Secret entrance to my game room

30FathomDave

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This project is far from finished, but I thought I'd get a thread going to post some pics of what I've been working on for the past few weekends.

I've always wanted to have a secret room- you know, where you walk up to a book case, pull a particular book, and then the book case opens up to reveal another room. I've always loved stuff like that.

The people who owned my house before me added an office to the back of the house. They added French doors to what was once a wall, and then built a room into part of the back yard. This room is now my game room. You can see the doors in the background of this pic from a couple of Halloweens ago:

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Well, after a few drinks sometime last summer, I decided to make those French doors more interesting. I finally got the ball rolling a few weeks ago with a lot of help from the old man (I can't give my dad enough credit. He's largely the brains behind this project). Step one was to reverse and somewhat recess the door hinges so that the doors swing outward rather than inward (this also required the left and right doors to get swapped), and hang flush with the door frame to help sell the illusion that my future book case is sitting up against a wall. We re-hung the doors to ensure that it worked. Check.

Step two was to build book cases onto the original doors:

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I still have to do a lot of sanding, create the backs of the book cases (the glass will of course be removed), add molding, and stain them- but here they are as of last weekend:

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Next post coming in a few minutes...
 
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That is way cool! I have to say that I am jealous of this! I cant wait to see the finished pics!

Tom
 
Wow very cool and unique idea, well done. Can't wait to see it when it's complete.
 
The plan for today was to create the "pull a book to open the door" mechanism.

What book shall it be? It has to be something cool... like Frankenstein, Dracula, or something related to a movie that I dig. I settled on this book, which I got on ebay last week for $10:

Handbook.jpg


Unfortunately, creating the mechanism has been postponed until next weekend. I hit up like 5 different hardware/hobby shops today, but no one seems to have the clevis that I need (I need 2). I wound up ordering 4 from NAPA to be safe, and they should have them in stock tomorrow.

In the meantime, I hacked off part of the original door handle and drilled a couple of holes in it so that I can put it all together next week:

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When this thing's all done, all of that stuff will of course be hidden by books. I've been hitting up Goodwill and used book stores looking for cool old books. The older and weirder the better. I found a 1905 copy of Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde last week for $5. Sweet!

Once the door latch is complete, the real fun begins. Perhaps the coolest part of this project is that we're going to add motors and mechanisms that will create the illusion that books are sliding forward and back on the shelves- like the books are haunted. It's going to be so awesome that I grin ear to ear just thinking about it.

That's all for today. Now to enjoy some rum and pineapple juice out of my lucky pirate glass...
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You sir are my hero.

As a kid I always said if I had any money I wanted my own arcade. While secretly wanting secret passages in my house as well.

BRAVO!
 
Dude! That's one sweet idea! Can't wait to see the final results! Reminds me of the old scooby doo cartoons and the hidden passage ways!
 
Wow this is an awesome thread! Hard to make a secret room when your arcade is 50 percent of my basement.

Sent from my android phone
 
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