Gameroom Project - Part 2

[Zud]

Thanks guys for the positive words. I feel ill at the moment, so that helps.

I am 6' 4" myslef. It just sucks, because that area is where I wanted the pins and I have F-14 and Getaway HSII that have domelights. They will not fit in that spot, so I have to relayout how the games will go. Which means I need to redo my electric locations. The builder is asking aout the electric locations now. I think my project is going on hold for at least a week. I know I am picky, but hey it's my house and my money. I want it done correctly and to what my needs are.

Sorry for the rant.

 

[towlebooth]

Cool project. I'm still in the design/clean-out phase of my basement game room. I think I will have to enlarge a stairwell or egress window in order to get cabinets in and out of our 1915 home in St. Paul. Currently we have them in our 2nd floor. It's a long story.

Chad

 

[mjenison]

Ceiling in one area of the gameroom will only be 6' 9". Not much I can do there because that is where the main trunk of the HVAC is at.

Is the trunk of the HVAC at 6'9", or is that what it will be once they frame around it? Maybe you could just not have them frame around it, leave it exposed, and just paint it whatever color the ceiling will be. Seen that done in a few houses.

Did you go with the drop ceiling or drywall ceiling?

Also, yeah it's your money...you want an octogon area, you should make that clear to them. Don't let them steamroll you; they only have to be there a few weeks, you'll have to be there much longer.

 

[Zud]

Is the trunk of the HVAC at 6'9", or is that what it will be once they frame around it? Maybe you could just not have them frame around it, leave it exposed, and just paint it whatever color the ceiling will be. Seen that done in a few houses.

Did you go with the drop ceiling or drywall ceiling?

6'9" After ceiling is in and floor is layed.
We will have mostly drop ceiling, but drywall where the sofits are, like the HVAC area.

Also, yeah it's your money...you want an octogon area, you should make that clear to them. Don't let them steamroll you; they only have to be there a few weeks, you'll have to be there much longer.

The octogon area was elminated by me to accomodate the wife's craftroom and storage area. I went back and forth on plans for a few years. This current layout was the best I could do with the small space I had to work with.

Maybe in a few years I can build that other gameroom in the backyard, 640 sqft, all gameroom.

 

[Zud]

Here are a couple of pics from the past two days.

Pic 1: Bottom of stairs
Pic 2: New electrical sub-panel
Pic 3: Low ceiling 6'9" (Cannot place pins there now )

I stopped construction, for now, so I did not go down there today. Will resume after the builder gets back to the States.

 

[mjenison]

Is it just me, or does it look like there's a ton of room between the framing and the duct work on that last picture?

Are they just trying to make it level with the beam next to it? Just frame the beam up and around.

Sorry, without being there I know its easy to arm-chair-quarterback the project, but I'd express that you want maximum ceiling height whereever possible.

 

[cadillacman]

No, I get just about half the space. Here are pics of the layouts. Changes have been made since these, but you get the idea.

pfft screw that room with the wood floors. I vote full on arcade!!!

This message has been brought to you by the 'full basement arcade for zud' committe and its affiliates.

sell it to the wife as the bar area, but then put your darts and megatouch in there, then more and more and voila full on basement arcade

 

[Zud]

Is it just me, or does it look like there's a ton of room between the framing and the duct work on that last picture?

Are they just trying to make it level with the beam next to it? Just frame the beam up and around.

Sorry, without being there I know its easy to arm-chair-quarterback the project, but I'd express that you want maximum ceiling height whereever possible.

Difference is like 3" so it is level with the beam. Looks better then a 2nd bump.

 

[Zud]

Color choices:

Choose Option 1 (1st Pic)
Choose Option 2 (2nd Pic)

NOTE: These are the actual paint colors, carpet, and tile we are going to use. It is amazing what some computer programs can do.

 

[avidgeek]

Option 2 mixes it up a bit.... more fun.

 

[Silverunicorn]

Option 2 mixes it up a bit.... more fun.

I agree, Option #2.

Chris

 

[Jeff F]

I also like Option #2.

 

[Zud]

Here is a pic of my potential layout. Games included are:

1. APB
2. Arkanoid
3. Asteroids
4. Battlezone
5. Crystal Castles
6. Dig Dug
7. DK3
8. Doubel Dragon
9. Galaga
10. Galaxian
11. Gauntlet
12. Gauntlet II
13. Jamma Cab
14. Joust
15. Mappy
16. Milipede
17. Omega Race
18. Paperboy
19. Pole Position Sitdown
20. Qbert
21. Robotron
22. Multi-Williams
23. Silk Worm
24. Space Duel
25. Sprint 2
26. Spyhunter
27. Super Pacman
28. Tempest
29. Tron
30. Gran Trak 10 or Lemans

 

[JPPT1974]

Here is a pic of my potential layout. Games included are:

1. APB
2. Arkanoid
3. Asteroids
4. Battlezone
5. Crystal Castles
6. Dig Dug
7. DK3
8. Doubel Dragon
9. Galaga
10. Galaxian
11. Gauntlet
12. Gauntlet II
13. Jamma Cab
14. Joust
15. Mappy
16. Milipede
17. Omega Race
18. Paperboy
19. Pole Position Sitdown
20. Qbert
21. Robotron
22. Multi-Williams
23. Silk Worm
24. Space Duel
25. Sprint 2
26. Spyhunter
27. Super Pacman
28. Tempest
29. Tron
30. Gran Trak 10 or Lemans

You got a lot of games as well as will look nice in your gameroom.

 

[gregbl]

Here's a small piece of advice from someone who also finished his basement.

Have your plumber put in a multi sump-pump system. I now have the primary sump pump at the bottom, and two smaller back-up pumps above it. These are also the quiet-shut off type. This way, if the primary sump fails or can't keep up, the secondary pumps kick in.

Also, we installed a full-house standby generator. Shortly after moving here from Seattle (the first week we moved in), a tornado struck Wheaton and knocked out power for 3 days. Within 6 hrs of the power going out, the basement started to flood and I was pulling moving boxes full of stuff and my extra computers up to the garage. I sent my wife out on a mission to buy a small generator that I could plug in to the sump pump and she eventually found one (all the way out in DeKalb, everyone else was sold out), but we had about 4" of water everywhere in the basement. At that time, it wasn't finished and we lost very little stuff because I got most of it out and it was still in moving boxes so it was easy to move. I left the plastic tubs because they were water-tight. I vowed that when we finished the basement we'd never, ever have to worry about flooding down there again so I installed the whole-house automatic standby generator. Within 13 seconds of a power failure, it kicks on and covers the entire house, not just a few select circuits. It runs on natural gas. That sucker cost around $7K, but it has given me peace of mind and I did get a discount on my homeowner's insurance because of it.

Sure enough, on Christmas Eve a few months after our project was finished, our power went out due to a storm. The generator kicked on and maintained everything (including heat) for the 1.5 days that the neighborhood was out. It didn't ruin our Christmas at all, we just clicked on like normal. It has saved our bacon on several smaller outages since then.

 

[cadillacman]

Here's a small piece of advice from someone who also finished his basement.

Have your plumber put in a multi sump-pump system. I now have the primary sump pump at the bottom, and two smaller back-up pumps above it. These are also the quiet-shut off type. This way, if the primary sump fails or can't keep up, the secondary pumps kick in.

Also, we installed a full-house standby generator. Shortly after moving here from Seattle (the first week we moved in), a tornado struck Wheaton and knocked out power for 3 days. Within 6 hrs of the power going out, the basement started to flood and I was pulling moving boxes full of stuff and my extra computers up to the garage. I sent my wife out on a mission to buy a small generator that I could plug in to the sump pump and she eventually found one (all the way out in DeKalb, everyone else was sold out), but we had about 4" of water everywhere in the basement. At that time, it wasn't finished and we lost very little stuff because I got most of it out and it was still in moving boxes so it was easy to move. I left the plastic tubs because they were water-tight. I vowed that when we finished the basement we'd never, ever have to worry about flooding down there again so I installed the whole-house automatic standby generator. Within 13 seconds of a power failure, it kicks on and covers the entire house, not just a few select circuits. It runs on natural gas. That sucker cost around $7K, but it has given me peace of mind and I did get a discount on my homeowner's insurance because of it.

Sure enough, on Christmas Eve a few months after our project was finished, our power went out due to a storm. The generator kicked on and maintained everything (including heat) for the 1.5 days that the neighborhood was out. It didn't ruin our Christmas at all, we just clicked on like normal. It has saved our bacon on several smaller outages since then.

yeah man ive got a standard generator myself.. between the twister a couple years ago that took out all the frickin service to our area, several small ones, and again the big tornado that fucked up out service again a couple weeks ago, im glad i had it.

I WISH i could afford a nat gas generator. That would be sweet. Nice to meet another "local" klover but ill use that term loosely lol

 

[Mr. Hot Dog]

Have your plumber put in a multi sump-pump system. I now have the primary sump pump at the bottom, and two smaller back-up pumps above it. These are also the quiet-shut off type. This way, if the primary sump fails or can't keep up, the secondary pumps kick in.

Good advice. Failure of that nature definitely happens and can be kind of unexpected. I used to play in a band that used someone's basement as rehearsal space. He never had problems with his sump pump, but we had a freak period of monsoon style rain that flooded the basement. All our gear ended up under water. It turns out that his sump pump failed because he had some spare carpeting in the basement, and carpet fuzz washed off it and ended up clogging up the pump. Weird. He installed backups immediately after that and never had a problem again.

 

[Zud]

Construction starts up again tomorrow after a week delay. I feel better after talking to the builder now that he is back in town.

 

[Zud]

Remind me next time that I want to start a construction project to just take the money and flush it down a toliet! Much faster and less heartache.

 

[Silverunicorn]

Remind me next time that I want to start a construction project to just take the money and flush it down a toliet! Much faster and less heartache.

Uh oh! What happened?

If it makes you feel any better, it took us 4 years to do our basement. And then it flooded. Twice.



Chris