CurtPalme.com Home Theater Forum

[MYoung]

I decided I've give the Wilsonart Designer White laminate a try. The two white sheets from Walmart I had hanging in my basement HT weren't cutting it. They weren't even 1.0 gain and they resulted in some blurring of the image as well because they weren't completely opaque and flat against each other. Plus, the wrinkles were annoying. It was either get a 8' wide pull-down screen (and pay an arm and a leg) or build a permanent screen from laminate or other material. I decided to build a permanent screen with Wilsonart Designer White laminate, thanks to the buzz it has received on AVS.

I went to Home Depot and inquired about it. It was a little frustrating as they were slow in understanding what I needed. They finally determined that they didn't have any in stock and special ordering it would take several weeks. Talk about eager to serve the customer and make a sale! They did manage find another Home Depot store about an hour away that had a 8'x4' piece available. I wanted an 8'x5' piece, though I almost decided to go with the 4' tall piece. Fortunately, I only had my car at my disposal that day so I decided to just order the laminate from cabinetparts.com. I guess when you buy from Home Depot you have to find a way to roll it up yourself. I didn't want to risk damaging it. I think I ended up paying around $120 for the 8'x5' piece from cabinetparts.com, including shipping to my house. Considering the hassle I'd have further dealing with Home Depot, the premium in price was worth having it shipped to my door.

The laminate arrived, rolled-up in a tall box. I got it out and unrolled it. It didn't exactly roll flat out -- there was still some curvature from being rolled up. To flatten it out some more I put some heavy pillows on it. I noticed that a corner was chipped. However, that wasn't a big deal as I needed to cut a bit of an edge off anyway because it was a couple of inches longer than 8'. I used a utility knife and metal straightedge to score the laminate. I did this twice to make sure the laminate was severed from the brittle back material so chipping would be less likely. I then used a strong pair of scissors to cut along the scored edge. It cut pretty well. It was now time to build a frame for the laminate.

I went to Home Depot and started looking for framing options. After bumming around the lumber section, I decided to get two tongue and groove wood flooring planks. They were 8' long so that worked perfectly. These pieces would support the top and bottom of the laminate. The idea was to slide the laminate into the groove of the wood and that would keep it straight without having to use a bunch of mirror hanger pieces. It worked out quite well! I had to carefully slide the wood planks along the edge of the laminate as the laminate was still keeping a somewhat curved shape. In addition, the groove was a bit wider than the thickness of the laminate, but it was enough to keep it straight for most of the screen width. Along the left and right edges I would need to use some plastic mirror hangers to straighten it out. I finished building the frame by vertically attaching some 5' long 1x4 wood pieces -- 2 on the left and right edges and one in the middle to stabilize the center of the frame. I then installed some mirror hangers to support the left and right edges. The frame was now complete!

Now that the frame was done I needed a way to raise it about 22" to be at a good height for the projector. While I have some 1x6 pieces of wood nailed into the perimeter of the basement foundation walls for wall paneling that I previously removed, I decided that it would be better to build a stand for the screen and frame. My original idea was to actually hang the frame and screen from a piece of wood resting above some walls of my unfinished basement room. I decided against that as the screen and frame, while not too heavy (I could still pick it up and move it carefully by myself), it was still too heavy to hang like that.

I ended up building a 8' tall by 8' wide stand for the screen. This was challenging to do as my room was only about 13' x 16' with some support beams in the way to some extent. The room is almost like two 13' x 8' rooms because of the support beams. I built the frame mostly of 2x4s. I included some 45 degree 2x4 supports to stabilize the main vertical supports that the screen frame would be attached to. I then attached the screen to those vertical support pieces with some heavy-duty bolts. It worked out quite nicely! It's nice that I used wood screws so I'll be able to disassemble everything in case I need to move it somewhere else, though it will be one hell of a task to move! The laminate really smokes the white sheets! I do notice a little bit of hotspotting on full white, though it's not really noticeable on normal content. The extra brightness is very welcome, seeing as though my projector is a Sony D50 running on an 8' wide screen!

At one point I wished I had just chosen to get a pull-down screen. But seeing how well the laminate performs, plus the fact that I won't have to worry about horizontal ripples in the screen or screen cleaning challenges (the laminate cleans very easily), I'm very glad I saw the project though. It does take some sweat-work, but I think it's well worth it! I feel like building another one for my 1292Q setup upstairs! I'll post some pictures soon.

[Person99]

Most of us just mount our fixed screens on the wall. Curious as to why you didn't just do this as it would have been MUCH easier.

[MYoung]

I didn't feel confident mounting the frame to 1x6 pieces of wood or into my concrete foundation. The 1x6 pieces of wood on my walls aren't in the best locations height-wise anyway for mounting the screen. Plus, there's a window on the upper left area of where the screen resides. My basement also has water issues. One side of the room has a history of getting puddles, though I'm in the process of trying to correct that. I have the stand on the dry side of the room. If I get the water issue fixed then I might utilize the whole room as a HT room, in which case I can just move the screen and stand to the other wall. The frame also allows for easily hanging black material for blackout purposes and the possibility of also serving as a speaker stand if I add some shelves. Yes, it was considerably more work, but it does give more flexibility.

[Person99]

Your basement does not sound like the ideal location for a theater. If you walls are not finished, how to you control sound at all?

[Z-Photo]

all basements in WI have water issues.........

cause all have water in them or are about to.
You need to make sure that all guest understand that the hole in the corner is NOT rustic indoor plumbing.

[MYoung]

[AnalogRocks]

[AnalogRocks]