Madhouse Theater project - Page 2

Been a rough week around here. I snuck in a few more rim joist insulation with great stuff here and there. That's really been about it. All 4 of us have been fighting colds. Found out today my oldest has an ear infection and I have some kind of flu that has me totally laid up. I didn't even go to work today.

Seeing some other progress posts today made me sad that I haven't gotten anywhere. I have just been spending more time in AutoCAD trying to get more detail in my plans. I ended up adding a room at the back of the theater for the equipment rather than just having all that dead space. Access will be from the other side, by the stairs and bathroom. I might even have room for a small desk and my own "office" since I don't have room for one upstairs. I also drew up what I want to do under the stairs for a built in movie storage with the blurry player included. So on the planning side I continue to see progress.

Been meaning to post my current layout, but won't be much else for another week or so. Just wanted to let any followers know I am still making progress, even if it's not in the basement!

A few pictures.

The obligatory chairs. I asked the wife if she wanted to come sit in the theater. Long pause. "What do you mean?" I put chairs down there. "Tomorrow."





The rim joist work I've been doing. Along with a closeup of the one that was wet. After removing the yellow fiberglass it has dried out. Still need to fix the root cause.





I was cleaning up as we are having people over for my daughters second birthday on Saturday. I know a few people are interested, so I want to give them some feel for the spaces. So I wasted time once more moving things into a storage area that I'll have to move again to put that drywall up. Who knew you had to become a mover?

Sadly, no. As I said, we had company all weekend. I sold some snowmobiles that had been taking up part of my garage, so I spent Sunday in the garage. And the plague continues to run its course through my family. I can tell you that I have a week of vacation coming up and my dad is coming over for a few days. Hopefully we can knock out the framing.

I can see how timing schedules and milestone dates are missed on these projects! I would like to be done around September (randomly, as that is when the Star Wars blu's come out) My wife would like to be able to use the basement for New Years Eve. I'll feel a lot better to see the framing done. Also hoping to get the drywall up on the back side of the storage wall and get the door hung. I want to keep the dust of our stuff as much as possible for the rest of the project.

I'll try to find time tomorrow to get my layout updated here. Over the weekend I think I decided to make the equipment room not so much a room; no door. Just an open space and I will also open the stairs on that side. So coming down the stairs both sides will be open below floor level. One side to the open part of the basement, the other side to the equipment area.

Hopefully progress will get moving again soon! I need to look into getting logan'd...

Here is the updated layout. I haven't updated for taking out the door and opening up the equipment area. I will also double stud the back wall of the theater if that is no longer a room. The rack also won't face into the theater. It will face down and I'll just have room to walk around it and wire it from the back. I need to develop that space a bit more. I should probably spend some time laying out that bathroom soon, too. I think the wife is getting mad at me for not spending any time on the details of the rest of the basement. I keep telling her there just isn't that much!

Ugh, the bad luck continues. The other night I made it bad down in the basement and sealed up a few more joist pockets. It's actually coming along nicely. I woke up about 3 hours after that and knew one thing, I caught the flu my wife, her parents, and my kids had. A few hours after that, my daughter woke up crying with a temp of 104. So my wife took her to the hospital while I suffered through the flu. We found out she had influenza A, and she got tamiflu. I called our doctor and got a script called in for my wife and I. Yesterday was brutal, but I'm shocked how much better I feel today. I feel like I got hit by a truck, but I'm not having anymore flu symptoms. My wife is recovering as well. My youngest still just has a stuffy nose, and my oldest (still only 2) is finally starting to eat a bit today. Hopefully she's getting better.

In my down time, I have been reading more threads here, and after reading SandmanX's build (wow), I think I'm going to do a star ceiling. His theater is as close to what I am picturing as I have seen. I'm not planning columns and my still undecided on my wall coverings, but my ceiling and screen wall will be a lot like his.

Just spoke to Ted to get some IB-3 clips to isolate the front and back walls as well as the sofit. So unless something comes up at work, next week I hope to frame the entire basement. I'm going to look into getting all the lumber and drywall delivered into the basement. I'm sure it's not free, but might be money well spent. I'm looking at 170 framing studs (including some pressure treated) and 90 sheets of drywall. I need to double check my math on the drywall. The more I think about it, 60 for my theater sounds like too much.

Yeah. I double checked my math and I was around 27 sheets for 1 layer. Double it and add 10% and you are at 60. I figure I'll have other things not accounted for so it won't go to waste!

It's just what I've come to call our home. When we moved here, it was my wife and me with our 3 cats. We've since added 2 dogs and 2 kids. Try getting those 7 to sit down and relax all at the same time. It's a madhouse!

The wife keeps bringing up another one of those. I keep telling her not to even bring it up until our youngest is 2. I'm not doing another 16 month spread between kids. I'm already doing 2 sets of diapers. Don't need a third, thanks.

This also allows me another 16 months (we have a 2 yo and 8 month old now) to get my theater done before we talk about another budgetary drain.

Am I going to regret if I don't do something for a subfloor? I was just planning to put down padding and carpet right on the concrete, but I see everyone doing a lot of extra stuff for their floors. Are these for acoustical reasons, moisture, or both?

I'm on for a big push next week. I've got the whole week off. Now I just have to stay healthy. My dad is coming to help starting Tuesday. Before that I've got a few projects upstairs and in the garage and hopefully I'll find some time to get a few things in the basement. I'm planning to order all my material for delivery before Tuesday. My goal is to have the whole basement framed and hopefully drywall the storage area and hang that door. We'll check back and see how I did.

After seeing your samples I ordered a bunch for my theater. Probably way too early, but I am so excited to get this going! My wife went to a local cabinet maker and got brochures for the kitchen/bar area and now she is excited to get that moving. Always good to have her in the game. Now if my computer would hurry up and save these files so I can leave before 6 on a Friday before a week off! Ugh!

I think I will stick to just throwing down padding and carpet on the concrete. I haven't had any moisture problems down there and I know the whole basement is wrapped. Hopefully I don't come to regret that decision.

Didn't get as far as I wanted over the weekend. I had a pretty bad sinus infection that was keeping me down Friday and Saturday. I started taking some antibiotics and by Sunday I was starting to come around. So of my upstairs tasks, all I got done was painting the family room on Sunday and Monday. It was a pretty big job though, and turned out great! I had planned to paint the master bath as well as make a dent in organizing the garage. No paint in the master bath, but that should be a quick job. As for the garage, it snowed this morning (yes, it's April), so I think it's excusable to not have worked outside this weekend.

The material as well as my dad are scheduled to show up in the morning. Paid a bit extra to have Home Depot carry the drywall down stairs. I have no desire to make 90 2-man trips up and down the stairs when I can pay someone else a few bucks to do it! Bad enough we'll have to make 30 trips each to get all the 2x4's down there.

I also added to my tool collection with a Bosch self leveling laser level. It's got a tripod mount on the bottom, so it's pretty flexible in what I can do with it! I'm still tempted to get my own miter saw and some air tools. I thin I'll get the air tools at some point, but my dad brought his miter saw over and that is doing the job. Not sure what use I'll have for one after the basement is done.

Tonight I went down there and started getting organized. I'm starting to understand why people post in their threads at 2 and 3 in the morning. Last night I couldn't fall asleep and found myself down there at 2 in the morning cutting drywall to attach to the bottom of the steps.

I'm thinking about adding drywall to each step, similar to doing the subfloor above. Then stuffing it with insulation and drywalling over the whole thing. Is that a waste of energy? The stairs are in the notch at the back of the theater, so I'm trying to minimize the sound of people coming down the stairs.

Midweek progress report. And there is progress to report! Started out Tuesday a little rough. My dad left the lights on in his car, so he had to wait for his battery charge to head over. Home Depot shouldn't let their service desk take delivery orders, because they don't deliver drywall into basements anymore. So I cancelled the drywall, but I did get the lumber. I carried this pile down on my own.



My dad got there just as I finished with those and helped me carry the treated ones down and we got started. This was our progress for day 1. The screen wall (double stud behind the screen really) and we got some drywall up in the storage area.



And a close up of the double studs and the IB3 clips from Ted and John. I need to call them to order a few more.



Day 2 we had a few helpers in the basement.





We got the entire right wall done, the double stud back wall, the decoupled wall next to the stairs, and a few more walls in the storage area drywalled.

Looking through the back wall of the theater.



The double studs and the decoupling at the back of the theater.



The back of the theater. My theater has a back now!



On deck for tomorrow is to finish moving things around in the storage area so we can get a few things out of the family room part of the basement so we can get that exterior wall framed. After that my dad will probably head out and I might work on the under side of the stairs. Get that filled with insulation and get drywall on the bottom.

So some pretty good progress! I am at a point where I can start calling on my brother-in-law to start on some electrical, pull some low voltage, and figure out how to do my sofit on the right around the plumbing.

Well I sort of aborted mission on the basement last week. We finished framing the exterior wall and before I could get started on the under side of the stairs, i realized how nice it was outside. After that I was distracted and working in the garage for 3 days. I built some shelves and worked on organizing that so I can comfortably get 2 cars in my 3 car garage again. Hopefully I can get in the basement for a few projects this week. Hopefully I can get the stairs boxed in and frame that wall this week. I know what I want to do for the speaker and sub cables from the equipment closet to the screen wall and I want to get the sofit framed. I'll be back with pictures after I get those done.

I squeezed in a bit of time downstairs last night. Ran a few supports across the stairs and started stuffing the underside with insulation and put up 1 panel of drywall. I ran out of insulation from my rim joists, so I switched to the wall under the stairs. Got the outsides of it together but didn't have all the dimensions I needed handy for the built-in shelving I want to do. I don't want to put the wall up until I've finished closing up the stairs anyway. I'm not sure I need to close off the under side of the stairs, but I do know once I've framed all the walls I won't be able to. It's minimal time and expense, so I might as well do it.

Today I'm in here reading and something that has been eating at me came back. I'm very overwhelmed by acoustic treatments and bass traps. I think I've got a grasp on the soundproofing and I think I'll have the best foundation I can have for the room. But once it comes time to start doing the treatments and bass traps I feel like I'm in over my head. What worries me about it now is I'm spending all this time and money on soundproofing and if the treatments aren't right, it's all a waste. Not completely I guess, as I'll be keeping sound from the rest of the house which is a main goal. But I'll not be taking advantage of the space. So I guess right now I just need some reassurance that what I'm doing now is setting a quality foundation and I can work out these other elements later. My plan was to do fabric frames around the whole room, and then I will even be able to move linacoustic or anything else around behind those panels to dial in the room.

Another area, which I think is related, is the construction of the stage and riser and what to fill them with. Whether to use the riser as a bass trap, etc. I've tried reading the acoustic treatments thread, but I don't seem to have the vocabulary.

So hopefully I'm on the right track! The more I'm reading it appears I should go through now and put SilenSeal around my wall sill plates. Is this the right thing to do?

Thanks for any help.

Thanks fotto. That is helpful. I have been considering buying plans. Especially since my room is not a simple rectangle. Like I said, I figured everything I have done to date should have nothing to do with treatments. I'm doing what I can to isolate the walls, but once drywall is up is when I get lost. And excellent point on the columns and the first reflection point! I'm sure that has caught a few people!

Thanks Jim. Glad to have someone review my plans and confirm that I'm not digging myself any glaring holes to step in later.

Progress has pretty much stopped. I'm sure I'm the first person to find it hard to get in the basement when the weather starts getting nice. I've gotten a LOT of outdoor projects done in the last couple weekends. I also had an in-law visit last weekend. This weekend my sister and brother-in-law are moving, so I don't anticipate any major progress. I'm also at a point where I need more studs to proceed, and I don't want to buy them until I know I can use them within a few days. Soon I hope. The wife keeps asking if we'll still be done this year. Her target is New Years. Mine is more like September/October. I'm sure you're all laughing now...

Very discouraged here. Things just keep getting busier and I haven't done anything. I sketched up roughly where I want outlets, lights and such and started talking to some guys here about how to do the wiring. I'm planning to start roughing it in soon, but the weekends have been full all month. Evenings have been full of caring for kids with pink eye, ear infections and anything else you can imagine. Why am I paying a daycare to get my kids sick so my wife or I can take off work and stay home with them again??? I think we could do that for free with healthy kids.

We have a few shows we like to watch that are ending next week, so I'm hoping to free up an hour or two after the kids go to bed. Maybe things will start moving again then.

Blasted nice weather. I'm halfway through assembling a big swingset for the kids, but progress in the basement is nill. Then I read in another thread that the best way to halt progress is to predict progress. So I predict no progress...

I did order some Berklines from Roman while I still could. They are coming Friday. Those who have gotten them, will 1 person be able to get them off the truck? The trucking company said they will be on a 53' truck 4 feet off the ground and they are just over 100 lbs each. Not sure if the wife will be able to help me. She is down for the count this week with sinus infection induced vertigo. I'm not sure if I'll be able to have someone else there. Think a few green pieces of paper would get the driver to help me?

Just looking for others experiences with getting them unloaded. Thanks!

Thanks for the encouragement. I have relaxed on the timelines and just realized it won't be done by September, and likely won't be done this year. I'll get back to it though. We've continued to have health problems as well. The wife is currently recovering from a sinus infection that completely took her down. She hasn't driven a car since last Saturday.

Anyway, here is the latest plan. Excuse all the yellow lines; I'm trying to guesstimate where the first reflection points will be. I was initially going to put the equipment under the stairs, but didn't want to do a big expensive pull out rack. I didn't want to make a little cubby to crawl in to do wiring on it. So I opted to put the equipment in another room/closet. I went back and forth on the storage area and realized I had all this dead space behind the second row that I could use. I can't put a door into it from inside the room, so it's kind of a hike. I'm debating making an opening into the room to see the gear, but then I've got a big hole in my sound proof room. So presently it will just be in the other room, not visible in the theater. I might even get a 9x5 office in the house! I currently don't have a single space to myself (which the theater will more or less be I guess.) It would be nice to have enough space for a desk, chair and monitor. Maybe some shelves to store my photography gear on.

I'm going to use the space under the stairs for custom movie shelving with the blu ray player located with the movies. That is the last framing for the theater I need to work out. Trying do figure the best way to isolate behind that space. It's going to be a bit difficult because of the slope of the stairs. That and electrical are my next steps (along with getting my plumber cousin to come out and see if he wants to do the bathroom and kitchen for me.)

Still no progress. I guess that's the nice part about doing it myself. It's at my own pace. I need to pick up the pace.

I did get these guys in though. I know the cart is a ways before the horse, but I liked these enough I wanted to get them before they are all gone!



I also assembled this, which accounted for 2 weekends. It's not as though I've been sitting around doing nothing!



Next up on the basement/theater project:

1. Contact plumber to get quotes.
2. Finish some framing and the sofit around the plumbing.
3. Start electrical.
4. Add some drywall/GG to the subfloor above the theater?

At this point I have almost no material on hand for any of these items except GG and some clips. The other aspect to buying the chairs early, I NEED to finish my theater now!