[Beerfuelledman]

Finally got it finished, a lot of planning (for me ) has finally paid off.

The room started with a behemoth of a fireplace and my old 34" Bush CRT taking up an awful lot of room. I had an alcove in the right corner that had a desktop computer (not much room in the house) but got rid for a Laptop pre Xmas. Also the flooring (Not AV but still) looked like the first laminate ever released and years of mopping had ruined it IMHO.

So, out came the fireplace. The current one was so big the previous owners had to knock a large portion of the left side out to fit in the inset. Then they bricked up the centre and filled it with insulation.

So next we had to brick up the left side they knocked out, and figure out what to do with the pipes from when the old back boiler was in there.

Next we filled out the space with mortar and used a plasterboard sheet to begin making the new fireplace. Out of view the pipes were lagged & boxed off with plaster board before scrim cloth & angle bead was attached for the skim.

We tested the space for the electric stove that was to replace the previous behemoth, and let me get the TV mounted low at a watchable height.

The next problem was that the skim couldn't fully mask the previous horrors. So we did a slight stucco effect to hide the imperfections and painted it Brown to add a chimney breast effect. Wasn't sure how to best mount the centre speaker, eventually went for concealment. Might need to adjust the setting up a notch for this as it sits a couple of feet behind the front pair.

I painted the room 'stone' and added a new floor too. Didnt seem right to spend so much effort on an install and not freshen it up with a lick of paint. Anyway, below is the (nearly) final job, just need to finish the skirts.

Road tested the speakers with a bit of Acksy Dacksy (If you Want Blood from the Family Jewels DVD) and was quite literally blown away . TV is set to run in on the recommended settings.

Hope you like it, I certainly do.

[Tomathy]

very neat, and all done in a week. i hope my wife dosnt see this. a job well done , and it seems to make the room bigger. those 34 crts were certianly big hulking things.

tom

[Golfpunk]

Looks great. You had almost the exactly same issue I have - a old 80's style fireplace that needs sending to the great scrapheap in the sky. Problem for me is time and the fact that I am absolutely cluseless when it comes to DIY and can't tackle this job. Finding a builder in Surrey to help with this is getting problematic......

But we will get there and then its a 50" PZ70 in its new home!

[Theydon Bois]

Very nice! I have zero DIY skills and always appreciate the effort people go to to get there kit looking sweet

I went for the easy option, and replaced an old wooden tv cabinet with a black glass stand and my TV and kit. I do intend to do some bits, drilling holes in the ceiling to feed ethernet from my router in the bedroom to a port that I will fix to the wall for my soon to be started HTPC. I would love to say I am channeling it and then painting it to make it look professional, but I will probably be using those clips you get for TV ariels.... Dont tell the missus....

[kdog]

Nice transformation mate

[Beerfuelledman]

Thanks for the kind words folks. It seems the £80 I just splashed on the HD-DVD player for the Xbox 360 may have been wasted...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7252172.stm

At least it upscales via the VGA...