My Audio Life: Part 6

 My Altec Adventures (continued)

By Steve Graham

The media room renovation is almost complete.  The room has essentially a nine foot ceiling.  A small part eight feet high, roughly in the centre, runs side to side and conceals duct work.  About half of the floor has been covered with Dricore™ and the rest has been raised slightly.  The blue on walls and ceiling have been covered with paint of a neutral colour, new carpet in neutral shade has been laid, new wood blinds hung and the base board and door trim reinstalled.  A few of the acoustic treatments have been remounted on the walls but I’m hesitant to go further until the Altecs return.  The TV sound is listenable but I still have a few slap-echo problems to deal with.

I was looking at the acoustic treatment on the walls of the local multiplex movie theatre the last time I was there.  From my research I suspect that the cloth covered treatments at the theatre contain Roxul® Rockboard®.

The Altec cabinets, apart from having a certain ‘aroma’, are also pretty beat up.  The master plan is to make new cabinets and “improve” on the originals at the same time.

A chain of home reno and building stores have great panel saws at each location that will make quick work of 4×8 sheets of plywood.  If you get a good operator the accuracy of the cuts can approach plus or minus 1/16 of an inch.  I once made a 19 foot long, floor to ceiling wall unit for one of my brothers with birch veneered plywood cut from the reno store.  I bought some iron-on edge trim from the local custom kitchen shop and finished the works applying polyurethane with a foam brush.

Altec drivers safely tucked away on a basement shelf awaiting new cabinets

So the Altecs will get the Home Depot treatment soon.  I’ll keep you posted.