Forum Posts

• li li

  • 31 posts
  Posted in the topic How to Install a Drop Ceiling in the forum Exercise

  April 18, 2017 12:04 AM MDT

  Step 1 - Design Your Drop Ceiling Grid

  It starts with a game plan. Literally, measure and make a TO SCALE drawing of each room. Then layout your tile spacing and see how it looks. Like tiling a floor, you want to make sure your outer edge ceiling tiles aren't too small. Ideally they will be evenly placed along the perimeter.
  There are several websites and videos online on how to lay out a room. I was super annoyed though that every video on the web assumes you have a simple square shaped room. If you do, you've got a huge advantage in figuring out how to install a drop ceiling. Both of my main rooms had cut ins, jut outs, and soffits. If that's the same for you, use the videos as a starting point, lay out your room and make tweaks one direction or the other to avoid small tiles near those obstructions.

  Step 2 - Install the L-Channel

  How to install a drop ceiling using these L channels - deep 100mm ceiling channel
  Here's an nicely mitered L channel on an outside corner. While learning how to install a drop ceiling be sure to take the extra time to get these corners correct.
  Now, time to get your hands dirty. Determine the drop you are going with and measure around the perimeter of the room down from the floor joists that amount. Mark the location of your wall studs and using self taping drywall screws, adhere the L-Channel to the wall.
  Interior corners are simple - Either overlap the two pieces or butt them together. Exterior corners can similarly be butted together but to give them a sharper look, I overlapped them and cut one on a 45 degree angle to give the appearance of a mitered corner.

  Step 3 - Install the T-Channel

  The main T runs perpendicular to the floor joists. Place your first main piece of T-Channel spaced away from your wall suspended ceiling systems as determined in your grid layout.
  These pieces of channel will be supported on either end by the L channel and will be supported in the middle by the eyelets and wire spaced approximately 2-4 feet apart. This amounts to about every other or every third joist.
  Once you have the wire loosely run through the channel and the eyelets, next work to ensure the channel is level. One good strategy is to run a string taut from wall to wall in line with the L-Channel. Then pull the individual wires tight to bring the T-Channel in line with the string. Wrap the wire around itself to ensure it doesn't sag or come loose with the weight of the tile. Rinse and repeat this process with the T-Channel spaced 4 feet apart until all the channel is up.

  Step 4 - Install the Cross Ts

  Cross T installation is a snap. Sorry, bad pun. You need to snap in the 4 foot cross T's. Again if using 2x2 tiles, the 2 foot cross T's as well. It's easiest to do both at once for a smoother install. Start with full T's and once complete move to the edges. Measure and cut each T to size. Always cut a bevel on the wall end to avoid interference with the wall.
  As you are going, drop in a couple full tiles to square up the grid. Definitely do this before cutting the edge tiles to ensure the grid is totally square.
  Drop ceiling light cut out of suspended steel channel system.
  After all the T's are installed, drop in all of the full tiles and move on to the edge pieces. Measure and cut these as well.
  If you bought tiles with a reveal, the best way to get an accurate cut is to first cut the tile to size and set it into place. Then score the tile along the edge, remove the tile and cut the reveal. This can fairly accurately be done by hand and by eyeballing the depth of the cut. After 1 or 2 cuts, you'll get used to it.

  This post was edited by li li at April 18, 2017 12:04 AM MDT
• li li

  • 31 posts
  Posted in the topic Ceiling Fixing in the forum Exercise

  April 17, 2017 11:57 PM MDT

  All our telephone calls, Internet traffic and electronic data travel as a stream of laser light pulses down glass optical fibres. The ultimate optical fibre could carry an order of magnitude more information than do today's, US researchers have calculated. Thread rod.

   

  Knowing the theoretical upper limit for the amount of information that a single fibre can carry should help those trying to meet the world's growing hunger for bandwidth. Galvanize ceiling suspending system.

   

  The limits of optical fibres are hard to get a mathematical handle on because glass is a nonlinear medium. The different sources of noise that creep into the fibre along with the signal do not just add up: they interact. This makes it difficult to calculate the relation between the amount of information, or power, put into a fibre and the amount coming out at the other end. Expansion screw Kit.

   

  Partha Mitra and Jason Stark, of Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill, New Jersey simplified their computations by finding a linear equivalent of the nonlinear term in their equations1.

   

  Information capacity reaches a peak with increasing power, the duo reports. Beyond this peak the growing noise level makes information progressively harder to extract from the signal. In a linear system, simply increasing signal power increases capacity.

   

  Transmitting at lots of different wavelengths of light simultaneously boosts the capacity of contemporary optical fibres. Fibre capacity is a product of the available wavelength-space (the bandwidth) and the efficiency at which information is transmitted.

   

  The upper limit of the efficiency, Stark and Mitra calculate, is about 3 bits of information per Hertz (the unit of wavelength) per second. Coupled with theoretical maximum bandwidth of a fibre, this means that the ultimate optical fibre could carry approximately 150 terabits of information each second - the equivalent of nearly two billion telephone calls at once. At the moment, commercial networks operate at about 1.6 terabits per second.

   

  "Knowing the fundamental limits to the capacity of a fibre is only one factor in determining what's important for system design" cautions Mitra. "However, the better we understand the fibre channel, the better we should be able to push the systems to their natural limits " he says.

   

  Govind Agrawal who works on optical fibres at the University of Rochester, New York believes the current exponential growth in the information capacity of optical fibres is set to slow.

   

  Putting an upper limit to their capacity may spur research into alternative technologies, such as photonic crystal fibres, he says. These send light through air, a linear medium, rather than glass. "If we send light through air, the speed limits wouldn't apply," says Agrawal.

   

  Other information channels, such as the nervous system have similar nonlinear properties. Mitra and Stark suggest their model may also be applicable to these. "Physical and chemical theories give us insight into how a biological function is carried out, but engineering or design theories have the potential to explain why the system is structured the way it is," Mitra says.

• li li

  • 31 posts
  Posted in the topic Remove a J-Channel Without Harming the Siding in the forum Exercise

  April 17, 2017 11:48 PM MDT

  Use a zip tool to unlock J-channels from vinyl siding.

  The J trim channel is the groove in vinyl siding that locks the individual pieces together. Beginning at the bottom of the foundation, siding is installed by hooking a J-channel onto a protruding locking edge at the top of each successive siding piece. The tops are then nailed down, and another piece of siding is slid upwards until the J-bend hooks onto the next locking edge. That piece is then nailed into place, and the installation continues in this way. Because the J-channel is literally hooked beneath the previously mounted piece of siding, you will need a special tool to disengage the J-channel for galvanize ceiling system from the edge that locks it into place.

  1. Locate an edge of the siding. This can be at a corner, a windowsill or a doorway.

  2. Thrust a zip tool up, hook first, beneath the overlap where the J-channel resides. This will be where the J-channel connects to the locking edge of the lower piece of siding. In most cases, you will hear a distinctive "click" when the J-channel edge snaps into the hook on the zip tool.

  3. Gently but firmly pull the tool down. The J-channel will be caught on the hook and will pull out from under the locking edge. Grasp the J-channel with your fingers as it unlocks and comes out. If the J-channel has not hooked, repeat the process. You may have to move an inch or so away from the end if the initial thrust if the zip tool does not connect correctly.

  4. Slide the zip tool approximately 12 inches over, and repeat the procedure on an attached part of the J-channel. In many cases, once the initial J-channel end has been released, you can pull the rest of it apart by grabbing the end with your fingers and peeling the siding away much like you peel a banana.

• li li

  • 31 posts
  Posted in the topic Shelf Brackets and Leveling in the forum Exercise

  April 17, 2017 11:42 PM MDT

  In additional to the vertical members, we use some horizontal strut. This strut is fastened to the vertical members using L brackets and bolts. Because the vertical member is C-Channel, we can use a laser level and slide the bracket up and down within the channel to provide us with very precise leveling of the benchwork supports.

  Horizontal strut attached by L bracket to vertical

  Below you can see vertical strut attached directly to the concrete wall. In this instance we are using prefabricated brackets to support the benchwork. The use of the metal ceiling channel sizes makes it very easy to precisely level the layout by adjusting the height of the brackets.

  We use two kinds of brackets. The more traditional brackets show above are somewhat less expensive but not quite as sturdy as the double welded brackets. "Less sturdy" means we can only allow one member to climb on the benchwork at a time, rather than two-- this stuff is quite strong when properly installed.

  On the double bracket below you can see a piece of 1" x 6" pine. We screw the pine boards to the brackets to provide support for our open-box frame construction.

  In this cluttered photograph below, you can see how the whole system comes together. Vertical channels are bolted to the floor. Additional stability is obtained from horizontal channel that is bolted to the building and also to the vertical channel.

  1"x6" planks are mounted either on the horizontal channel or on the L bracket. Inverted open boxes are then bolted to the the 1"x6" to provide a platform for track laying and scenery.

• li li

  • 31 posts
  Posted in the topic Ceiling Carrier Assembly in the forum Exercise

  April 17, 2017 11:38 PM MDT

  Once cut to length, the steel strut is secured using standard threaded nuts, bolts, and washers. The key to making the strut a solid foundation for building upon is making sure it is well-secured to the existing layout space. When we have an existing wall, we can attach the strut directly to the structure. This gives us a strong system for adding support brackets.

  When there is no existing wall we make sure to bolt all free-standing strut-work to the floor:

  and wherever possible, the structure is brought all the way to the ceiling and secured there as well:

  In a few areas the strut is cannot be extended all the way to the ceiling carrier.