I want a Little Room Down Under!

Stone the crows, another Aussie Home Theatre build!!

Quick back story before we begin. The cheeky play on words title refers to our location, which is Sydney Australia, and the smallish size of the room we'll be converting to a theatre room (5.3m x 3.8m, which is 17'x12'). My wife and I purchased our 2 storey house in 2005 with plans to build a theatre in the formal lounge/dining. After having children though we realised with their bedrooms above that room, and the limited access to the ceiling cavity, that room would not be ideal.

Instead we are using a rumpus room out the back that is smaller, but gives full ceiling cavity access. The room has 2 sets of windows, so I'll be bricking one of them up, and double glazing the other, while adding a thick curtain to further reduce noise. I have a rendered plan which gives an overview of what I'd like the end result to be. Colours and a few other things will be different in the final though.

All plans are still to be finalised, but the goals of the room are;
- Soundproof the room as well as possible, within reason.
- Projector and electronic screen for HT experience with movies/games.
- Normal TV for day to day viewing
- Room for a display cabinet
- Room for blu ray/DVD/gaming storage
- Controlled lighting with zones, and auto projector/screen setup.

I already have a 7.1 Richter speaker system, so will be using that, as well as adding another sub for a 7.2 setup. All components are already owned, but will need to purchase a screen, projector, a grafik eye and all materials. Budget for the project from now is around $15k AUS (roughly the same in US).

With screen down, 100' to 110' (there is rope lighting, but I haven't rendered it in)


Day to day viewing, 58" TV.


Rough top down view


This is the room after I've moved things out. The triple corner window will be removed.






The outside shows the window that will be bricked up.


Almost every thing I've learned from reading these forums over the years. As you all know, there's some amazing projects, and wonderful ideas in here, so thank you to all the dreamers who share their dreams, as it enables others to fulfill theirs.

And so we begin...

The opening to the room is too large for a single door, so I'll be installing a set of double doors, opening inwards. It's a non standard size, so I'll need to frame it and cut some 620mm doors down to size.

Squared frame constructed and inserted.


Installed square.


Doors in.


Handle and seals next. I have some raven seals for around the frame and for the bottom, but the bottom will have to wait until I carpet.

Yeh, as Greg stated, they are one of the tightest seals around. Reminds me of a girl I used to date...hmmm...slightly off topic.

I couldn't find the exact ones I wanted from bunnings, so had to order them from a general hardware. Ravens site lists the resellers. I'll grab a better pic of them soon. For now I've removed the doors as they are too thin, being standard MDF. I'm adding some MDF to thicken them up, so once I have some pics I'll add the seal pics too.

haha. Well in my defence I work and have 2 kids under 3, so my time is kind of limited. I get a little time at night when everyones in bed, and then I go for it on the weekend in between moments of keeping my wife sane by helping out.

In saying that, I worked out the doors are too thin, so I've added 2 sheets of 16mm (5/8") to each door with some GG in between. Here's some pics of the routing down of the MDF. I used a flush trim bit to match the sizes. I didn't weigh them, but they probably weigh around 35kg (77lbs) each. Couldn't lift them on my own actually, but then again, as Greg will confirm, I'm about the same height as Mini Me.

Picture of the messy workarea. Our cars have lost their garage spot for a few months.


Love working with a Flush trim bit, but the mess can be depressing, especially when I cut 4 door pieces.


Before the trimming...


I want to rebate the doors so the MDF is thinner on one door, and wider on the other, which should meet together nicely in the centre.


See...I did stuff!

Well I ordered my projector and bits today. Little soon, but want to play around with sizes early. Ended up with;

Panasonic AE7000E
Grandview 112" Electronic Screen with the appropriate hideaway box.

I've been on these forums too long to turn the projector on and start watching a movie though, otherwise I know it's all over. Hopefully I can stay strong

Sure thing. I went 16:9 as I want it for gaming quite a bit, and also being a big screen for the room means movies in 2.35:1 should still look decently sized.


Ta mate. The projector I sourced locally via digital centre. I negotiated for the Avatar pack with 2 glasses to be included, but thanks anyway. I have a Samsung 58" 3D LCD so my 3D collection has been growing steadily already. Looking forward to watching Tangled on the big screen, as the 3D in that was outstanding. Long way off, but a guy can dream


Thanks, I'm happy with how it turned out. Yeh, I added extra hinges, the 4 per door were ball bearing hinges, which is essential given the weight. The ones I used were not wide throw though. I have some pics of that which I'll put up shortly.

Ok, who hasn't ever sprayed too much expanding foam.


I had other doors to do in the house, so I purchased a tool to make the job easier using a router. Was happy with the result.


Perfect fit. Four of these per door, but the hinge tool made quick work of it all. These are the ball bearing hinges, which give nice and smooth movement.


The door has a rebated edge, so to stand it like this I had some 2x4s with a stepped section cut out enabling the door to fit perfectly and stand up for the routing.

Time to rip the architrave for the door, as well as a bunch for 2 other sets of french doors I'm doing in the house. I have a router table with a bit matching the profile of the other architrave in the house, and I'm feeding each piece one at a time through.
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This is the channel I created, and the profile of the bit can be seen poking up from below.
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The end result. There were 18 pieces all up I needed to run through...slow process.
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haha, yeh it took some convincing that's for sure. She just wants it done, so is happy to do whatever is required to make things happen. What is a killer is all that door routing. Every item in the garage is covered by a thick layer of sawdust...didn't think that one through.

hah, yeh, that poor wood had no chance. I don't really know what I'm doing, but I have a great talent of providing an illusion of knowledge.

I have to make some panels too in the future, so will probably give that some thought at one stage.

Last door update.

So the door is now around 65mm (2 5/8") thick so I'm ready to put it back. Problem is I can barely lift it. I had to place a pivot on one corner so I could move it around, and then use a trolley to get it from the garage to inside.





I used some mounts to keep it in position while attaching it.


Closer look at the ball bearing hinges.


One door has a bolt, so will probably keep that closed most of the time.


I routed a channel to insert a seal in the other door. This will close and form a failry tight seal with the opposing door.


Handles are in, the right one is a dummy.


I don't have any shots of the seals, but they run on each side and the middle, as well as the top, so around 7m of them. The screw in, so when I paint I'll remove them. Only thing left is the bottom seals, which come down when the door closes. Can't route those and insert them until the carpet is in. Now, onto something else other then doors...

I hired a bricky to help me remove the window, and then brick it up.

This is what it looked like beforehand.




And afterwards...


I put the frame up while he got himself ready. A 58" TV will be mounted on the wall, so I got a chance to layout the studs just how I needed.


The start of the bricklaying


Getting higher...


I managed to find a brick that was an almost perfect match, so the join between old and new is really well done.


And higher...



All done. Now I need to wait 3 weeks before wiping it down with hydrocloric acid. I started removing the walls, and thought the better of it. Will tackle it next time.

Thanks mate, appreciate the comment.

Walls have started to come off.




Started cabling the front with a channel for the floating cabinet to the plasma on the wall, and also a section for the speakers to come in. These are sealed section as I'm not keen on puncturing a hole in my fish tank for wires to come in, so want to ensure these holes are all as soundproof as possible.


HDMI, Cat5e and cable service on the left, and far left is a box for 2 x 4 GPO's. I'll have another 2 x 4 on the right, so 16 powerpoints in total. The cabinet will have a hole in the back for each componant, so these connections will be accessible at the back of the cabinet.

Well it's all smoke and mirrors. We're almost caught up to real time so progress will start to grind to a halt soon. In a weeks time I'll have 2 weeks off, so plan to get stuck in big time. As for the projector and screen, they arrived this week, so I plugged it all in and mounted the screen to test sizes. Not much fun having a massive screen with no sound, so the incentive faded very quickly. Loved the image though, and am still divided if it's actually too big. As for the Peter-fest, that is sure to create some confusion on the day


Appreciate the offer mate, but already have a 30m run to that room from before. Only cat5e, but if I was to replace that one, I'd have to replace the other 2 runs in the house too, so I'll pass for now. Double story runs to ground floor are not fun, even though I'd just tape the cat6 to the end and pull through, I have no issues streaming 1080p, so will leave for the moment. ta mate.

It's been 2 weeks, so time for an update. I'm in the middle of 2 weeks leave at the moment, so am trying to get things done. Have been running all the cabling and trying to plan what is needed.

The roof cavity is very restrictive where I'm working, making progress slow.


I'm glad I paid a batt installer a few years ago to install these. They did a wonderful job of piling them into a corner, unfortunately many areas of the ceiling were not covered. Dodgy tradies...grrr.
This also shows the ducting that I will need to split.


The area I have to enter and work in.


At the far end is where I'm running the cables to for the projector and the speakers.


Running them to this area which is above the screen/cabinet inside.


The conduit for the speaker, network, aerial, hdmi, etc.