Andy's Maple Ale Theatre - Page 5

(end of August - early Sept)

After much wiggling, the far wall cabinets are in. These things have been taking up space in my garage for over a year now so it is great to get them installed. I actually had to install them twice because of the change in stone vaneer (more on that later) meant I needed less of a gap to accommodate the stone.



But when it came time to put our counter top in, things didn't go as well. I measured and re-measured the heck out of that thing before we ordered the custom top. However the girl at HD who gave me all the required tolerances for the end caps actually forgot to subtract them herself. Oops. So a week later when the top arrived it was a few inches too long and didn't fit. Arg!



So back to HD and the girl realized what had happened. Turns out she is a floor manager or something, but she was great. She gave me free saw blades and offered rentals if I wanted to trim it down myself, and if I mess it up she will replace the whole thing anyway. This was appealing because I could then cut it at a slight angle to make the top fit between the walls super perfectly. She spent lots of time with me getting all the stuff I needed in the store and consulting all the old timers there to make sure I did the best way.

So in the end I cut off the excess, and I cut it at a very slight angle, and holy cow that counter top couldn't fit into that twelve foot space any tighter or more perfect. Woo hoo !

Mystery photo:

What's a corbel ?

Ordered the stone for the fireplace wall and counter wall.

In the meantime, time to work on the mantel - it needs to be up before we do the stone work.

Found a couple not too far north that accumulates old barn beams and makes them into mantels (and some other things). She had a fair bit to choose from, however everything is big and long. I have just a little fireplace wall and so it would have to be cut - custom job.



So in the end (just like everything else it seems) I ended up not taking a finished product but just got an old barn beam from her and I would do all the cutting and staining. The good part of this is that I can use the excess to make rustic-beam corbels (are they really corbels? or are they just faux cross-beams ? I dunno!). Regardless, I cut off the end and then made two corbels from that - including fake weathering from my jigsaw, hammer, and sandpaper.





Stained it all up - looks great !



I love this knot ...

Mantle mounted !

Certainly !

Here is a diagram:



(A) I bought thick metal strapping (can't bend) and attached to backside of the mantle with 2-3 large wood screws (3"-4"). Where you mount them on the mantle should line up with your studs on the wall.

(B) I then held the mantle up and screwed the top and bottoms of the straps to the studs on the other sides.

If you were to have one side of the strap longer than the other, I would guess that you want the longer part to be on the top. The force of the weight of the mantle will rotate along the bottom edge (Bottom Right in my diagram) thus pulling the top mounting screws (b) outward.

I did a test with my left over 18" chunk mounted onto a single 2x4 with only one screw on each end. I then flipped it over, hung it upside down etc...

Hope it helps!

Stone Arrives !

(October)



My kids helped me move all the stone down to the basement. One would load up a milk crate and the other would unload in the basement, and I would do all the shuttling. We laid all 100 square feet out so we could pick 'n' choose as we went along.



Built a frame of the exact dimensions of the far wall, and started the jigsaw.



The big hassle is that I had to trim almost every piece in some fashion or another. Which meant running upstairs and outside, cut, and then come back down to see if it fits.

This is going to take some time ...

(insert several weeks of no progress here)

(including lots of staring at all that rock I have littered all over the basement)

(November update)

We had a great halloween party, and I finally came to the conclusion that it was going to take me a looong time to do both stone walls. We'll never be done by Christmas. (there, I said it, I have a deadline!)

Got a few quotes and then had someone come in to finish the walls. It took 3 guys two long days to do it. That makes me feel better - and it looks great.



While they were cutting away I worked on lots of little things that needed to be done, like the centre channel stand:



And refinishing the stairway handrailing. It was kind of gross really - sanding 8 years of skin and sweat off untreated pine.
Once it was all sanded thoroughly I stained it and will varnish it later.

Stone Done !!

And boy do I love it.

Fireplace:



and the far wall:

Last of the catch up notes:

- ordered Seymour Centerstage XD material for the screen.
- last minute reconfiguring of the riser from an internal wiring point of view. I wanted the capability to gut all the rope lighting and replace it if I needed to, but that took some thinking. All good now.
- had to clear out and mega sweep the basement for the carpet guys.
- Hey ! I never finished tap-con'ing the corner of the floor - stayed up late last night finishing that off.

oh, and ..

... - I BOUGHT A PROJECTOR !

(faint - thud) :-)

But it's just sitting there in it's box ... all lonely ...

Please open me ??

Carpet going in!


Edited by andymo - 12/15/12 at 6:23am

It's actually not real stone! It is a manufactured thin stone vaneer product - that way you don't have to do a mortar and lathe layer. I was looking at the stone vaneers that come in pre-determined jig-aw pieces, but I always saw the lines. This stuff looked much more realistic to me, but takes a bit more work to get it to fit tight.

Here is a picture from the StoneRox box:

Carpet done !

Here are the standard photos.

I couldn't figure out why the carpet was looking purple in the photos (not that there is anything wrong with purple ... ) until I realized that I had taken all of those photos with the camera set up for the hockey arena.

So, the colour is not quite right in the photos, but the carpet is nice and comfy and squishy !









Woo hoo !

and the kids gaming area is more or less done.

I think this sequence of photos shows the story of the last 2-3 years.





"It's great Dad !  And we no longer have to wear shoes to go in the basement !"

The boys actually rolled around on the carpet once it was done. Great fun.

Installing the rope lights on the riser steps !

Finally get to attach the rope lights that have been lying on the floor for weeks.

To mount them snugly under the lip I used Fencing Staples:



and ta da ! (once again, my camera white balance is off - still set up for the hockey arena. Gotta remember to switch that back sooner)



Cat approved. Hey ! STOP EATING THE RISER !!

LOL - yes, thinking of some sort of wrap-around product. There are a few to choose from, but probably not until next year (out of cash now).

We HAVE had semi-serious thoughts about wrapping one of the jack posts in sisal rope and make a giant scratching/climbing pole!

Building the Screen


I am still undecided about my masking approach, so for safety's sake I attached metal strips to the top and bottom boards in each of the 'corners'. So if I decide to use a magnet-based mask, they are there.



Putting it all together. Poplar boards, 6" corners. Gotta love pre-Christmas sales at Fabricland !



Test... just because ...



Putting the Seymour Centrestage XD on (I must have walked 40 laps around the screen doing this) ...



and BOOM BABY !!

Wireless Engineering ! Well, actually, more strategy these days ... I guess I haven't done any real engineering for a while LOL.