The worst part about basements, at least mine: moving pins in and out. Good luck!

It is a great thing when done. Hopefully you don't have the low ducts and issues like I have in mine, but it is exciting. Good luck! Please update as progress gets done. These projects, although long and tedious at times, are always so cool to follow.

Good for you man! I'm sure it will look great when it's done.

You could always drop the head to go under the duct then when clear raise it.

Have you seen one of your geckos lose a tail and grow it back yet?! One of my ex GFs was a practicing herpetologist and had some of these little fellows (among other things)....seen how they lose a tail a grow it right back was pretty amazing! Pretty neat feature...we all need that ability

Looks like a lot of hardwork but worth it. Good luck Greg.

Gl NJGecko. I'm toying with the same idea. Ran out of space and want more pins. My question, what did you do with all the stuff you had in the basement. For me, 25 yrs of "collecting" crap, I need a basement to put my basement crap in.
Might want to talk to your guys for an estimate.

Nice job Greg, lots of work ahead but it will all be worth it.
Wish I had a basement!

Wow, looks like a great canvas to start! How wide is your basement door? Make sure if you haven't already, make sure that door is wide enough. I had no room to do so or I would have. Sucks having to take the heads off, but I know your situation is similar with your current game room.

So far it's looking great!

We DryLocked our walls too. I think that was a good move. Make sure you have a good sump pump (and backup if possible). Best quote I ever saw was "Basements are great...until they aren't".

Ours flooded twice. Hopefully never again, but I am not counting on it.

Going to be great for you once it's done! Looking forward to the progress as I do with your pin restores

Is this your crew or did you hire someone to do the work? We did ours mostly ourselves, but it took a really long time, LOL.

Congrats on the progress!

Chris

I am finishing mine now entirely myself and my 14 year old son. We didn't know much about how when we started and had to learn nearly everything along the way. We're approaching a year now into the project. Did everything straight from the raw slab like this project. Drylock, framing, wiring, insulation, drywall, subflooring, finish ceiling, lighting design, everything. The knowledge gained for both of us has been a hundred times more valuable than the gameroom we're about to have.

One thing I learned is that the drilok is nice but the real win is an air exchanger. Code in most places with basements require one anyway if you want to call it finished living space. I can't emphasize enough how much better an air exchanger will make a basement gameroom.

This is what we did as well. We did the DryLock, framing, drywall, and floors. I subbed out the electrical because we put in a sub panel, and I just don't mess with electric. A friend is an electrical engineer, so he helped there. the only other thing we had someone else do was the drop ceiling and boxing out the soffits.

Came out really nicely (in my opinion). We know the flaws, but most people don't even notice them. The guy that did the ceiling was warned that the walls were not square, and after his first day said "you weren't kidding!".

We gained alot of experience in our project. I am not ready to build a house, but it's good to know some basics

Plus it gave us time to work together, which we do well.

You can see the project at http://www.flickr.com/photos/91696572@N00/sets/1049931/show/

Sorry to derail the thread NJGecko, carry on

Chris

Well, there's the difference

It took us 3 1/2 YEARS to do ours, then it flooded, and we had to re-do the floors

Chris

No matter how hard you try you'll never have enough room. I never thought I would end up with 21. First it was. "Only in this room". Then it was well I can give up 1/2 the office. Now there is a thought swirling around my head about moving the office so the entire room can be pins. It's such a sickness.

Thanks for keeping us updated on the project. I love these types if threads.

Chris

This.

And this again.

You started with one also.....now you have....?

Chris

Make sure you have a good power supply, like a 100 amp sub-panel with built in surge suppression. Also consider sound absorbing insulation in the ceiling.

and the price range of the games you want. How many coats of Dry Lock did you put on? I put 2 coats on mine.

It's all about practice. If you're not sure you have the skill to do something then build something small elsewhere that will practice the skill. If you can't cut a 2x4 square then pick up ten of them and stay out in the yard with a saw until you can. If you can't cut drywall then pick up 3 sheets and cut them to pieces.

I had to rip out drywall that I had hung a couple of times in spots. It just didn't look the way I wanted so I had to figure out what I did "wrong" and start over. Learning a skill is like that. Maybe the most valuable skill I learned in this year long project is to let progress happen as it happens. I don't have a ton of free time so I had to learn to be happy with what I was able to get done. If I stressed over progress then the project would be come just another burden and that wasn't my goal.

Of course, impatience can be a struggle, and right now the whole project is stalled awaiting black light carpet samples. Can't paint without a chosen pattern. Need... samples... to hurry... and arrive...

...and I'll repeat for emphasis that in your style of slab basement a basic air exchanger is just as important as any game. Trust me. If you're in a cold winter region you want a heat recovering exchanger. If you don't know the difference I can explain. I spent a month researching them.

Can you explain the heat exchanger thing to me?

We added ducts to our downstairs HVAC system for the basement area. @ ecaust and 1 return. Also checked that the system could handle it before doing so. Cooled in the summer (although it really does not need to be) but more importantly, heat in the winter.

Would this be the same as what you are talking about?

Sorry for my ignorance.

Chris

That might perform the same function. I didn't research integration into the existing forced hot air system. The basic idea is that you need something that's going to exchange a third of the air volume each hour (or the full volume every third hour). That forces fresh air into the basement and removes contaminants like dust, mold, carbon monoxide, etc. I'm not an expert but ideally it's taking in fresh air from the outside and not just recirculating air from upstairs. Depending on how many windows you have down there, though, it might naturally draft enough for that. You'd want to run that by your building inspector as he'll know the equations for windows/doors to air exchange.

What do you do if you only have baseboard heat in rest of your house..and now you are doing your basement?

That would be the #1 reason for me to do my basement

The first question was for Chad.

You install ducting for the air exchanger. That's what I did. It doesn't have to be tons of ducting. I think I ran probably 35' total for all four lines (stale air return / fresh air blower/ external return / external exhaust).

Part of the key is having it be fresh air from outside for the basement. That way mold, spores, etc are flushed outside and not into the furnace for redistribution into the rest of the house.

I can still do that with a furnace using oil that only has baseboard heating? Hmm, i dont think so. I would have to run same type of baseboard heat..and i would rather have forced air for the reasons you all are mentioning.

In this situation it has nothing to do with the furnace. It's an independent system that is not connected to the heating system in any way. The air exchanger is a small box that sits somewhere connected to ducting that comes from an exterior wall and then spiders out through the room.

Got it...thanks. That's the way to go then.

http://residential.fantech.net/residential-products/indoor-air-quality/hrvs-heat-recovery-ventilators/

That's a great place to read up on the concepts and to pick out a unit. I learned a lot of what I did from that site and from talking to the town building inspector. I ended up installing their VHR704 and have been very happy with the difference it makes in the air quality. That said I haven't run it in the winter time yet.

I did a ton of price searching and by far the best price I found was here:

http://ecomfort.com/vhr-704-heat-recovery-ventilator-hrv-4-top-ports-56-cfm-3-speed-402.html

You'll also need to order the control unit from them. Cost on that will depend on which control unit you pick. I went with a basic dial based humidistat.

NJ...how high is the ceiling? 8 feet? There are plenty of cool floor treatments around now. Interlocking stuff, etc. I have another question...I'll PM...
Basement is looking GREAT so far!

Got ya!

I chose to paint my ceiling joists all black. Between the ductwork, and some copper pipes, and it not being a super tall ceiling, I felt like it was the best option. Sometimes if it's not high enough drywalling or dropping can make it seem super low, even claustrophobic IMO. The black gives it a little height.
There are drawbacks like having to vacuum spider webs out every not and again but it's an option.

Added a mid $$$ industrial carpet with padding on that worked well.

I did the *exact same thing*. The lights are track lights installed in between joists. They barely protrude downwards at all. Everything in the ceiling is flat black. I even painted the wiring and ducts. It really does make a difference as your eye is never drawn upwards to make you aware that the ceiling and all that stuff is right above your head. It's just like in a club where you look up and really can't see much of the ceiling.

For the floor I used Dricore panels. Not hugely expensive, only adds 3/4" or so for subflooring, and my son and I did the whole room in a couple of hours. It makes a big difference to not be walking on the cold hard concrete and it provides something like an R5 level of floor insulation even without finish flooring. Plus installed correctly it provides solid airflow for the concrete surface that when combined with the air exchanger keeps the air down there nice and fresh.