The RTROSE (take my sweet time) HT Construction Thread - Page 4

It's my understanding once the tap goes in the construction slows disproportionately to the amount of liquid libations ingested so I'm holding off on the beer fridge or kegerator (for now anyway).


Regards,

RTROSE

All,

Thanks for your input on the sigh....kitchenette. I am leaning towards #2 for a couple of reasons.
1. The design is more compact and intrudes less into the adjacent area where the future popcorn machine will hopefully be and the workout area.

2. The snack bar for a place for eats while downstairs.

I was thinking of an undercounter fridge like this one.



But at 431 bucks on sale I think this is a little pricey. It is the look I'm going for though.

I also purchased my sixth roll of 250ft of romex and with fingers crossed hoping this will be enough.

And to think my electrician originally suggested one roll should cover my job. To his credit he did not realize I was actually telling the truth regarding what I had planned on in the basement.

I have just a couple of things to finish up with the electrical and I should be all set for Saturday when my electrician shows up.

I am also talking with a plumbing contractor regarding the installation of the rough in for the sink supply lines and the sump for the waste water basin to the city sewer. I have already gotten one estimate for this and it was $850 for the new hot/cold supplies and the sump/pump and the sewer connect. I thought this estimate was on the high side so I am getting a couple of other quotes to see if we are in the ball park.

I have also contacted a couple of drywallers to come by and give some quotes but alas they have not had the time to stop by yet. I have absolutely no idea what a ball park figure is for the drywall so I hope I don't get "sticker shock". Last year I had my small 3 foot by 5 foot half bath re-drywalled and he charged me 150 bucks. I thought that was not too bad until I figured I bought the supplies and it ended up being about 45 bucks an hour for his labor. Did excellent work though and even went the extra mile to help keep the area clean (winning my wife over in the process) so I guess it was well worth it in the long run.

Once the electrical is done I get to move onto running the A/V cables and wires. Whooooo Hooooo!!! More drilling pulling, drilling pulling, drilling pulling drilling......well you get the idea.

Regards,

RTROSE

aham23,

That looks really nice. There is a HD about 25 miles from here so the next time I'm near there I'll go take a look.

If it is not too much trouble what are the dimensions of the unit? BTW I like the looks of you cabinet too.

Thanks,

Regards,

RTROSE

aham23,

thanks for the measurements and the link. Will definitely have to check it out at HD. Being at roughly 34 1/2" it should fit under the snack bar nicely.

Regards,

RTROSE

Well I am finally ready for the electrician. He even called this PM to confirm that we were still on for tomorrow. I have got the circuits run all of the can lights and outlets prepped and spent about two hours cleaning an straighting up. This simple act really pleased my wife since she has been grouching about the mess and the fact she has not had her garage for about two or three weeks now. I am really hoping we can finish up the electrical after this next visit. I have done much more leg work for this visit compared to the first one because I have an idea on what I'm doing now.

I was also able to start compiling a return pile of miscellaneous items that I have over bought or plain did not need. Getting some cash back to funnel right back into the HT will be nice.

I did come home and found a thief in my basement. Stole 527 dollars directly from my HT fund.....



Unfortunately I will have to make nice with this thief as I hope it will be many years before I'm "robbed" again!

I found out why my old water softener was leaking. There was about a 1/8 inch hole in the bottom corner of the unit I was just lucky it did not leak more because as soon as I moved it the water really started to flow out.

Well I'll update again after I see how far we get with the electrical.

Regards,

RTROSE

Well.......

I had high hopes that I could put a DONE stamp on the electrical but there was just too much left over from our first day that we just couldn't get it all done. The cans, sconces, and outlets in the HT are done. The outlets and cans for the workout area and kitchenette are done as well as the lights for the stairway. The dedicated circuit for the A/V equipment is done and the light for the equipment closet. We have the kids media area outlets and cans to complete and the storage area to finish.

The only other things needed to do is the cat5 and the phone line tie ins. My electrician left me the cat5 and phone to run before he comes back later this week. He believes he can finish up the job in one more evening. So far I have about 15 electrician man hours and about the same on my own just drilling and pulling wire and cable.

Todays work went much faster than the first visit due to the fact I had everything ran and pulled and all he had to do was double check my runs and prep work to the can lights and then wire everything up.

Only one run to Lowe's today though rather than 3-4 trips we made last time. I think I have about 9 trips to Lowe's just for my electrical parts and supplies but could even be higher (wasn't actually thinking about it until now) who knows.

I'll probably have about 20 hours total in "billable" man hours at the finish of this stage plus materials. My electrician commented to me today that actually what my basement project/job compares to is a small house job. It then struck me my basement is roughly the same sq. footage (almost 1100) as my first house and that put the job into perspective.

I guess I should have told him I wanted to wire a small house vs. telling him I wanted to wire a basement "project" He did comment that today went better and it was very nice that all of the "grunt" work had been mostly done.

All in all a good and productive day.

Regards,

RTROSE

I like the "candy store" look and idea I would have enough counter space I think I could pull off something like that. Nice touch having two fridges in that location.



Yup, I'm leaning towards #2 as well. I though about a "full up fridge" but thought about about using the under counter fridge as a space saving feature and for a "cleaner" look. I also have a full size fridge in the garage we use for mainly pop as well as the kitchen. I really don't need three full size fridges in the house.

I did not do one lick in the HT today due to some other commitments and was doing some "honey do's" around the house. I have been so busy in the basement the last few weeks I have neglected some of the things I should/need to do around the house. My wife has been very understanding so I wanted to get some things done around the house so she will continue to be very understanding!

Regards,

RTROSE

That is a great idea regarding the fan. Just off of the kitchenette I am planning as a future addition a popcorn machine. Never considered the oder of the popcorn machine becoming overwhelming after a point. Will have to check into the fan idea before I close up the ceiling.

I'll just add it to the "to do" list that is slowly being compiled as I am progressing. It seems as though I cross something off it justs creates two more items on the list.

Regards,

RTROSE

Well since Sunday I have been "detailed" to some other projects around the house that I have been neglecting for quite a while.

I have been working on and building a set of double doors for the wife's laundry area and now that I am almost done she has decided she has come up with a "new" plan. We are the second owners of our home and the previous owner did not really do anything that was too "upscale" so all our doors are the cheap "contractor grade" hollow core doors. Her new plan is to replace all our doors with solid wood core six panel wood doors. This should greatly increase the visual appeal of our house and give me lots of experience when it comes to replacing doors so when it comes to the HT doors I should be a pro by then.

I can tell you that cutting mortises in the doors and the casing is not the most fun thing I have ever done but I have learned to use a chisel pretty effectively.

I'm waiting to hear from my electrician for when he will be available next to finish the electrical. I may call him tomorrow to see what is going on.

Regards,

RTROSE

Well.....

Right now my electrician is MIA as well as the guy who I contacted to do my drywall work. The positive thing is they do answer their phones or return my messages they just don't show when they say they will (drywall guy) or their schedule is so tight they can't fit my small "finish'er up" job into the other projects he has going.

My kitchen guy and I are working on cabinet door styles and color selection. I am going for a look that is not too "kitchenesque " and more "man caveish". I was thinking black doors and cabinets with a black glass tile backsplash and a black countertops that have flakes of copper or reddish color.

I still undecided on the flooring I am going to go with but I'm leaning heavily towards slate tiles.

Once I have gotten my electrician back to finish up I will continue on by starting to run all my A/V and speaker cables. I have them all purchased and I am going to terminate my own coax cables. I'm doing this so I can get the right lengths I need plus I wanted to make my own cables just to say that I did that too. Silly maybe but what can I say? I am also planning on running two sets of speaker cables to each of the front speaker locations in case I ever want to bi-wire or bi-amp the front three speakers. Does anybody have any comments on this. I may never use either of those options but it is nice to have the option. I am trying to educate myself on the whole bi-wire/bi-amping of speakers and I understand that they are two totally different things.

So far (now the following comes as fingers are crossed) at the pace I have been moving I have not overrun the money supply. My wife and I are trying very hard to complete this build on a "pay as you go" basis which so far has worked very well and we have no debt so far in this build but somewhat dictates the slower pace of my build.

I have told my wife that I am willing to proceed in this way for a couple of reasons. One it leaves us able to work on other projects around the home should we decide to funnel the money elsewhere (cringe) and the other is I don't mind waiting for the equipment I really want. I feel if I am patient I will more likely get the equipment I want vs. having to "settle" for something less if I buy sooner because I get impatient.

Sorry for the ramble but I was having some build thread withdrawal and needed to post.

Thanks for listening/reading.

Regards,

RTROSE

I have finally made contact with my electrician and it looks like this Thursday or Saturday is the completion date for the electrical (I say with every appendage crossed in some manner) and according to him with what I have left to do should be a four to five hour job. If this rings true I will have approximately 20 "electrician" man hours and lordy who knows how many hours on my part. As I have said before I have done the majority of the "grunt work" as far as the electrical is concerned. Very satisfying to see your work pay off.

I have had the day off today due to having to work the weekend so I had the opportunity to do some work on the HT today. I did mostly clean up work and moved some items around to make it easier to work in the remaining unfinished areas and removed the old "bare bulb" lighting fixtures that were smattered around the entire basement with no rhyme or reason to it. I will be recycling some of them to the storage area.

I have still been relegated to "door replacement detail" and the double doors I have built and hung are in need of trim and to top it all off we just bought four more doors on sale at Menards to continue replacing the other doors. I'm hoping that since these doors are pre-hung it will be easier than building a door basically from scratch.

I'm looking forward to running the speaker and video runs but I am waiting for the electrical to be completed so I can avoid any potential problems mixing power and video runs. I am still contemplating the conduit situation. I know that it is the "right' thing to do for any future cable issues however it seems like it will be a big hassle due to where I will need to run the conduit. I think the flex stuff is out just because of cost so I think I'll be working with the rigid conduit if I choose to go that route.

Speaking of conduit does anyone have a rule of thumb of how many coax runs can fit in a 1", 1 1/4", 1 1/2" and so on conduit. I think I can go as large as a 2" conduit without running into very many issues. The max I would have in one conduit run would be 8 coax and one HDMI. Would all of that make it through a 2" conduit? I would guess with out checking it would be a tight fit. I am using RG59 vs. RG6 for that reason.

Regards,

RTROSE

That makes sense then and seals the deal that I will be putting some conduit in. Also makes it easier that I don't have to shoe horn all the coax, HDMI, into the conduit then worry how I would try to run new or replacement cables through the same conduit. If this is the case I could downsize to maybe 1 1/4 or 1 1/2" conduit. As long as I can get a HDMI cable through it should suffice.

I got a call from my electrician today and he is coming over Friday evening to finish up and he has blocked off Saturday morning "just in case". I also got a call from the plumber who is going to make the connections into the main house sewer line and he wanted to come tomorrow after I called about four weeks ago. If he wasn't such a good plumber I would be ticked about the lack of contact and then calling me at 2000 hrs wanting to show up in the morning. He is great and did the remodel on our second bathroom at a reasonable cost so I'll cut him some slack....this time

Looking forward to marking another step off in my build.

Regards,

RTROSE

I know at Lowe's and Menard's the only options are the 1/2" and 3/4" in the flexible conduit. I think I still may go the rigid route due to availability and cost.

Regards,

RTROSE

As of 22:05 hrs. yesterday the electrical in the basement is DONE! Whoo Hooo. The only thing we did not get accomplished was the phone line to the outside box but that will not keep me from progressing in the basement. Now everywhere I go in the basement there are lights, switches, and plugs. Up until yesterday only half of my basement had electricity obviously making it hard to work in those areas.

As I continue to make progress it is very encouraging to see things get checked off of the list however it seems as though as I get one thing checked off of the list I look at the bottom and see that two things have been added. I guess that is just the nature of the beast!

I am now going to concentrate on getting the basement cleaned up from the assault from my electrician, start running all of my A/V cables, finalize the projector location, and work on a DIY projector mount. Then when all of that is done I'll start on insulation, vapor barrier, and then on to drywall.

Regards,

RTROSE

After each time the electrician left I was worried my wife would go into the basement and wonder what in the Sam Hill happened. She ventured into the basement after the drywall demo and was just amazed(mortified) at the mess.

You are very close when guessing Seymour, think a little more northern south central.

Regards,

RTROSE

Ok here are some updated pics of my build so far. Not exciting but pics none the less.

Here is the "front wall" of the kids media area. This wall will be finished off with "built-in" looking cabinetry across the entire wall.



What I'm thinking is a 37" to 50" flat panel or projection TV for the kids PS2/Wii and such will also be hooked up to Dish and the HT so you can watch independently or what the HT is showing depending on the circumstances.

If your looking at the front wall this would be the left wall





The doorway leads to the storage area. I'm planning on placing the sub on this wall near the location of the orange low voltage box.

The right wall.



And finally the rear wall and stairs.



The kids media area is roughly 13 x 13. The rear wall is where I am having some second thoughts about how to finish it off. I really want the wall to end where it does because I want the side open to help with furniture moving but I was thinking about some type of half wall. I have some time to decide what I want to do but as always I'm open to suggestions.

I have wired for 5.1 surround for the kids area and I figure I will initially go with a HTiB such as the Onkyo SR 800 or the new S5100 system mainly due to ease and cost considerations.

I'm working on getting the HT area cleaned up so I will get some pics posted of that area when I can shamelessly let you see with out all kinds of stuff everywhere.

Regards,

RTROSE

P.S. I just noticed the date on the camera it is wrong. I used my son's camera because I was lazy and did not want to find the other camera I use all the time. I just did take the photos in the last day or two. Not quite sure what is up with his camera. DOH!