[nelson4u]

I will be building my theater soon and I am thinking of going with 2 layers of drywall with Green Glue on all walls and ceiling and also using RSIC on the ceiling only as there are bedrooms above the theater.


I am wondering if installing recessed lighting will degrade the soundproofing qualities of the double drywall G/G and RSIC on the ceiling ?


I thought I read somewhere that it was better to use track lighting in this situation, but it seems a lot of theaters have recessed lighting.


It seems that cutting six or eight holes in the ceiling will ruin the soundproofing.


Any help is appreciated

 

[Fatman513]

I think some of the people who used can lights either put them in a soffit that was built after the ceiling was drywalled, or built MDF boxes that were attached to the floor joists and covered the lights.

 

[Brian Ravnaas]

hey nelson, it won't help.


cutting a hole in the ceiling and replacing that heavy mass with a tin can won't help anything, but...


the shape (round, reasonably stiff) of the lights, their fairly small size, the no-holes sub-floor above them, and the insulation in the cavity will all work to help your cause.


some folks have built MDF shells around such lights just to make sure.

 

[Chriš2]

Quote:

Originally posted by Brian Ravnaas and the insulation in the cavity will all work to help your cause.

provided you have IC rated cans, otherwise the insulation needs to be 3 or 4" away from the fixture, leaving a big gap. I got shallow IC rated cans, built boxes around them, and had enough space above to run a piece of linacoustic across.

 

[P!tt]

nelson, just my two cents worth... I did a ton of research before choosing lighting and I went with track lighting. Keep in mind the 6"+ that they will hang down from the ceiling and also keep in mind something I didn't think about until they were installed and it was too late, the transformers, if not high quality, will make a buzzing sound. We hooked ours to dimmers and the lower the luminence, the louder the buzz. Turning them off completely, in our room yeilds the viewing experience too dark and gives people headaches. So we leave the track lights on in the back very low. But the buzzing is annoying during dialog or quiet points in the movie.


FWIW

 

[tebling]

It seems like another option would be not to do ceiling mounted lighting at all. I'm planning on a ceiling fiber optic star-field, and will rely on rope lighting and soffit-mounted spotlights to provide the bulk of pre/post movie illumination.


-tim

 

[wdill]

Quote:

Originally posted by P!tt nelson, just my two cents worth... I did a ton of research before choosing lighting and I went with track lighting. Keep in mind the 6"+ that they will hang down from the ceiling and also keep in mind something I didn't think about until they were installed and it was too late, the transformers, if not high quality, will make a buzzing sound. We hooked ours to dimmers and the lower the luminence, the louder the buzz. Turning them off completely, in our room yeilds the viewing experience too dark and gives people headaches. So we leave the track lights on in the back very low. But the buzzing is annoying during dialog or quiet points in the movie. FWIW

P!TT, I wonder if you have the wrong dimmers.

There are incandescent, magnetic low voltage and electronic low voltage track lighting and you should have a matching dimmer. Having the wrong one can cause the buzzing.

 

[ken-ha]

nelson4u,

The ceiling also dictate what you are going to use. My original plan was using track lighting and rope lighting. But because of the ceiling height (86" before drywall and carpet, i.e. why I went for recess lighting. However I bought the smallest IC box (which is HALO 4") and hope it will cut down the sound leakage. Some of the 6" recess IC box is as deep as my 2x10 floor joists.


Regards

Ken

 

[No Clue]

While I like track lighting, I like the look of recessed lighting better for a theater. A lot of it comes down to cosmetic vs performance and most have to make compromises somewhere. It depends on where you fall in that equation.

 

[nelson4u]

Thanks everyone.


I think I will try the recessed lights with the MDF boxes around them.


Does anyone have any pictures of the way they constructed the boxes ?


Do you make a 4 sided box with a top and mount it to the joists and then fill it with insulation ?