Ambrosio's Unaplex II: Room within a Room Build

**tjambro** · **06-15-09, 05:23 PM**

Quote:

Ted White wrote:

Looking great. That insulation in the lighting compartment won't be too compressed, will it?

I don't know, do you think it is? It's R13 that is folded in half and basically makes a "u". If I want to fill the entire compartment, I would have to cut two 7 inch pieces and stack them flat on top of each other. Instead of cutting 2 pieces, I just folded one R13 piece in half (the "u") and put it up there. Isn't that basically the same thing as cutting two pieces? The bottom is a little more compressed because it is up against two 2x2's.

It wouldn't be that big of a deal to remove some if that would help. I would appreciate your thoughts.

**Ted White** · **06-15-09, 06:22 PM**

Generally for absorption you don't want to compact much beyond the point you would for thermal specs. So a 7" cavity would be great as long as you don't crush when installing lights
Posted via Mobile Device

**tjambro** · **06-15-09, 06:30 PM**

Quote:

Ted White wrote:

Generally for absorption you don't want to compact much beyond the point you would for thermal specs. So a 7" cavity would be great as long as you don't crush when installing lights
Posted via Mobile Device

I left space for the lights but most likely will have to remove a little because I only left room for the can, not the electrical box.

Thanks for your input.

**Ted White** · **06-15-09, 09:04 PM**

You know the score.

**tjambro** · **07-05-09, 12:53 AM**

As if the build hasn't been slow enough, it's gonna get even slower due to my most recent purchase. My '98 Chevy Cavalier convertible has been showing its age and I decided it was time to replace it with this:

It's a 2007 Pontiac G6 hardtop convertible and while it's not as fun as a brand new PJ and IB sub, I can't drive the IB sub to work and I need to work to buy the PJ and sub...well, you get the point.

I have enough materials on hand to finish the soffits in the theater and sound lock/lobby but after that, I will have to wait a few months to build up a little cash before spending any more on the theater. Oh well, it will get done when it gets done...

Now I'm REALLY having a hard time getting motivated to finish the soffits.

**bpape** · **07-05-09, 08:40 AM**

That looks like a lot of fun Tom.

As for the soffits, you'll be surprised. When there's no money for new toys, you work with whatcha got...

Bryan

**tjambro** · **07-05-09, 03:11 PM**

Quote:

bpape wrote:

As for the soffits, you'll be surprised. When there's no money for new toys, you work with whatcha got...

You're right. I already have the Fantech inline fans and some rock left so I should be able to completely finish the soffits, dead vent and put the last wall up outside the theater (theater/arcade boundary) before I need anything else. As slow as I am, that should keep me busy for awhile while funds are being procured.

**Space** · **07-07-09, 08:04 PM**

Hey Tom, just get a DVD player and put it in the Pontiac G6 raise the roof and call it a day

Good choice!

Brien

**tjambro** · **07-08-09, 10:33 PM**

Quote:

Space wrote:

Hey Tom, just get a DVD player and put it in the Pontiac G6 raise the roof and call it a day

That would be cheaper, wouldn't it Brien?

Tomorrow is my last day at work for a week, so I'm gonna try to get motivated and work on the soffits in both the theater and the sound lock/lobby. Feel free to prod me every once and a while to make sure I am actually doing the work.

**Ted White** · **07-09-09, 10:31 AM**

Go man, go!

**Prof.** · **07-09-09, 08:18 PM**

You've just been prodded..

**tjambro** · **07-22-09, 08:52 PM**

Thanks for the enouragement guys. I worked on the room 6 of the 11 days I was off. I know you die hard guys would have worked every day but I don't have that type of energy or resolve. Plus my inlaws came down for the weekend just before I had to go back to work.

While the pictures may look like much was not done, I felt that I did good, hey at least some progress is being made.

I continue to work on the theater soffits:

The big sections are complete with the ductboard and dividing partitions for the can lights installed. All romex to be installed in the soffits has been installed. I still need to work on the corners and transition pieces but at least the large pieces of mdf have been hung. I will eventually cover all in a layer of 5/8 DW with GG between the mdf and DW.

Here's the right hand soffit with the opening cut for my 5' linear diffuser (HVAC supply):

You can also see one of the can light openings.

I started working on the sound lock/lobby soffits also:

It may not look like much, but I had to run the romex before these soffits are closed up. The silver tape above the 2x2 is the ductboard tape that I used to secure the low voltage CL2 lines that will lead to a remote 4 zone switch that will connect to my 6 zone Grafix Eye unit that will be installed here:

The Grafix Eye will be installed in the backer box that I created just to the left of the door. This is the wall that divides the theater from the sound lock/lobby area taken from the sound lock side. The backer box is currently open on the right side near the door. The divider wall is large enough that I can work on the lighting controller after the rock is put up and then install the last piece of mdf for the backer box and caulk that last side. The 2 dial rheostats for the dead vent fans will be installed directly below the Grafix Eye.

At the top right hand corner of the photo you can see 2" bpape felt that I had left over that I lined the "transition hvac box" that connects the theater supply duct with the sound lock supply side. The main supply run will run above the door and cannot be installed until the drywall is up. The Grafix Eye backer box and the "transition hvac box" do not touch the opposite wall. The backer box is no problem, it's not even close to the opposite wall. The hvac box comes within 1/8" or so of the opposite wall and I caulked it up. I don't know if this was necessary, but I figured it wouldn't hurt. I probably could have made it 2 layers but I forgot and have since closed the wall.

**tjambro** · **07-22-09, 09:06 PM**

Here's the same wall above with the 1st layer of rock on it:

I know the piece near the door looks bad, I'll work on that.

Here's a photo of my new 65W incandescent pj:

Actually, before I entirely closed up the romex in the soffits I figured I should at least do some basic testing. I have installed over 700' of romex and I still have more to go! I don't have any of the romex installed in my breaker box yet but I attached a hacked extension cord to a line near the breaker panel, plugged the hacked cord into a switched power strip and hooked the 65W can light to the end of the circuit I wanted to test. That's why you may notice a lot of capped wires in the pictures. I figured if the last load on the circuit works, the others must also.

I did learn something valuable. Don't test the last circuit of the day when you are tired. Everything was working perfectly and I told my wife, "I'll be up as soon as I test this last circuit". Well, it didn't work. No problem, probably the bulb (nope), probably the wire nuts not on tight (nope), probably this last leg not wired tightly to the previous leg (nope)...now I'm starting to panic. I grabbed the 'ole tester and no juice at any of these points. Ok, let's test right where the romex enters the room. The orange light is on and while I haven't used this tester in quite some time, the light seemed a little dim to me. Forget this, lets go back to the panel...doh! Black goes to black, white DOES NOT go to the temporarily bypassed ground but to white. Oops, 2 minutes later, everything was working. Whew, that was scary!

I plan on getting the 2 additional layers of rock up this weekend and perhaps work on the soffits in the sound lock. I only have 8 sheets of rock left and will clearly need more to finish the wall, soffits and the yet unbuilt wall that divides the left side of the theater from the arcade area. Need to replenish the check book before ordering more rock. I also need thinner rock for the arcade and utility room where the closets were removed and plumbing re-routed in the utility room.

**Ted White** · **07-23-09, 10:07 AM**

I am really loving those soffits. The split soffit (lights and ventilation) has never been so well documented.

**tjambro** · **07-23-09, 07:20 PM**

Quote:

Ted White wrote:

I am really loving those soffits. The split soffit (lights and ventilation) has never been so well documented.

Thanks Ted. It's not that it's well documented, it's that I am moving so slow and have nothing else to post pictures of.

I'm looking forward to getting them done and putting up a layer of GG and DW over the mdf so I can move on with my life.

**Prof.** · **07-23-09, 08:05 PM**

Quote:

tjambro wrote:

I did learn something valuable. Don't test the last circuit of the day when you are tired. Everything was working perfectly and I told my wife, "I'll be up as soon as I test this last circuit". Well, it didn't work. No problem, probably the bulb (nope), probably the wire nuts not on tight (nope), probably this last leg not wired tightly to the previous leg (nope)...now I'm starting to panic. I grabbed the 'ole tester and no juice at any of these points. Ok, let's test right where the romex enters the room. The orange light is on and while I haven't used this tester in quite some time, the light seemed a little dim to me. Forget this, lets go back to the panel...doh! Black goes to black, white DOES NOT go to the temporarily bypassed ground but to white. Oops, 2 minutes later, everything was working. Whew, that was scary!

These little hiccups try the best of us at times..
I know that when something suddenly stops working in my theatre..the first thing I do is panic..

Progressing nicely..

**tjambro** · **08-16-09, 05:35 PM**

Quote:

Prof. wrote:

These little hiccups try the best of us at times..
I know that when something suddenly stops working in my theatre..the first thing I do is panic..

Progressing nicely..

Thanks Prof.

OT. Hey, I thought of you the other day. You see, I am reading a book about the 50 worst decisions since man was on this planet. No, no, it wasn't your decision to build a theater.

The book had a section with Australia's rabbit problem. I saw the city Adelaide mentioned and knew you lived near there. The book said that rabbits were introduced on Christmas 1859 by some guy who had 24 sent from England so that he can hunt them. They said they spread like wildfire and there were millions upon millions of rabbits in Australia. It also said some farmland had to be abandoned because the rabbits ate up all the fields. Is this true?

**tjambro** · **08-16-09, 06:11 PM**

Did some more soffit work:

This is not the theater, but the little room you have to go through to get to the theater. I call it the sound lock/lobby room. These soffits are much easier to build then the divided soffits I am building in the theater room. The theater room has can lighting so the cans need to be isolated from the duct work to minimize sound transmission. I originally was going to put cans in this little room but decided instead to build some shallow columns surrounding the lit poster boxes I plan on purchasing and put sconces on the columns. This room does have duct work, some of which you can see in this picture so I will be isolating it by enclosing it with mdf/GG/DW. Still, much easier that the divided soffits.

On the right side of the photo above the halogen lamp, you can see the cut out for the HVAC supply for this room. On the left side of the photo, you can see the exposed duct that is just a little smaller than a 6" round, this is the return side. In the photo, it looks like the duct runs into the larger duct but it doesn't. The return duct will snake around to the left into what will be my equipment closet. That larger duct you see is a little larger than an 8" round and is the supply for both rooms. It comes in from outside the closet, runs across the photo and tees above the halogen lamp. The larger volume goes into the theater and the remainder dumps into the cutout you see above the lamp.

This shows the smaller duct vent coming up against the larger supply duct. Also in this picture, you may be able to notice that there appears to be two layers of mdf covering the main supply duct. This is a correction that I am not thrilled with but will accept. Due to my unlevel floor, ceiling and poor planning, the soffit frames for the soundlock did not line up properly with the frame over the door. The difference was too much to leave as is, so I inserted a small strip of mdf on the outside frame to bring the supply soffit down so that it is level over the door. The problem is that the soffits around the room will not come in level with the supply soffit. I think it will look ok when it is done because hopefully it will look like I planned the soffits to be different heights...yea...yea, that's the ticket! I really didn't want to remove all the soffits, wiring, and re-do it so this was the best solution I could come up with. Now, if this were in the theater itself, I may have ripped it down but this is just the room to get to the theater.

**Prof.** · **08-16-09, 09:06 PM**

Quote:

tjambro wrote:

Thanks Prof.

OT. Hey, I thought of you the other day. You see, I am reading a book about the 50 worst decisions since man was on this planet. No, no, it wasn't your decision to build a theater.

The book had a section with Australia's rabbit problem. I saw the city Adelaide mentioned and knew you lived near there. The book said that rabbits were introduced on Christmas 1859 by some guy who had 24 sent from England so that he can hunt them. They said they spread like wildfire and there were millions upon millions of rabbits in Australia. It also said some farmland had to be abandoned because the rabbits ate up all the fields. Is this true?

Yes, that is absolutely spot on!..

As a lad, I can remember going to a relatives farm, where the rabbits were so thick that you could fire a rifle in their general direction and hit one!!
They were like plagues of rats..and they consumed crops everywhere and a lot of the grass lands in the country areas..

The Governments then introduced Mixamatosis (probably not the right spelling) to the populations and virtually wiped them all out..But not all!

Some years later, they returned..This time they were immune to the Mixamatosis and started increasing in populations again..
You might have heard the term "breeding like rabbits"..Well a truer statement was never said!!

A new virus was introduced (can't recall the name off hand) which again started eliminating the hordes..and to this day has kept them pretty much in check..

Where I live, we still get a lot of seasonal rabbits which have to be baited on a regular basis, to keep them under control..

I would love to get my hands on the person who first introduced rabbits to Australia, as would most farmers!!

**tjambro** · **08-16-09, 11:27 PM**

Quote:

Prof. wrote:

Yes, that is absolutely spot on!..

Thanks for the confirmation Prof. We have rabbits here but they are not bad at all. You may see one or two every once and a while, but not like you blokes (did I use that term correctly?

). I just can't imagine that many rabbits in any one place. The book said that your people would actually build fences to limit their migration and you could see which side of the fence the rabbits were on from space! That's a lot of rabbits!!

OK, time to get this thread back on track...I used all but 3 of my 150 sheets of sheetrock. I don't have enough to build the external long theater wall (3 layers) or the IB wall (2 layers on each side). So I ordered 46 sheets of 5/8" for the theater and 12 sheets of 1/2" for repair (plumbing move) and to replace the wood paneling. It will be delivered in a couple of weeks.

**Prof.** · **08-17-09, 08:02 PM**

Quote:

tjambro wrote:

, but not like you blokes (did I use that term correctly?

).

Yes you did..That's an old "outback" Aussie slang name..not used much these days..like "Stone the crows" and "Starve the Lizards"...
Ah!..the good old days..Now everything is just "f"..

**tjambro** · **08-17-09, 09:12 PM**

Quote:

Prof. wrote:

Yes you did..That's an old "outback" Aussie slang name.

I hate to admit it, but we have a steak restaurant chain over here in the States called "Outback" and you guessed it, it's based on an Australian theme. I think that's where I picked up the term blokes, it's on the door to the men's restroom....The woman's restroom is labeled Shielas. Ah, how deep we Americans are.

**Prof.** · **08-19-09, 07:43 PM**

Quote:

tjambro wrote:

Thanks for the confirmation Prof. We have rabbits here but they are not bad at all. You may see one or two every once and a while, but not like you blokes (did I use that term correctly?

). I just can't imagine that many rabbits in any one place. The book said that your people would actually build fences to limit their migration and you could see which side of the fence the rabbits were on from space! That's a lot of rabbits!!

Just OT again for a moment..
This article appeared this morning..Just when I thought everything was under control!!
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2...20/2661352.htm
It never ends!.

**tjambro** · **08-19-09, 10:09 PM**

Quote:

Prof. wrote:

Just OT again for a moment..
This article appeared this morning..Just when I thought everything was under control!!
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2...20/2661352.htm
It never ends!.

...$740 million in damages to agriculture, unreal. I hear you Aussie's banished the Easter Bunny too, I can see why.

Advertisement