Non-Dedicated Home Theater Build - A multifunctional use of space

[Deadset]

A Non-Dedicated Home Theater Build - A multifunctional use of space

Below is an outline I plan to cover:

Planning
Construction – framing / HVAC
Wiring
Plumbing
Insulation / Sound proofing
Drywall
Ceiling
Flooring
Doors
Trim
Flooring

A plan and layout is the most important part of the theater / basement build process. Without a plan, you’re going to regret it about midway through and seriously regret it by the time you complete it. I hope this information helps anyone looking to perform a similar addition to their house. I am an electrical engineer by trade, hobbyist when I get home, so I’m not the best woodworker, but if you take enough time you can get the desired results.

Depending on interest in the topic, I’ll start with planning and framing construction and continue from there if it looks like this is needed in the forum.

Phase 1: Planning

My plan was to keep an open floor plan, add a 4th bedroom, mini-bar and a great room that 1/2 will be a theater; the other 1/2 will be a kid’s play area with a space to hang a TV for them. The theater will have a window however it’ll be blocked with blinds and curtains. The overall function of this build is not a screened off room fully dedicated to just viewing movies. I want this to be a room for movies, games, TV and who knows what in the future, so it will stay an open floor plan for that reason. The other reason behind it is I want to keep the house from being too unique if I decide to sell in the future. But really I dig open areas and the less I sectioned off my basement the better.

Starting from scratch is a great way to get exactly what you want; knowing your limitations from the things you cannot change. When you build your own basement theater / multipurpose room know this: You will make changes to plan. However, being open minded and using inspiration along the way is a good thing; just don’t be too close minded if you decide to add a feature that sets you back 2 construction days. It’s worth it in the long run. Keep that point in mind during the entire build. Inspiration comes in many forms, sometimes when you’re really thinking of what to do or just out of a mistake that you turn positive.

To start out with, I came up with a floor plan before the building ever began in Jan 2008.

Here is a bird’s eye view of the basement

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This is the most important step of the entire process as everything hinges on this plan. Measure the outermost walls and everything that is fixed and cannot move, those are your limitations. Next, add the walls, doors, and structures where you want, making sure everything is to scale in whatever program you use.

I went to stores to measure heights of chairs I was interested in, heights of desks and countertops. For instance, I wanted high outlets for chili night at the mini-bar, so just go the stores and measure, account for flooring and rough in the boxes.

The minibar setup

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Now that you have everything on paper, take your main layout and print it out at least 3 times. With red ink, mark where you want outlets on one sheet, overhead lights on another and stereo equipment, cable & phone connections and network runs on the other. Having it written down helps when determining counting the number of boxes to buy, plus I’m a visual person so I can visualize where I want certain things.

Before we move on, note that lightning is important, especially down in the basement. I do have 3 egress windows, however I want to light the basement as if those do not exist. I installed 18 can lights that were nailed up inbetween the rafters and installed 5 ambient mood light receptacles. For the 4th bedroom, I wanted it to feel like I real room, so I installed a real light fixture – b/c I had the headroom for it. Putting together a lighting plan is important.

Switches are also important, make sure you know what the use of the space is before you determine what switches control what lights. Knowing that I would walk into a room, flip on zone 3 can lights (lights over the theater section), walk to that section, turn on mood lighting and turn off the can lights….I know I needed a 3-way switch for those can lights…..rather than walking back to the main switch. It’s little things like that, which will add personal touches and character to your build. Remember you’re not doing this by contractor spec, you’ll be putting comfortable features in….such as outlets not directly behind a headboard if you know the bed position.

Phase 2: Construction – Framing

Now that you have your plan, you can start framing. There are several resources and ways to frame a wall. The most important thing to remember about framing is to keep it level and plumb and while you are nailing up studs, visualize yourself screwing up sheetrock. That will eliminate any floating spots when you’re ready to hang sheetrock.

The way I decided to frame was to install the bottom plate making sure it was straight by snapping chalk lines. Do NOT use the concrete wall as a guide to keeping your wall straight, it will NOT be straight no matter how careful they poured your foundation. Once you have the bottom plate, I used a 6 and ½ foot level taped on a straight 2x4 cut down to act as a guide….when the level was level….I marked on the top rafters where and that’s where I put the top plate. Once the top and bottom plates are in place, the next step is to toe-nail in the studs in place, cutting each one to length. The glorious thing about basements is that each stud could be off just a 1/16th or 32nd, so each one was custom cut.

Note that framing is done with 16" centers from the studs, you can pre-mark these on the top and bottom plates before or after you secure them, that way you can easily just nail up the studs. It should also be noted that for corners, I used a square - a rather large square to get the corners just right. You can also use the 3/4/5 triangle method for closets....or a quick and dirty method is measure diagonally from corner 1 to corner 3 and corner 2 to corner 4...they should be the same give or take a 32nd of an inch, that will ensure a square room / closet / storage area.

The way I did it was tedious; you could build a wall and raise it up. However, I prefer the custom fit way as I didn’t want to shim the wall up. I felt this way provided a better fit. It’s personal preference.

Below are pics of my framing with a short description of challenges I ran into. Stay tuned for more on HVAC, wiring and more.

This was one of the first days working, I started framing around what would be the bathroom and set the tub


Another shot from the hall / furnace room. I bought the fixtures ahead of time so I could get a good idea where to place the vanity and mirror.


This wall separates the laundry room and bathroom. You can see the stub in for the toilet and the sink drain. The small sink drain was framed into the wall and connected to the vent stack which is in the laundry ceiling and connects out to the roof. This is code as every sink has to vent.


Framing of the doors for the bathroom, there are king studs next to the normal studs that hold the header studs. You want to leave a few inches around the size of door you decide on and shim it in later.


This is a shot of the bedroom framing, just building the skeleton of the basement.


Another skeleton shot, you can see my level on a stick to get the wall plumb and level.


A good ½” hammer drill with concrete bits sets the tapcon screws to hold the bottom plate.


Sometimes when you frame, the wall doesn’t line up with the rafters, runs parallel, so this is a pic of blocking I installed so I had something to nail the top plate to


All nailing was done with this compressor and nail gun, save a lot of time, you don’t need a high end one, just one such as this that runs about 250 bucks


Pic of framing around the egress window, it’s pretty easy, just start with the side pieces and nail in the headers with the supports


Another shot of the long wall, skeleton is now growing! You can see my RG6 cable dangling from the joist, I had the cable co rough in a few lines free of charge 


Another pic of blocking, it’s important to note that I pre-drilled those. The glu-lams would have been tough to just pop a screw through there


Pic of my work area with a bottom & top plate installed


Pic of window and framing around duct work, slowly working my way around the outside of the basement before I do any interior walls


Went back and filled in the gaps with header boards and supports, 16” on center of course 


Another shot of the wall, this wall is orthogonal to projector screen wall


Here’s a framing pic around the duct work in the bedroom, instead of using 2x2’s like most sites recommend, I found them too flimsy, so I opted for 2x4 ‘short’ walls around them, they turned out great.


Another pic of the 2x4 framing around the duct work, I wanted to hide everything from site so framing around it was essential in getting that finished look at the end of the project


Here is an interesting pic of me clamping and hanging a ‘short’ wall around the duct work, it was 17 foot long


Whew! Short wall is up, you can see upstairs cold air return foil board and a few shots of the phone / cable wiring.


Finally finished covering all the duct work


So that I would have heat in the basement, I made several trunk runs for vents in the rooms. Menards sells collars you can install, just place them on the trunk, mark with a sharpie, cut out with a metal bit using a rotozip, install the collar and foil tape off, then add a few self tapping screws


Pic of the vent extension and boot


I taped it off during construction as I didn’t want to heat / cool the basement while it was under construction


Framing around the cold air return and heat duct


Here is a pic of framing around the furnace room, even though there is a door there, frame as you would a wall, when you rough in the door, you can always cut out the bottom plate where the door will be with a reciprocating saw


This is an early pic of the DVD/Blu-ray storage area, if you look in my gallery you can see the finished pic of it.


Another shot of my closet for blu-ray storage, it doubles as a cold air return. I installed collars to connect into the cold air return and using the 2x4 framing, I created an air channel in between them using foil board.


Pic of the pocket door, I wanted to use that corner for book shelves and just couldn’t get up space using a standard swing door


Here is a pic of the bedroom closet framing, again I used a pocket door frame you can pickup these at lowes or Menards already preformed, just rough them in and install


I used a 22 cal nailgun to install the pocket frames to the concrete


Here is the tool, I bought the cheaper one and used a 3lb sledge to hit the pin which shoots the 22 cal and nail into the floor, it’s pretty cool, but be careful when you do this


Here is an early shot of me setting up the boundaries for my mini-bar, which backs up to the under the stairs closet. I decided to come out 28” and frame around them so the the bar wouldn’t just look like it was floating in the room, I wanted walls around it.


Another early shot of the mini-bar area, also to the left you’ll see the framing I did to conceal the upstairs main drain. I wanted to hide all aspects, so I also framed in a closet around the main drain. Even further left is my smooth fox terrier Murdoc 


Early shot of the mini-bar area and just to the right you’ll see built in storage 1, which will house more movies. That one is different that the built in storage that doubles as a cold air return.


Ok that’s about it for now, I’ll be back with more tips on framing and then move onto wiring.