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S

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Discussion Starter · #1 ·
I've been reading the various build threads here and I have to ask...


Who are you people?


Tear down, Framing, Dry-walling, Carpentry, Electrical panel work, even some Plumbing work here and there. Where do you all get these skills?


Is there a high correlation between professional home builders and home theater enthusiasts? Is there a guru deep in the mountains that trains you in secret art of theater building?


What kind of background did you bring to your build?


Is there hope for a nerd that can reconfigure a load balancing firewall blindfolded but smashes his thumb every time he picks up a hammer?


Thanks.
 
J

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#2 ·
I've learned as I have gone. I've fixed up my 2 former houses during school in the past and learned by doing.


I think most here have learned the same way...plus we all try to chip in when people have questions..


oh, and Biggie in DC is the master of answers and posting visual pics to help us out. He has a pic for anything!
 
P

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#3 ·
I've done woodworking before (end-tables, shelves, etc.) and have woodworking tools. The shift to carpentry wasn't that tough. I've done enough household plumbing repair to be comfortable sweating a copper fitting or whatever. I'm an electrical engineer and pretty comfortable with wiring.


I learned real framing and drywall on this job, with the help of some basic web stuff. It's not rocket science, and most things you can make mistakes and correct them as you go.
 
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HeyNow^

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#4 ·
I'm old so life's experiences have finally sunk in...a little. It all started when my Dad told me to never use his tools. Wrong thing to tell a kid.
Some folks around here amaze me with their talent. I won't list them since I know I would leave someone out.


I can't hold a candle to those gifted souls. If it doesn't exist, I have actually seen people on this forum MAKE it!


Lot's of smart folks around here!


And Biggie is the Guru in the Mountains you speak of
 
tlogan6797

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#5 ·
Same here. I've puttered around the house but this is the single largest and most complicated thing I've ever done. BUY the correct tools. Get a framing nailer and you won't smash your thumb, you'll just shoot a nail into your shoe and almost really, really get hurt.


I've found that you learn as much as you can about the aspect you are working on at the time. And then just as you get really good at it (or sick of it), it's time to move on. You DO need to read through these forums and build threads to get the full idea of what you are doing, but you don't need to know how to install a new circuit breaker until you get to electric. What you DO need to know is that you WILL need to install additional circuit breakers. If you see what I'm driving at here.


Personally, I took the "I can wing it" approach. I knew the limitation(s) of my space and had general idea of what I wanted to do and how I wanted it to look. Then I started building. The one thing about the DIY approach is that you can just tear down the mistakes and do it again.


I can't stress enough that if you want to tackle this, get one of the design guys that hang out here to do a plan for you. It will save you TONS of time. I can't tell you HOW many times I had to remove and restaple one area of electric wiring because I kept forgetting something that I needed an outlet or switch for.


You can do it! We all had to start SOMEWHERE.
 
I

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#7 ·
I'm a craftsman! Pure and simple!
Although it isn't my day job!
Like Paul I am an Electrical Engineer, sitting at a desk all day, writing reports.
Doing things around the house is like therapy, or maybe crack! I can't get enough!


I did custom car stereos when I was younger, naturally migrating to home theater too. But I got out of the loop for a while. I still used my gear, but I didn't keep up with it like I used to. My new house sparked my interest again.
 
carboranadum

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#8 ·
I buy lots of books and learn as I go along. I'm not cheap, but I do really enjoy building things. I try hard and feel as though a lot of what I've been able to accomplish looks better than that completed by builders or craftsmen that are flying to get on to the next job.


My current home is the first place where I've undertaken any building project even close to being this large. I have always been handy, but I can read and learn quite a lot from the experience of others. I have been browsing this thread for about 6 years now, and have learned a TON from the folks who have gone before me. That's where the true value of this forum is.


CJ
 
O

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#10 ·
Funny, before I owned a home I watched a lot of the old Home Improvement shows. Not the fluffy ones they seem to give now, but shows like This Old House, and the couple, Guy and Girl (cant remember that show's name). Show's like these took you thru a whole project and would show you how to get things done from beginning to end.


I know there were a lot of behind the scenes stuff which you don't see like retakes and such but those shows were a lot better at showing DIY'ers how to do stuff. My wife used to always give me a hard time about watching them since we lived in an apartment at the time. When we moved to our 1st home I was pretty confident on taking on different projects though she was worried. Now I have gained her confidence and she tells people I can fix anything



Best thing to do is research what your looking to do, don't be afraid to try something and take the proper precautions. Like others have said you learn by doing, if you mess something up you learn from that to.
 
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carboranadum

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#12 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by oman321 /forum/post/15510110


Funny, before I owned a home I watched a lot of the old Home Improvement shows. Not the fluffy ones they seem to give now, but shows like This Old House, and the couple, Guy and Girl (cant remember that show's name).
Click to expand...


Hometime? I watched these too. When I got a Tivo, it drove my wife nuts that I recorded all of these and watched them back to back to back....still do (This Old House's Weston Project is SUPER COOL!).


CJ
 
I

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#13 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by W00lly /forum/post/15510087


I think if you can swing a hammer and read a measuring tape anything is possible.


I was the gofer growing up
when my dad started remodeling the house when I was 12 I learned alot by just watching and handing him tools
Click to expand...

LOL. I am imagining "The Christmas Story" and the tire changing incident!



My dad always let me help with anything. But I learned most of this stuff from my car stereo days. Now I show my dad how to do everything. Anytime he has to do something around the house he always asks for my opinion before doing anything. When I ran the wiring for my new house a few months back he couldn't believe I cut out a 16"x20" piece of drywall so that I could drill a hole through this ridiculous stack of lumber in the wall.
By the time I was done you couldn't tell I cut the piece out at all. And all this was after we built my brother a new kitchen!
 
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#14 ·
Hometime, that's it. Good stuff, I used to be able to watch hours on top of hours of this stuff. I still watch some other ones now to, but the good ones are hard to come across.
 
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tlogan6797

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#15 ·

Quote:
and the couple, Guy and Girl (cant remember that show's name).
Click to expand...

Hometime?


I used to watch those shows all the time, too. Everytime I'd fix something around the house and my wife would be amazed that I knew how to do it, I'd just say "I saw JO JO do this Saturday morning!" That would Joanne Leibeler.
 
I

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#16 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by carboranadum /forum/post/15510158


Hometime? I watched these too. When I got a Tivo, it drove my wife nuts that I recorded all of these and watched them back to back to back....still do (This Old House's Weston Project is SUPER COOL!).


CJ
Click to expand...

My wife loves all these shows, especially the HGTV stuff. We have been watching "Spice up my kitchen" since that is our next room to makeover. Our bedroom DVR is full of kitchen DIY shows that we watch after we put the kids to bed. Of course she doesn't do any of the work, she just watches for ideas.
 
I

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#17 ·

Quote:
Originally Posted by tlogan6797 /forum/post/15510220


Hometime?


I used to watch those shows all the time, too. Everytime I'd fix something around the house and my wife would be amazed that I knew how to do it, I'd just say "I saw JO JO do this Saturday morning!" That would Joanne Leibeler.
Click to expand...

So you and Jo Jo were on a first name basis huh?
 
W

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#20 ·
My wife and I are both engineers and we both have done some home renovation work in previous houses we owned/flipped. We built our current house (served as the GC) and did trades that we felt we could do ourselves either because it was cheaper that way or because we'd get a better result. We, too, spent countless hours and weekends watching Bob Vila and Hometime (I would also like to give a major shout out to Jo Jo) and were always willing to at least try doing something ourselves. A lot of times it is as much about having the right tool as it is being good at doing something. So the best advice is to really research things. I have been building my theater for over a year, and have been doing research here all along the way to make sure I am doing things right. Also, as a previous poster said, if you can do it, hire one of the designers on here, you will be very thankful you did!
 
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