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Formica's Audio / HT room... the construction


formica

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I took a picture of some uplighting dtel and I did in our new addition. The photograph was taken in the am and is kind of blurry. This type of lighting would help disguise the short ceiling in your new room and is very easy and inexpensive to install. If you like it, I can take some additional pics and post them.

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That's easier to see... you guys really have an open space going

there. BTW, looks like rope light over a crown moulding,

right? I was considering something similar to that to

highlight my steel beam.

Unfortunately I don't have room for a tray ceiling like Roger

(indyklipschfan) did... esp since I'm planning on some acoustic foam up

there. OTOH, Glen (Picky) has about the same height as me and his

place looks great.

ROb

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The total open area is 34'X24'. That includes living room, dining room and kitchen. Totally open floor plan. The living room ends at the columns, that beam you see divides living from dining/kitchen. We plan to post more pics after holidays.

Actually, the moulding is floor moulding, dtel held a piece of moulding up there and a 45 degree angle looked about right, so he cut small wooden angles out on a 45 degee, screwed those to the wall, then finished nailed the moulding to the angles. Be sure to put a dip in the top of the wooden angles so the rope lights can seat in the moulding and not be exposed to the eye. The rope lights come in 18' lengths, very inexpensive. Be sure to put outlets that all tie into one switch, preferably a dimmer switch. This works perfect. We doubled the rope lights in the moulding to make it a little brighter and all of those outlets are one dimmer switch. I realize your ceiling is low, rather than highlight the steel beam, which will appear to divide the space, go along the top of the walls with lighting, we dropped down about 2 1/2 inches from the ceiling. The up lighting will draw the eye away from the short walls and toward the ceiling. This lighting is excellent for movies, entertaining, etc. It lights the room enough to navigate the room, but puts no light on the television screen itself. Its perfect lighting for parties. Also, the recessed ceiling lights (can post pics and info if you like) are easy to install, safe and not expensive at all. We used 2x6 for the ceiling joist, and they fit perfect. Check Home Depot or Lowes, we believe they were between ten and fifteen bucks each max. Our recessed lighting is also on a dimmer switch.

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It's hard to tell what the room really looks like with all the Christmas stuff. We have nine people living here since Hurricane Katrina and my birthday is Christmas Day, so we have always had more Christmas decorations than normal people. We have about 9000 miniature lights in our landscaping. Dtel fusses because you can't hardly walk through the house at Christmastime. But what can he do...it's only a few weeks a year.

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Last pic. BTW, speaking of dimmers....came across these jewels from Lutron.

http://www.lutron.com/spacer/

Since they're infrared, they can be triggered by the same remote that controls your system. And, you can have multiple dimmers in different locations in the room yet still control them all at once (assuming your remote "scatters" infrared enough). Write a macro for the remote that includes triggering the dimmers and wha-la! House lights dim on cue. Sweet!! [:)]

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The area with the rope lighting installed is actually 18'x24'. We used the inexpensive rope lights and doubled them up in some areas. You really can't tell because the lighting is low. We had purchased some rope lighting to use for Christmas decorating a few years back and decided to see if it would work. My daughter has an "attic bedroom" (meaning 5' side walls) and she used the same lighting technique as a feature in her bedroom. She went to the after Christmas sale today at our local "Wally World" and purchased the rope lights for $1.99. Of course, custom cut lights would also be really nice.

We extended the moulding by putting 1/4 round or "shoe" moulding onto the end with finishing nails, which added approximately 1/2 inches more to the moulding.

Tom, your room must be beautiful, based on the pics you posted.

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Tom, your room must be beautiful, based on the pics you posted.

Tom's really has got a great dedicated room coming together (Tom, sorry

to hear about the projector delays BTW...). Mine won't be quite

as dedicated... but I have limited space for now.

The walls are actually clay colored with

venetian plaster finish, not pink as it looks in the pic.

I was wondering about that, cause dtel didn't seem like a pink type of guy... [;)]

I'm off a couple of weeks and should be able to get some work done...

although I do have to put a priority on my gf... given she's been

working such long hours trying to get her business to the next

level.... but that's a different story.

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I've been busy on my project rather than posting so i haven't been around here much.

Here are a couple of updated pictures... This is the nearly

completed IB manifold. I still have to line the inside of the

centre channel nook with MDF.

Since I can't hide the fasteners, I'm waiting till I borrow the finish nailer.

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Here is the manifold in place. The entire front wall will be

covered in OSB on the closet side as well as the corners inside the HT

to accommodate the Khorns.

Screwed, glued, braced at 26"oc, and then covered in gypsum... given the additional cost, I thought, why not?

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This gives a better overall view with the OSB installed. I'll try

to get an picture of the IB manifold support... it's basically

screwed directly to the concrete floor.

One major design change today, integrating a lot of the original advice

concerning equipment placement with rear access while keeping it out of

direct sight. I've moved it all over to the other side of the

room into a walkin closet that's next to the washroom.

Technically the equipment was to wide to fit. but I ended up

demolishing the wall, and moving the door over the couple of inches...

and it'll just squeeze in now.

Cable runs to the projector and speakers are also simplified...

so I'm pleased even if it was more work than I planned on. I'll

try to post a drawing and picture later...

ROb

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