I was thinking of putting this in the finshed project section but decided it would be more appropriate here.
I am in the final stages of finishing my basement ceiling and thought I would give a short review of the system I used.
I wanted to put up a ceiling tile system in the basement for a couple of reasons:
1. I wanted the sound dampening that ceiling tile provides.
2. I still wanted easy access to the area between the joists
But I did not like the idea of having to give up 4 - 6" of ceiling height to do this. The basement ceiling is already a few inches below 8' and I did not want it lower.
The solution I found was a system called ceilingmax and it is a zero clearance ceiling tile grid system.
The grid consists of 4 peices.
A wall peice that you mount to the ceiling and wall all around the perimiter of the room. A top bracket that mounts directly to the joists. A runner that snaps into the top bracket providing your tile support on the long axis and a cross tie that snaps into the top bracket supporting the tiles on the short axis.
Overall they system was easy and quick to install and is a system that one person can install. It was much easier than the normal suspended ceiling systems I had installed previously.
If anyone is thinking of installing this system there are a few things I can suggest that will make the job a little easier.
The instructions state that you should attach the top brackets to the joists with screws. Well I was not looking forward to holding an 8' long peice of PVC up to the joist and driving a screw with the cordless in my other hand so I decided to try a little experiment. I got out my crown stapler and some 1" staples and attached a top runner with the stapler then put some weight on it. Well I couln't quite hang on the top bracket without it coming loose from the joist but it was close and I weigh more than an entire box of ceiling tile
. So from then on I attached all the wall peices and top brackets with the crown stapler and this made the job go very quickly and smoothly.
When you put the the top brackets they need to be 22 1/2" apart. Well The instructions suggest using a chalk line to mark the joists and this will probably work fine when you have two people but it can be a pain with only one. Also the marks that a chalk line creates across the joists can be a little hard to see. What I did was take a peice of wood about 1 1/2" wide and about 1/4" thick and cut it off 22 1/2" long then just used it as a guide and marked the joists with a marker.
All in all the job has gone well. I have done it in two sections divided by the support beam in the basement. The overall size of the finished basement is about 900 sqft and working by myself I have managed to do it with about 4 days worth of work. It would have been less if I had been able to work uninterupted for those 4 days but unfortunately that wasn't possible.
I should have pictures of the ceiling soon and will post them when they are available.
In addition to this I have been building bookshelves along one wall. I am a little over half way done and when finshed there will be 24' of book shelves divided into 2' sections from floor to ceiling.
So if any of you have been wondering what i have been up to and why there haven't been any postings from me in the finished project section of the forum this is one of the major reasons. But I have also been working on a few things in the shop and I expect to be able to post about them soon yard work permitting
I am in the final stages of finishing my basement ceiling and thought I would give a short review of the system I used.
I wanted to put up a ceiling tile system in the basement for a couple of reasons:
1. I wanted the sound dampening that ceiling tile provides.
2. I still wanted easy access to the area between the joists
But I did not like the idea of having to give up 4 - 6" of ceiling height to do this. The basement ceiling is already a few inches below 8' and I did not want it lower.
The solution I found was a system called ceilingmax and it is a zero clearance ceiling tile grid system.
The grid consists of 4 peices.
A wall peice that you mount to the ceiling and wall all around the perimiter of the room. A top bracket that mounts directly to the joists. A runner that snaps into the top bracket providing your tile support on the long axis and a cross tie that snaps into the top bracket supporting the tiles on the short axis.
Overall they system was easy and quick to install and is a system that one person can install. It was much easier than the normal suspended ceiling systems I had installed previously.
If anyone is thinking of installing this system there are a few things I can suggest that will make the job a little easier.
The instructions state that you should attach the top brackets to the joists with screws. Well I was not looking forward to holding an 8' long peice of PVC up to the joist and driving a screw with the cordless in my other hand so I decided to try a little experiment. I got out my crown stapler and some 1" staples and attached a top runner with the stapler then put some weight on it. Well I couln't quite hang on the top bracket without it coming loose from the joist but it was close and I weigh more than an entire box of ceiling tile
. So from then on I attached all the wall peices and top brackets with the crown stapler and this made the job go very quickly and smoothly.When you put the the top brackets they need to be 22 1/2" apart. Well The instructions suggest using a chalk line to mark the joists and this will probably work fine when you have two people but it can be a pain with only one. Also the marks that a chalk line creates across the joists can be a little hard to see. What I did was take a peice of wood about 1 1/2" wide and about 1/4" thick and cut it off 22 1/2" long then just used it as a guide and marked the joists with a marker.
All in all the job has gone well. I have done it in two sections divided by the support beam in the basement. The overall size of the finished basement is about 900 sqft and working by myself I have managed to do it with about 4 days worth of work. It would have been less if I had been able to work uninterupted for those 4 days but unfortunately that wasn't possible.
I should have pictures of the ceiling soon and will post them when they are available.
In addition to this I have been building bookshelves along one wall. I am a little over half way done and when finshed there will be 24' of book shelves divided into 2' sections from floor to ceiling.
So if any of you have been wondering what i have been up to and why there haven't been any postings from me in the finished project section of the forum this is one of the major reasons. But I have also been working on a few things in the shop and I expect to be able to post about them soon yard work permitting
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