.  The flash really picked up the dust in the room.

I am extremely happy with the results.  The fabric I received is extremely black and looks great.  The only thing I need to do is go over the piece with a steamer to try to get the wrinkle out where the fabric was folded for shipping.  It runs the length of the wall.  It isn't terrible, but I want to see if I can get rid of it.

With the exception of the phone line, I am done with the wiring behind my rack.  I now have everything that is needed in place.

I finally cut the drywall for the front and side of the rack closet.  I installed the side, but am holding off on the front until I make sure I have everything installed correctly for the rack opening.

I have 6 switches installed below the sub-panel to control the lights.  I just put cheap $1 switches for now, but these will be replaced by zwave dimmers so that I can automate them.  I didn't want to have a big bank of switches at the front of the theater, so I put them in the back and will have a scene controller as you enter the room.

I hope to knock out some odds and ends this week and then get started on my columns next weekend.  

Thanks Tim.  I plan to make some sort of hinged cover or removable panel for the sub-panel so that you don't see it.  I used adjustable boxes for the switches so that I could extend them out if necessary.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Geordon 


We bought rolls of plain old 120V rope lighting on the after-Christmas sales and strung them together. Split the run in two, but it is on the same circuit, so they are controlled together. They are not LED, but the price was right, and I can easily swap them out down the road if I want.

That's an excellent idea.  At this point, I will probably do something like this since it is much cheaper and upgrade in the future.  I found some 120V LED rope lights, but they are single color and very expensive.  Single color incandescent will be fine for now.

do you dim yours? 

Out of curiosity, which should I do first - carpet or wall treatments? Is there much of a risk of damage to the wall treatments during carpet install?  I was planning to do carpet last, but wasn't sure which is most commonly done first.

I got a few things done in the theater this weekend, but first I should provide an update on some of my recent decisions.

I was recently reviewing the complete basement project and trying to determine what remained to finish.  It didn't take me long to figure out that I am way over budget.  Yes, I saved money on many things, but I also upgraded or added many things.  With that said, I decided I was going to have to make some changes if I wanted to finish the theater any time soon.

One of the biggest expenses in my theater was going to be my speakers.  I had previously mentioned that I was planning to buy a complete set of Salk speakers for my theater.  This seemed like an obvious place to make some changes.  By selecting different speakers, I could get the budget back on track.  More importantly, I could always upgrade in the future once the wallet has recovered.

After doing lots of research, I decided I could get the most bang for the buck by going DIY in the short term.  I can build a very high quality speaker for a fraction of the price.  I finally decided to build a set of SEOS speakers for my theater.  Here is what I will be using:

Left/Center/Right: Fusion 12 Tempest

Surrounds (4): Fusion 8 Alchemy

Subs (2): 15" MK III Titanic

I spent some time over the past week gluing up the cabinets.  They still need to be sanded, filled and painted, but things are moving along.  Here are a couple of photos of the build:

Surrounds:

'

Subs:

Mains:

And here is the full set of cabinets:

I am really looking forward to completing them, but for now, I will likely focus on the room itself.

My son and I also spent about an hour on the table saw cutting up all of the main pieces for my columns.  I laid everything out ahead of time so we wouldn't have to stand outside in the cold any longer than necessary (it was 14 degrees here today).  Hopefully I can start assembling the columns this week.  My plan is to have 4 main columns at the rear of the theater for the surrounds and two "false" columns in the front of the theater that will only house some switches and balance the look of the room.  The front two columns will look the same, but won't be quite as deep.

I also started working on the panel size and layout for my walls.  I have a pretty good idea of what I want it to look like.  I just need to finalize the exact dimensions.