msujdog's Media Room, Game Room, Bar Build

Greetings fellow AVSers! I have been a long time lurker on this forum, and I have to say, this board has served as both the inspiration for my project as well as a tremendous knowledge base. There were so many questions I had as I went through my project that were answered by some simple searches on this board. So I hope that my experiences that I document here can help inspire and educate future remodelers!

My thread is a little different in the fact that I am already 3/4 of the way done with my project. I'm gonna walk you through the first three sections and finish up on the last part when my bank account catches back up. (I seriously drained it on this man cave).

Here's how this will break down:

1. The plan
2. The Game Room remodel
3. The FLOOD (oooh, yeah, my world got f'ed up)
4. The Media Room remodel
5. The Bar build

So without further ado, let's get started.

A couple things about me. My passions include homebrewing and/or drinking quality beer, great AV experience during movies, and music. I wanted to incorporate all of these things into my design. The important things to consider was a) good sound throughout, b) a bar to showcase my brewing projects, and c) a play area for favorites like ping pong, darts, foosball, etc. I wanted plenty of storage so I could keep the area as clean looking as possible.

I moved into my current Michigan house in 2006 and was immediately taken by the wide, open, semi-finished basement. The previous owners had at some point had a finishing company come through and install drop ceiling and a strange paneling system. The panels were drywall with a textured surface almost like wallpaper.


This is the north side of the basement. It is divided in half by the stairwell.


The view from the north room toward the stairwell and the south room.


Looking from the south room toward the north room.

Here's a view of the media room with our old crappy, mismatched couches and the TV right after we moved in.



A view toward the small closet that houses my kegerator.


I started working on a plan to take the basement in sections. I drew up this little diagram and started saving money.

I finally started the project in the late winter of 2008.



I drew up some sketches for both rooms. I figured the easiest place to start was on the game room. I was happy with the basic structure of the room (and I couldn't really expand anyway, because there was concrete on the other side of the paneling). I wasn't, however, too excited about the paneling. I wanted it to look like real drywall. I also wanted a wainscoting feel that would compliment the bar I planned to build.

Here's a picture of the sketch I made at the time:



The room at the start:



Instead of ripping down the paneling, I just put about two or three layers of joint compound over the whole thing and sanded it down. It was labor intensive, but pretty cheap. Here I am with my little helper:



Here's the perimeter mudded completely:



Next, I sanded and painted. You can see the paneling going up here. I considered expensive oak plywood or making wainscoting from scratch, but these 8' x 4' pre-primed panels from Home Depot worked great cut in half.



I painted the panels prior to installing them, which was a ton easier. It was hard to get all the creases and grooves completely full of the high gloss black paint, but the roller made quick work of it. Here is a close up of it installed:



Here's the finished product. I have a hard time replicating the paint color here with my camera, but I'm really happy with it. It's Ralph Lauren "Broome", and it has a real warmth next to the black paneling. The pictures on the wall are a tribute to our hometown's best brewery, Founders. (Amazing brewery if you haven't tried any of their beers!). The pictures are blown up versions of their beer labels, and it took a special favor to get them done. I'm really happy with the way they turned out.





Finally, I built a drink rail across the south wall and put a few bar stools under there. It's a great place to sit, drink, and taunt the ping pong players.



I finished the project in just about 2 months, with most of the delays being due to the fact that I did most of the work during the naps of my son. I got it done just in time for a March Madness party in 2009. Little did I know that the basement was about to become the full focus of my attention...

I had only seen water in my basement two times before -- once when the washing machine hose came undone and once when there was terrential downpour. Even then, there was just a 2 x 2 section of carpet that was wet. I cleaned it up easily with a steam cleaner vacuum.

Spring of 2010 was a very, very wet year in Michigan. It rained, well, a ton. It seemed that every time the ground might have a chance to dry up, another rain would blow through and saturate the water table again.

It was a rainy day in May when all hell broke loose. I was getting ready for bed and looking outside -- there was one of those crazy terrential downpours that I mentioned before. It's the kind of rain that comes in so fast that the streets can't keep up. I fell asleep in the middle of the storm.

About two hours later, my 8 year old comes in and wakes me up. "Daddy", she says, "I hear a scary noise, like a monster." It was 1 am, two hours after I'd fallen asleep. I was not happy to be awake. I took her back to her bed and told her I'd check it out. About half way down from the second floor, I heard it -- "BOOOM". That wasn't thunder. I searched around the perimeter of the house but didn't see anything. It was still raining. I heard it again. "PFFFFFFF". It sounded like it was in the basement, so I crept down. I heard it again, this time VERY loud. It was deep, explosive, bass. As soon as my foot hit the bottom of the basement, it all became very clear:



My foot was soaked. I looked toward the north end of the basement, and there was my subwoofer, sitting in water. It was shorting out, making explosive bass pops so loud that it woke up my daughter two floors above.

This was the room, full of water, even if you can't see it very well from this picture:


I moved everything over to the opposite side of the basement that was electronic or valuable and tried to go back to bed, but I didn't sleep much.

The next day I got my steam vacuum out and tried sucking up the water, but I'd fill up the vacuum with just 10 seconds of vacuuming. Dump. Start again. Dump. Worse yet, it seemed like the more I sucked, the more water seemed to come up from the ground. It didn't make any sense.

We had the insurance company come out, and they surveyed the damage and recommended a cleaning company. He told me the carpet would not be salvageable, so I ripped it out.



The company came out and put up huge dehumidifiers that tripped my breakers non stop. Two days later, another storm came through and flooded the basement AGAIN. This time, I was able to watch it. Water wasn't coming from the walls, it was coming from the microscopic, tiny cracks in the basement floor.

Another call to insurance, another deductible (separate floods are separate claims!), and more dehumidifiers. At this point, it was pretty silly, because water had saturated all the carpet tack strips and the bottom of the drywall.



I started doing some research, trying to figure out what was going on. I talked to a few of my neighbors and found out that some of them had similiar problems. It all originated from the builder 30 years prior, who installed black corregated tiling around the exterior of the house and connected it to the storm sewers. The problem was, they built the sewers at a level differently than they do now, so when it would rain INCREDIBLY hard, the water would actually travel back up from the street towards the houses and saturate the exterior of the houses. In my case, the water table was so saturated that hydrostatic pressure was forcing water up through the concrete floors. Any tiny crack it could find was good enough for that water.

There was only one option -- find the pipe that connected my house to the street, dig it up, and cap it off.

I went to the township first, hoping to find plans of my house or the street sewer system. No luck. Then I went to the county, hoping for the same. No luck. One of the neighbors refered me to the plumbing company who did their house, and I gave them a call. The owner came out with top secret plans of our entire subdivision which he guarded like a treasure. He marched off where he thought the pipe was: 10 feet below my driveway. Crap. Guess I'm not doing this job by myself.

So I hired them to come out. It's a good thing I did. The pipe was 10 feet down, straight below buried electrical wires. Upon investigation, we found that one of the previous owners of the house must've had flooding problems, because there was post-construction interior tiling installed that ran into the basement drain. That drain connected to the sanitary sewer, something highly illegal to do these days. The company put in a sump pump for me as well, since I would need a way to discharge the water since I no longer had the exterior tiling to do so.



The rest of the summer I spent looking at my house from the perspective of, "how can I get rid of water?" I installed gutters, and in my last project, worked on the grading of the house. On the north side of the house -- where the flooding occured -- the ground actually swept back toward the house. I brought in 4 yards of dirt and relandscaped the entire area.

Before:



Adding dirt and grading properly:



The finished product:

Winter came, and the basement was still a mess. Everything was torn up and tossed on the game room side where the basment didn't flood. The wife and I agreed that we weren't spending any money on fixing it until we knew that the flooding wouldn't continue.

I was actually praying for a really wet spring in 2011, and we got one. I wanted a good test for the interior tiling & sump. Around March it kicked on for the first time, which was surprising, because it hadn't kicked on since it was installed back in August. As winter faded and spring arrived, the pump was kicking on more and more. We got another one of those terrential downpours, and I could literally hear the water coming through to the sump at a fast trickle rate. The pump would fire every two minutes.

Only one problem -- the pump was discharging into my yard. Our soil is mostly clay, so there was no where for it to go. It puddled up and soon became a swimming pool for my kids:


I knew that the water was basically making a big circle: out from the sump, into the yard, down into the ground, back to the sump, back to the yard, rinse and repeat. I had to get the water away from the house.

I decided to connect it to the storm sewer.

First, I had to re-route the PVC to run to the south side of my house.


The sump would have to discharge and run about 60 feet south toward the road. The plumbers had left me a pipe to connect to in case I wanted to do this when they capped it off the previous summer. It would just mean a lot of digging and tearing up an old, heaving sidewalk that needed to get replaced anyway.

Here's the sidewalk and where the pipe will exit the house (behind the wine barrel):



First, I tore up the old concrete. Good job laying it on clay, builders!!



I buried 4" PVC sewer pipe the rest of the way and was able to nicely slice the sod so I could cover it back up with minimal damage:




I finally got all the concrete out. Look at all the lovely clay!


Finally, it was time to fix the sidewalk. I installed Belgian pavers that were on sale at Menards. I even cracked up some of the old concrete to use as a paver base. I'm so green!!!! (Actually, I'm frugal and cheap). Here's the paver base. You can see how I was able to hook in my descending storm gutters to the pipe.



And the final walkway:


It was great to be able to hear the water rushing away from the house, knowing it was going straight to the city. We contemplated a rain garden of sorts, but decided it was better to be safe than sorry. I know this pales in comparison to the flooding of NOLA or upstate New York, but those floods are reminders about how much of an enemy water can be to your house.

The rest of the spring, I didn't see any water. Yay! Time to finish the basement!!

I totally need a backup. I've looked at a few systems, but it seems that they range from cheap to overkill. For example, a cheap battery + pump will run $140, but many reviews state that the battery needs constant maintenance or it won't last even 6 months. Other expensive back-ups can easily run up to the $600. I'm almost just tempted to buy a generator that I could hook up should the need arise.

Now that the sump was hooked up, I sat back and watched the basement and was delighted that I saw no signs of water. When fall came around this year, I decided it was time to start the remodel of the media room.

I spent a week or two thinking about the best and easiest way to fix the water damage. I considered just cutting out the bottom 2 feet of drywall and mudding in fresh drywall. The issue, however, would be that the regular drywall wouldn't match the style of paneling that was installed. I considered cutting out 4 feet and doing another kind of wainscoting like the opposite side of the basement, but I thought that would be too much paneling. My third option would be tearing out the old paneling and installing fresh drywall. This would be tricky and labor intensive because I'd have to remove the drop-ceiling which was screwed into the drywall.

I started pulling off the bottom two feet of drywall to do some investigation. I had no idea what was behind the drywall. I quickly found out that the original installers used 1 x 3 firing glued to the wall with 3/4" foamboard as insulation.




When I ripped this off, I discovered what I feared the most: when the flood happened, the drywall wicked up the water, where it slowly traveled up the wall and turned into black mold.


When I told tWife about this, she freaked out and wouldn't let anyone near the basement. So it bacame quickly clear that I was doing a total demolition. In retrospect, this was a great decision, because it allowed me to build proper frames, insulate better, eliminate all possible sources of mold, run new wiring, and waterproof.

Demolition:






The only surprise during demolition was the north wall, where the floor was missing concrete two inches from the wall. Instead, it was loose gravel. I suspect that this had something to do with the interior tiling that was installed. I went back in forth in my head as to whether I should patch this or not. In the end, I decided to patch it, along with other sections of concrete that had been damaged when pulling up the carpet tack strips.

Once I was down to bare concrete, I decided to drylock the whole damn thing. I know that drylock isn't a waterproofer -- nothing is -- but it certainly couldn't hurt. I filled in all the cracks where the water had come up previously, giving an extra bit of protection.



With the floor waterproofed, it was time to build my first frame. I made sure to use treated lumber for the bottom base board, and I fastened the walls down with 2.5" concrete hammer nails. While there's nothing complicated about building a frame, I was still proud of my first one and snapped this memorial picture:



18 foot frame on the west wall:

The next most crucial decision was insulation. I spent a lot of time on this board and others reading about the best insulation. Soundproofing was less important to me than R-value. The biggest problem with my basement before the flood was the temperature. It was so cold that you needed two blankets to watch a 2-hour movie down there. So I wanted the best possible insulation. I read about moisture barriers, batt insulation vs foamboard, etc. In the end, I called my brother in law who owns an insulation company. He said there was nothing better than spray foam. Maybe he's biased, but I took his professional opinion and hired him on the spot.

The beauty of the closed-cell spray foam is that it's one of the best R-value insulators, it goes up fast, it's completely air tight, and it is a perfect moisture barrier. Water simply can't get through it.

The cost was significantly higher. I estimated that I'd pay $150 for R-13 or R-19 fiberglass. This ended up running me $600, which was a discounted rate. However, I am 100% glad I did this. The difference has been noticable from the minute it was installed. I could feel air coming in through the joists before...now, absolutely nothing. I also had a small pest problem that was resolved. During demolition I'd discovered animal droppings in the ceiling. I set some mousetraps and killed two voles that were getting in through a small hole in the joists. The foam plugged the holes for good.

Here's the installation:





Most people around the country may not need the foam, but in Michigan, it's cold in my basement for 3/4 of the year. Definitely a good splurge, but one that also sent me over budget.

I also added some insulation to the ceiling. While the insulation doesn't necessarily reduce your home's heat bill, it did help retain some of the heat in the basement before it slowly drifts upstairs. I also had a real problem with bass resonating up through the rest of the house, particularly during music DVD's. Lowe's had some R-13 for only $8.94 a roll, so I bought a few and ran them above the drop ceiling:



After the foam went in, I ran the rest of my wires. I ran CAT5, two pairs of coax, a dedicated power box for the TV, and the speaker wires for my rears and surround speakers.

Drywall went up next. I was able to do it all by myself since I wasn't doing any ceilings. Remembering the flooding, I left all the drywall an inch off the ground as an added bit of protection.



A close up of my wiring:


I did the mudding myself. I hate mudding. It sucks. It is truly an artform that I don't possess. The great thing is that I did a halfway decent job. Of the 10 or so major sections of drywall, only one seam is somewhat bad. The rest look great after a ton of sanding and flat paint.

Finally, it was time to reattach the drop ceiling. This turned out to be the messiest part of the whole job. Since the new 2x4 frames replaced the old 1" firing, all the tiles and frames had to have 3 inches cut off. If there was aesbestos in those tiles, I certainly inhaled a ton of it. It was messy! When it was all finished, some of the frames were somewhat bent and not all of the tiles fit perfectly back in. It was especially noticable because they were all white. I decided to paint the entire ceiling black, something I'd wanted to do anyway to give the room more of a "theater" appeal.

I borrewed a professional paint sprayer from a friend, but it was DOA. The impulsiveness in me kicked in and I went out and just bought a cheap Wagner ($70). It was really messy, and I had to keep refilling the small 1/4 gallon resveior, but it ended up working great. For anyone that's thinking about painting a drop ceiling, here's a couple of tips:

1. Get cheap black flat paint. I paid $14 for two gallons of Menard's Lucite paint which just covered the 250 sq ft of ceiling.
2. Plan on spraying from every angle. There are so many holes in the ceiling that you need to hit it from all four directions.
3. Don't ever think about using a brush or a roller. It would take forever. Invest the money in the sprayer.
4. Don't let the sprayer run out of paint. When air gets in, this when it will spit and sputter and make a mess. Other than that, it works great. There were a lot of negative reviews, but I had no problems.

The painted ceiling:





While it looks like you can still see a lot of white in the pictures above, you really can't with normal light. That's just the camera flash lighting that up. The black hides all the imperfections, stains, and makes it look like a brand new ceiling. All for $14 worth of paint.

More to come tomorrow.

I've got about a half an hour here quickly to post a couple update pictures. More to come.

After the ceiling was painted, it was time to do the walls. I was looking for a nice green color to compliment the other side of the basement, but something that would be light enough to work with the Ambilight feature on my Phillips Plasma.

I picked out a couple colors, but they looked vastly different after the black went up on the ceiling. I got to the store and had an "oh-****" moment where I didn't trust my gut. I got a lighter green that was almost a yellow, and after two walls were painted, I knew I had screwed up. I hated it. So, it was back to the store to get my original color. Here it is:




The same day, my TV mount showed up! I got a standard 48" wide mount from Monoprice that was so dirt cheap, I felt like I was stealing! Here you can see the wires run through a dual-gang DataComm box.



Once the mount was up, I couldn't help but hang the tv.



Finally, the floor. As I mentioned before, I'd had a horrible flood which destroyed the basement (but also necessitated the wonderful renovation). There were two improvements I wanted to the floor: 1) warmth, 2) extra security in case of more water. I decided to build a floating floor.

I did a LOT of research on this and many other sites. I narrowed it down to three products:
1. DriCore. I found this to be the easiest and perhaps the best solution. The tiles were readily available at HD, Lowes, Menards. Installing them would be simple and fast.
2. Delta-FL. This option would be much more labor intensive, but cheaper than DriCore.
3. Platon. Again, more labor intensive, but half the cost of installing DriCore.

In the end, I went with option 3. I'm not afraid of extra work, and I needed to recoup some finances after splurging on the spray foam.

Platon goes down pretty easily. Two rolls from Menards was perfect for my basement. They recommend a minimum of 7/16 OSB, so I went one size bigger just to be safe. I ran into my first snag, however, when I started to drill the pilot holes for my TapCons. My power drill just spun and spun. It was at this juncture that I learned about "hammer drills" and how I wasn't gonna get this project done without one. So....back to HD to buy a solid DeWalt hammer drill. What a difference though! I tore right through that concrete floor. I ened up hitting each 4 x 8 OSB with at least 7-10 screws. Somewhere in the back of my head I was worried about the fact that I was drilling through my Drylocked floor, but a couple beers and I forgot all about it.

Here's the installation:





Walking on this floating floor isn't perfect -- I can feel one or two small sections of the floor where the OSB was slightly bowed, but it's nothing horrible. I would've had to put down a ton more TapCons, and after awhile I got sick of the noisy drill. They do recommend putting down some fabric between the floor and the Platon to minimize the noise of the tiny circles contacting the cement when you step on them, but I skipped this step and can hardly hear the contact.

Next up -- carpet & cabinets

Ok, finally getting around to updating my final completion of stage 2.

After I got the floating floor installed, it was time for carpet. I was super excited that Home Depot offered 72 hour installation, because I could get the project completed by my birthday! Unfortunately, they were backed up by three weeks. So much for that guarantee. Anyway, the wife helped me pick out a plush carpet that had a lot of mixed tones to help hide the eventual spills and dirt that my kids will create.

Carpet installed:





Next, I assembled my entertainment center. I originally had plans of building one, but somewhere along the line I realized it would be a) a lot of work, and b) way above my skill level. So I created this arrangement using the IKEA Besta system. Pretty cool online tool lets you design your own cabinets. The cost was probably cheaper than what I would've paid for materials to build my own.



This next shot features the ambilight feature on my Philips Plasma. I love the feature. It changes color based on the color of what's on screen. It gives the room a real ambiance (cleverly named) when the lights are low.



Decoration included some Star Wars posters that I had from college on one wall, and some framed vintage Beatles prints on the other wall flanked with my guitars. I'm big into music DVD's, and I wanted the basement to pay tribute to music.








That's it for stage 2! The absolute best thing I did was pay for top quality insulation. The spray foam made all the difference in this basement. It's now the warmest room in the house. The media room has now become the source of many parties and great family movie watching.

My bank account took a major hit, so I'm assuming it will be about a year before I dive into my final stage, BAR CONSTRUCTION.

Building my bar within the next 6 months. Don't want thread to become archived.