Home Theater Forum and Systems banner

MrAngles' Tornado Shelter Theater

Tags
basement
98K views 731 replies 26 participants last post by  NBPk402 
#1 · (Edited)
Hey everybody, I've been reading the forums for a while to get ideas for my home theater in anticipation of my new house with unfinished basement. We're all moved in to the house and I'm ready to start the planning phase for finishing the basement. I want a home theater and an office down there and would like to make the most of my space (primarily for the theater). The problem space-wise is that there are two round metal support posts in the middle of the basement (indicated on the floorplans as brown dots). Here's a floorplan of the basement as it is now.
http://img528.imageshack.us/img528/729/basementoriginal.jpg

Here's what I've got planned so far for the layout:
http://img51.imageshack.us/img51/6318/basementoption1.jpg

The ceilings will be about 7 feet tall and I was hoping to do a 120"-140" 16x9 screen, and was hoping to two rows of seating, so a room 18 feet long seems like it would be on the small side. It occurred to me that I could move the back wall a few feet back, and put the post in some kind of pillar, which would allow me to move the seating back a bit, but I'm not sure how well that would work in real life having a pillar there.
http://img826.imageshack.us/img826/8568/basementoption2.jpg

I wanted to get some opinions from people who maybe have dealt with a similar issue, or at least people with projectors and a large screen to see what thoughts you you have on having a pillar in the room, or if there are other configurations you'd suggest. Let me know if you need any more information.
 
See less See more
3
#346 ·
No problem. At some point, I should figure out a better way to catalog it so it is easier to find things in it.....

And, I will say, when I first started thinking about a constructed star ceiling, the task seemed pretty daunting. Once I finished, I discovered it was a lot easier than I thought it would be. And, the effect is well worth the time.
 
#347 · (Edited)
So I got some more work done last night:



And then I got no more work done at all:


You can't tell in the pictures, but the last sheet of drywall only got two screws in it before I ran upstairs to get the projector.

I was messing around with different screen sizes, including a floor to ceiling 16x9 image that was pretty awesome. My current plan has the projector 19 feet away from the screen, which I was a little worried about based on the numbers in this table:

Which basically says that at 18'10" the smallest 2.35:1 image you can project is 120", which doesn't give me much wiggle room if I end up finding that to be too big. In practice though, I was able to zoom in quite a bit smaller than that without any apparent issues, so I guess I'm ok?
 
#348 ·
All progress will be stopped now : )

I am going to bet that projector gets put up and down 200 times during this process. I find it great to enjoy the room as it is being built. Gives a little more motivation.

with a 2.35 that big... how big is the 16x9 at same zoom? Or do you have automatic zoom? Or do you have a A Lens? One thing that was helpful to me was to map out the back row distance and verify the visibility over the front row with a projected image on the wall. It caused me to do a little bit of last minute changes before it was too late.
 
#349 ·
I have a Panasonic AE8000u which has lens memory, so I'll have a constant image height of 4 feet, with a 9.4 foot wide 2.35 image and about a 7 foot wide 16x9 image, which I guess would make the screen 122 inches. I didn't measure the image size in the picture, but I think it's about that size, and it didn't seem too big from where the front row is going to be. I did zoom it out to this size for fun though:


As far as the back row goes, I'm almost completely sure at this point that I'm not going to put a riser in right away. I need to get the room usable as soon as possible for storm season, and I feel like I'll be able to determine my riser height and width a lot more confidently once I have my seats and have had some time to watch a few movies and be sure about the position and size of the screen.
 
#351 ·
I think you're right, I was considering putting more conduit in so I could mount the projector directly above the back row if necessary, but after trying it out I don't think it's necessary. Your projector is 19-20 feet from the screen isn't it, in the rear soffit? Why do you think the Panasonic chart says you shouldn't project less than an 120" 2.40 screen from that distance?
 
#354 ·
Either way you will need to tie into the rafters above for strength. From the picture its slightly hard to tell. But you can run 2 x 4s vertically and tie into the ladder steps to the joists. Just angle shoot nails or screw via pre-drilled hole son an angle. If you want more support It use simple cheap deck cleats that are made to tie in 2x4s to joists.

I didn't use all the sound clips and rails so I will be interested on how others recommend this since you are trying to keep from connecting the joists to the inner room and drywall. Or will you run the sound clips down and around the soffit?

Are you also saying there is only 3" gap above the ladder in between the ceiling? Or what is the "3 clearance" problem?
 
#356 ·
Are you also saying there is only 3" gap above the ladder in between the ceiling? Or what is the "3 clearance" problem?
there is a 6" gap from the ladder to the ceiling. My plan was to build another ladder (which would be 6" tall, from the top of the bottom ladder to the ceiling) out of 2x2s or 2x4s, three inches would be taken up by the sides or "rails" of the ladder so to speak (1.5" for each 2x4), leaving the "rungs" at three inches. I could screw the two ladders together at an angle, but at the top I'm screwing into 25 gauge steel hat channel, and I'm sure that needs to be a straight drive through the steel.

For the decoupling, I have hat channel running perpendicular to the soffits every 24". Halfway between each of those, I plan to attach the soffit to the joists with an IB-3 clip (the right angle clips that I used in the wall framing).
 
#360 ·
Okay I have both the side piece and bottom piece put together and they look great, just waiting on a trip to home depot for 2" fine thread screws to go into the hat channel. I picked up a box earlier today just to leave it in the cart apparently... I appreciate you guys helping me out so quickly on a weekend, and sorry if my posts were unclear, I'm sleep deprived and posting from a phone today. Time to have a mountain dew and get back to work.
 
#362 ·
Two sections of soffit are up!


I don't see a lot of pictures of this, so here's more detail on decoupling the soffit from the ceiling:

So as I said before, the hat channel that will hold the ceiling drywall up is perpendicular to the soffit, running 24" apart, and I just put the clips at the end of the channel right where the soffit would hang, and used 2" fine thread drywall screws to hold the top section to the channel. The Soundproofing company talks about how to hang a soffit on a single parallel hat channel by placing a clip on every joist to support the extra weight, but the literature doesn't mention what to do if the channel is perpendicular to the soffit. In this case I placed an IB-3 clip in between each run of hat channel, so the soffit is supported every 12 inches. I measured where the IB-3s would need to go first and used #10 machine screws with washers and lock nuts to secure the clips to the top of the soffit, then after the soffit was in place and screwed into the channel, I screwed the IB-3s into the joists. When I was done, I was able to do pull ups on the soffit.

It took a while to figure this out, and after measuring fifteen times and cutting once (then measuring again and cutting again), I'm very happy with how it turned out. I really appreciate ALMFamily and Bamabum for helping me out!
 
#369 ·
More pics, the entire right side soffit for the front section of the room is framed. (Ignore the natural gas line going through the soffit, I still need to move that but my wife won't let me do it when the family is home):


Here's the air return, it's the largest obstruction coming into the room. I tried to frame it as closely as possible while allowing it room to expand depending on temperature:


It leaves just over 24" of unframed space, so I'll be using 5/8" OSB for structure and as my first layer of mass there, using a variation of the "frameless soffit" method.
 
#370 ·
Looks nice and straight - well done!

I am sure you know this already, but when you start putting layers up, make sure to leave a slight gap between the studs and the layer you put up if you have spots with no channel.

Also, leave a gap between the cement floor and your layers and plan to fill that with the soundproof silicone.
 
#371 ·
Thank you!

The section I put up last night is about 1/8"shorter than the sections I put up over the weekend and it's really bugging me. Once I put the OSB and sheetrock on I'll forget about it, I'm sure.

Thanks for the tip, I did plan to do that, I've been using 3/8" laths(sp?) on the floor and in the corners on the wall sheetrock, and figured I'd do the same on the soffits, even on the top where it would hit the hat channel.

What do you think I should do for insulation around the air return, there's anywhere from a half inch to an inch and a half of space between the duct and where the OSB will be, should I put a little fiberglass in there, or should I be concerned about the fiberglass touching both the OSB and the duct, causing slight sound transfer?
 
#374 ·
I'd like some input on where my surround speakers should go. I have Acoustic Research AR4c speakers for my surrounds, which look like this:

In the past I've always preferred my surround speakers to be mounted as high as possible and slightly behind my ears, and I love these speakers because they have a ball and socket swivel mount (you can kind of see the foot for it in the picture) that allows me to angle them any way I could possibly want to, whether mounted on the wall or on the ceiling. I was originally thinking I'd mount them to the walls under the soffits, but looking at it now with two feet of space between the seating and the wall and maybe 6'8" clearance under the soffits, I'll probably end up bumping my head on them a lot. Should I mount them to the side of the soffit then? Will there be an issue with basically mounting them in a corner?
 
#376 ·
Okay here's something I mentioned previously but I'm not sure I was able to explain it properly, and maybe it still won't make sense until the finished product, or maybe not even then. I plan on putting up crown molding, but not an elaborate light tray, so it won't be able to hide anything that sticks out much, so I thought I'd recess the outlets for the rope lights into the side of the soffit, in order to keep the plugs hidden.

The left rear soffit is not a false soffit, so to make things more complicated, the recess needs to be made with double drywall and be acoustically sealed.
This is the soffit I'm talking about:


And here's what it looks like:




The bottom of the recess will be sealed when I drywall the bottom of the soffit, and the fron will remain open for the rope cord to go through. I just need to slap a putty pad on the back of the outlet and it will be all set. Ultimately, I don't know if it was worth all the effort of cutting drywall to fit, screwing the drywall in with my little ratchet screwdriver, etc. but it's done now, and the front soffit is a false soffit, so that one will be a lot easier since it won't have to be sealed, I'll just need to throw one piece of drywall up there for the gang box to mount into.
 
#387 ·
Ok so leaning the first T brace against a wall to get the first edge of the drywall up there has worked great. Now I'm at a point where I have two panels in the center of the room that need to go up, and I'm not sure how to do it, because when I tighten the second brace up to the ceiling, it loosens up the first brace and the drywall falls on me and tries to kill me. Any tips?
 
#388 ·
I would cut the first brace to the length where you can get it to stand more or less straight up when you wedge it in. That way, when the second goes up and loosens the first, the weight of the drywall will keep the first brace from falling over until you can move to it and readjust it to be a bit more steady.
 
#390 ·
New pictures!

As I mentioned previously, I put 2" rigid foam insulation on the exterior walls, held up by furring strips, and hung the drywall directly to the furring strips. This is very effective for moisture control and saves space vs framing a wall away from the insulation.

I also chose not to use clips, double drywall or green glue on the exterior walls to save money and space. The problem with this is that sound can still go through the single layer of drywall and travel through the cavity and rigid foam up between the joists and through the floor to the room above. What Ted White and I came up with was a solution where the soffits create a soundproof seal from the ceiling over the wall cavity to the sill plate. This is an illustration of the plan:

You can see here the layers of drywall where I created the corner up and over the edge of the concrete, butted up to the sill plate. I shot a layer of spray foam between the concrete and the drywall to keep any moisture from seeping through to the drywall, and sealed each layer of drywall to the sill plate with acoustical sealant.



Here I put IB-3 clips halfway between each length of hat channel, with 1/4" hex bolts through them.


Then I hung two layers of drywall on the ceiling with holes drilled for the 1/4" bolts to hang through, and put up the soffit.



Here are a couple shots of the recess for the soffit outlets. One is for the rope light, tied into the outlet in the soffit behind the support beam, and the other is for UV lights for a star ceiling. The conduit for my left surround speaker wire also opens up right above this recess, so I decided to just have the wire run through the recess to make it easier to pull wire through later if necessary.

 
#393 ·
Some random thoughts.

I was looking at my giant pile of empties and I feel like I'm going to be obligated to give some kind of credit to Mountain Dew once the theater is done because there's no way I would be anywhere near as far along as I am now without it.

To anyone who didn't know this like I didn't, buy a drywall dimpler. I feel like I was literally throwing away time and energy prior to picking this thing up.

Here's a pic of what's going on in the theater now.
 
#395 ·
Looking good mate! The dimpler tool is super handy - I got one after a previous project where it took so long for me to get a proper drive depth. I finally got the hang of it when I was done - but of course it is a fair bit in between projects so I thought it would be a good investment. :)


I bought some puck lights to see if they would work for the bar lights and the screen wash lights, I like the low profile installation and I like the xenon bulbs (although I haven't attempted to dim them yet), but I haven't found any larger than about 2" yet. Is that just the way it goes with puck lights, or is there some place I can order larger ones?
Hmmm - cannot really help here. I went with recessed LED lights throughout and never really shopped for puck lights.

Did that support method work out for the ceiling?
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top