Hawaii Home Theater Construction

Opening remark: After years of planning and reading, this is my first attempt at a real home theater. Without two very generous people this project would never have come to fruition; Jim Goodrich at CineLife and Koolau Kawelo at Kawelo Construction. Jim provided never-ending professional guidance in the planning and problem solving of this home theater and direct assistance acquiring the majority of the amazing equipment in this theater. Koolau headed the construction team and is the key person involved in bringing the home theater structure to life. My role is to help wherever I can in the building process that involves a large two floor addition to the house as well as a first rate home theater. I am grateful I have these two kind and generous people in my life. My family and I are in their debt for making this dream come true.

Equipment:
Aerial Acoustics 20T Mains in birds-eye-maple
Aerial Acoustics CC5 center speaker in Birds-eye-maple
Aerial Acoustics SW12 subwoofer X 4 in Birds-eye-maple (1 in each corner)
Aerial Acoustics SR3 surrounds

Kaleidescape 3U Movie server
Kaleidescape M700 Disc Vault

Sony VPL-VW1000ES 4K Projector

ISCO Anamorphic Lens on a Cineslide

Stewart Filmscreen, 2.35 aspect, 11.5 ft width with side masking

Bryston 6SST2 500Wx3 in 4 ohms (Mains)
Parasound 5250 250x5 in 8 ohms (surrounds)

Integra 80.2 Pre/Pro

Torus Power CS 25 AVR power conditioner

Panamax MB1500 UPS power conditioner and projector battery backup

Directv HD DVR

Equipment in discussions or pending: Fortress seating (palladium)- two rows, Control4 Automation and Control, Kinetics IsoMAX wall and ceiling sound isolation and Kinetics Illumination program for the future Acoustic room treatments

Theater: LxWxH 24 x 18 x 9

Construction: pics taken of the work over the past couple of weeks as well as the concrete pour that took place today. HERE WE GO!!!!!!!! Pics to follow (as soon as I figure out why it keeps failing)

Edited by psychdoc - 9/13/12 at 1:09am

Here is a zoomed in look at the plans

Here are some pics of the construction process. If anyone knows how to add pics beyond thumbnails please let me know. Thanks.

second try

That concrete step will be the riser (it saved a lot of time and money just making it this way) for the second row of seats. That small section on that platform that sticks out will be demolished to ensure maximum space for the room. Tomorrow the demolition kicks off in earnest.

Hi All,

DC- yes, lots of plans for all of that. Riser is in concrete due to costs (digging deep in Hawaii is very expensive and having it level at that area solved a lot of problems cheaply as far at joining the new structure into the old (cost is a factor always). As far as the other portions, when they go up I'm sure we will encounter some difficulties but I will talk about it when the time comes up.

Yes, there are windows in the plans but they will be blacked out with insulation and a wall, via kinetics ISOMax wall clip, will be in front of it. Basically, if I ever want to sell the house I can pull down (or the next owner can) the inner wall for another bedroom with windows.

Thankfully I sill have some yard space on the other side but in Hawaii, yards are sold in sq ft (not acres) as they are so small. This is another reason for sound isolation. More pics and problems to follow......

Dennis- thanks for your input. That is what is so much fun about this hobby, we all can have fun with different approaches and compare final results, learning from each other as we go.

and it continues... The walls of the HT go up. The rain FINALLY stopped (for the moment) and Koolau rushed in to put up the walls. Strong work from a great guy! I'm still bugging him to let me jump in and join the construction team on the weekend (being a medical doc doesn't provide many opportunities to build anything, let alone a big house addition).

HT inner walls: I put in an order for the Isomax wall/ceiling clips from Kinetics after talking at length with Doug at Kinetics (super friendly guy who stuck around after his workday was over to talk at length about the pros and cons of the clips in various different conditions) as well as after talking to Jim (same person mentioned in first post). There is so much information out there and it's often a case of "you don't know what you don't know". Still, it's been a lot of fun learning as I go. I can't thank Jim enough (Cinelife). He's been willing to talk at length almost daily about various HT topics just for the simple fun of sharing his hobby.

Seating: It looks like Fortress Palladium will be the seat of choice. Two rows, one of 5 and one of 4. Thats it for now.

Here is another pic

With help from Jim I locked in my seating; Palladium from Fortress (a pic can be seen here in gallery #2; http://www.fortresseating.com/produc...php?prod_id=31 ). Also, my order from Kinetics was placed for their ISOMAX wall clips for building a floating wall within a wall on all four walls and ceiling of my HT. As you can see, the house is now pretty close to the back left corner of the property (generally speaking, everyone's yard here in Hawaii is pretty darn small, it takes a while to get used to that when moving here from the mainland). That makes HT soundproofing a priority for our master bedroom which will be above the HT and the neighbors to our sides.

There are lots of small tremors, only one time did I feel anything in the total of 10 yrs I've been here and that was very mild. Yes, there are termites and code requires the ground to be treated prior to construction. It's a good idea to have it treated in the future as well. I don't know anyone that has had a hard time with termites other than in buildings that have no upkeep although I'm sure they do exist. On a different note, don't get me started on cockroaches, they are huge out here!!!!!

Hi Jim,

Great to hear your Aerials are working out well for you. I'm really excited to hear how my setup sings once the room is fully completed. I still look at your room as a great example of what to shoot for, especially for the wood trim work. We'll see if I get close.

The seats will be a darker shade of brown on the Palladium model. They should be great.

Stopped by the job site today. It was raining (the usual lately). The framing is moving quickly and should be moving to the second floor soon. The view to the mountains is going to be amazing.

Hi aaustin,

I can't speak for the whisper clips or the stats presented in your link but the kinetics has different configurations. My version of construction will yield 61 STC. Their website shows everything in detail. Of course that number drops with every hole you drill, at least by a little and varies at different frequencies. Cost is also a huge factor. For me I weighed my cost vs the possible benefits and there wasn't much contemplation needed- it's a fantastic solution for me.

It sounds like you are debating which way to go in your project. It will be great to see the final results of your final decision.

Aaustin,

Great to hear. Did you make a thread, I'd love to check out your final product.



First issue that seems to be coming up over and over in different ways; the length of the theater. I've done everything to squeeze every inch out of the project to provide a good length but so many items would be easier if I could make the room 3 or 4 more feet longer. Right now the room will be roughly 24x18x9. Instead, 28x18x9 would be perfect if I had more space to work with. I still think the end results are going to be amazing but having those few extra feet would make my life less stressful.

A couple more thumbnails. If anyone knows how to add pics directly to the thread please let me know (using thumbnails isn't much fun for anyone)

Exactly like that! Thanks DC.... will do!

One more try......



pic of my 3 yr old boy william near the back left corner of the HT being built, wife and baby Sarah talking to Koolau at the front of the HT where my screen will come down in front of a large tv.


SUCCESS!!!!!!!!!! Finally, no more darn thumbnails!

I know exactly what you mean. At the same time, I don't want to waste bulb life watching some silly reality show that is playing in the background while I'm on the computer, or worse yet, have my wife waste a lot of blub life on something like the bachelorette (no offense to those that love that show). At the same time, I want this room used a lot, by everyone, especially my family together. So in the long run, I think the cost effective way of doing this is having a large thin panel tv against the wall (70"-80") and have the 11.5 ft wide Stewart screen come down for the big Sports events or high quality movies in my Kaleidescape server.

I agree with you in this; if I had a free never ending supply of bulbs for my projector I wouldn't bother with a tv.

Yes, they are the same (actually cheaper for the 70" tv). I plan to change the bulb out before the brightness is substanially reduced. When that will occur, I don't know.

I've seen the same projector model on my screen and it looked great and had some punch to it but it was clearly not as bright as the projector I was comparing it to, a Sim2 HT5000E. Of course, most projectors are not as bright as that light cannon.

roof is getting peeled off for the second story master bedroom that will be over the HT

The second floor is about to start. Very nice rainbow in the background (very common here in Hawaii)....



My new view out of my master bedroom now that I'll have a large second floor. The picture doesn't do the mountains justice.