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What Have You Done To Your House To Accommodate Your Lego Hobby/Addiction?
Farmer_John
USA - 4,035 Miles from 62 West Wallaby St., Wigan, Lancashire, UKMember Posts: 2,389
I always do at least one "major" project at the house each year during vacation/holiday time. These projects are like lego sets on steroids, and can be more expensive, dangerous, and frustrating. The project for this year is building an additional room in the attic for my boxes of legos, and was originally proposed by my wife with the alternative being divorce (take note, @LegoFanTexas). It will (hopefully) simultaneously clean out our room and my closet while taking this hobby out of the line-of-sight of my better half.
Presently, I have only planned a square room that is 10'x10' (3m x 3m). Since it is in the attic and we live in a warmer climate, it will require extensive insulation. I am actually planning to install a window A/C unit for climate control in the summer (winter isn't an issue). I purchased and installed a 20amp breaker to handle the lighting, A/C, and other misc. loads. We have WIFI, so internet isn't an issue.
My question is: If you could build a room from scrap based on the information given above, what would you include? I may end up incorporating some of the suggestions (based on cash flow). I also plan to post a picture of my new hideaway to this site once it is completed (including the boxes stacked to the ceiling, of course).
Presently, I have only planned a square room that is 10'x10' (3m x 3m). Since it is in the attic and we live in a warmer climate, it will require extensive insulation. I am actually planning to install a window A/C unit for climate control in the summer (winter isn't an issue). I purchased and installed a 20amp breaker to handle the lighting, A/C, and other misc. loads. We have WIFI, so internet isn't an issue.
My question is: If you could build a room from scrap based on the information given above, what would you include? I may end up incorporating some of the suggestions (based on cash flow). I also plan to post a picture of my new hideaway to this site once it is completed (including the boxes stacked to the ceiling, of course).
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Comments
My dream though is this: http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/sets/72157628031860734/with/6445769941/
The good news is that once that's done, I will start on the Lego room in earnest. First I get to clean the attic. The breaker for the room has been purchases and installed; however, I now have to run the circuit down the wall from the attic to the main electrical panel and connect it to the breaker. While I understand electricity very well, I still hate trying to fish the wires down walls full of insulation. I would rather have bamboo shoots jammed under my fingernails than fish wires.
Once the electrical circuit is prepared, I have to work on the floor (which was discussed above)....but I'm getting ahead of myself. Pictures to come.
You may only be storing boxes up there, but the weight of someone walking around up there could sag the ceiling joists over time.
Good luck and send some pics of the existing attic!
To @brickmatic's point, I haven't considered the lighting type for the room. Needs to be bright with limited UV. And to others' points, I plant to install crossbeams to support the additional weight (especially if the day after Christmas sale a Lego is good). Would 2"x2" crossbeams be enough or do I need to go with 2"x4" crossbeams? Again, we are just talking about lego sets; not unused treadmills, etc. I have attached an image of the attic and roof framing.
dont forget to find a way to solve the dust problem if you're leaving a big layout set up.
I have easy access to the attic, but the height to the roof is too low for practical use (I can't stand fully upright). Otherwise I would do something very similar to your plans I'm sure!
I am extremely fortunate; the alternative is outside storage...One day I will redo the basement and turn the slapdash "office" into a true LEGO room, since the kid has taken over my original buidling area...
On a side note, I went ahead and wired the room for 7.1 surround. I figured while the frame was open, why not make it a more valuable room for the next residents living in this house. It's always more difficult once the sheet rock is up.
The best thing about this room is that I can clean out my closet (actually hang clothes in it) and our bedroom. I have other hobbies, and will be able to move everything into this one special room.
No flooding potential, but we live in an area prone to tornadoes so some lucky lad in the area could have a lego room fall on his head someday. My kids are already offering to trade rooms to have the "new" room. ;-)
The biggest question now is whether my wife will negate my current claim on the garage! I need my tools too...
In the first shot, you can see a 4"x4" vertical structural support post for the roof (near the ladder) that had to be relocated. You can also see wire running across the floor that had to be moved (right side of ladder). The bed is where the wife made me sleep when I purchased too many legos (notice it doesn't have a mattress). :-)
The second shot (taken yesterday) shows the wires and support post moved/relocated, walls framed, roofing insulation in place, and wiring completed. I went ahead and installed speaker wire for 7.1 surround in case the next owner is not a lego aficionado, a phone jack, and Cat 5 connection. I also have a sorting area/office area (not shown) to the right of where the camera is positioned. I decided to put in a roughly 4'x4' built-in book shelf next to the sorting area for smaller models (and an occasional book). I also plan to install a ferrous metal plate (perhaps 3'x3') somewhere near the sorting area for my collection of lego magnets.
The excitement is building (pardon the pun).....
All that said, I honestly didn't think about it as "I'll let you remodel the attic if you remodel the kitchen" until I read your post. My wife never put it in those terms, but she is a lot smarter than me. Now that I think about it, I may have been hoodwinked.
I'll post more pictures this week as more insulation and the drywall go up.
My argument for getting the garage done first is that we will need the storage area for all the kitchen stuff once we start on that. It was the "logical" first step ;)
Ok, I promised I would have the rest of the Lego and boxes out of the dinning room by "last" weekend. Back to work . . .
I should have more pics coming this week. Our handyman and his wife stopped by to visit and show her the status of the room. Even she was impressed. I mentioned in an earlier post that there will be a built-in bookshelf. The handyman took the boards to his shop on Friday and told me today that he has it completed (stained and all) and ready to install. Once it's all completed, I will probably have to get a license with the local jurisdiction as a fire hazard (due to the insane amounts of plastic that could potentially burn).
Forget wall paper...it would've been really neat to have purchased fifty 5512 sets while they were on sale at Christmas and have lego walls.
The room is about 10' wide by about 15' long. Not real big, but big enough to hold my lego stuff and also have space for a small office area.
We are getting up early tomorrow morning to go pickup the drywall. I believe the doors (entry door and the door out to the rest of the attic) will be completed as well. Probably won't put up the drywall until next week, so I will spend the remainder of the week sealing the room. It is already very tight, but one can never use enough Great Stuff and Caulk, I always say.
Image 1 is taken from the bonus room looking towards the new lego room door. The bonus room is on the right side at the top of the stairs and the new lego room is on the left at the top of the stairs where the attic entrance was. The floor of the new room is about 20" higher than the bonus room floor (see Image 1), so I will have to step up into the new lego room. The original door to the attic (now being moved to the back of the new lego room as an access door to the attic) was 28" x 42", which is obviously too small. The contractor now working on the specially shaped door shown in Image 1 for accessing the lego room (angled because of the roof on the top). The new door is about 6.5' tall at the highest point and slopes down. The reason for having to do this door work is that there is a load bearing header below the bottom of the new door, and certainly didn't want to mess with the home's structural support. In short, I won't have to crawl into the room and the new door will be tall enough so that I don't hit my head stepping up into the room. Because of the different height between the bonus room and the new lego room, we are also going to have a nice customer moveable step built to place on the floor outside the lego room door. Image 2 was taken from inside the new lego room looking out. The third image shows the new lego room from the doorway (with some of the drywall against the wall. Hopefully the pictures make my explanation easier to understand.
I would have no problem with doing this same project with a drop down staircase, which is what we had in Texas. The main for me is not as much access as it is making the room tight and conditioned to protect the legos (and other hobby stuff) from the high summer attic temperatures. You could install R-3 to R-6 blue foam board (I got mine from Lowes) between the steps at the top of the drop down staircase to insulate that portion of your room. What I would envision as the trickiest part of doing a room with a drop down staircase is getting the drywall into the attic. We just moved ours up into the room this morning and only had to turn a 90 degree corner that did just barely had adequate maneuvering space (with the 12' long pieces), and it was tough. You would likely have to remove your staircase and pull the drywall up into your attic (assuming there is vertical clearance in the attic). It might be easier to pay someone to drywall for you and let them worry about it.
Either way, this is a project that had to be done as we are out of conditioned storage space and I couldn't see selling our house in the current market to get a new one.
I hope to have the drywall all in by the end of this week...maybe even taped and bedded. I hate painting, so might have to try and bribe my wife (extra dark chocolate?). I will continue to post pictures including moving in the sorting table and boxes of legos...
Your help is key, so I would just ask around until you find someone you're satisfied with and they have good references.
Do you have a drop-down staircase? If so, is there clearance above it to bring in material?
I had a custom 10"x10" return air box built and now I'm waiting on the 10"x10" return air filtered grille to arrive from the eBay seller. I still have to purchase the flex duct and vent components from Lowes or Home Depot. Once I have all the parts, I have the unenviable task of tapping in to our existing HVAC system without throwing the entire home system out of whack (again, with the potential for me getting beat by the wife).
For me, the HVAC is the most difficult part of the entire project to date.