Home Theater Console

There is a beam that runs at the floor of the living room. Some of you may think, if you know its there, why buy that place. Well, for the price within our budget and home solutions that may maximize the space eventually, its a good deal.

Back to the beam, this has an impact on the use of a large sofa. We were also limited by space for housing all my Home Theather and media devices which are typically housed in a console. A few creative thoughts were put into this, and I really had fun putting this together.

This picture is from the showflat. You can see the beam on the right which their designer has used as seats by placing some cushion pieces. The beam also limits the sofa to a tiny 2 seater.

The solution I came up with was to create a platform that matched the height of the beam. The beam was 50cm tall, so the platform was of reasonable height, with a step. Doing this allowed the use of a full 3 seater comfortable sofa. Look at the edge of the platform at the wall, you can see a hollow space in white. This is new console where I was going to place all my media devices. This has negated the need for an additional space occupying console. Additional planning was required to route cables from the media location to the TV.

Laminates done.

Thats a 80″ TV waiting to be installed. The trench for routing the cables can be seen on the far right. The console door was installed wrong in this image. It was flipped later.

3 seater lounge sofa successfully placed. Many have commented that my TV is too close. I like watching on a big screen, and that’s why I have a big TV. 🙂

The trench was covered and later the whole wall was covered with wall paper. This allows cables to replaced at the trench. Such a new optical cable or HDMI cables. This is not easy. I left a draw string in there to assist pulling new or replacement cables.

This is final console door. Its now become 2 doors. One at 2/3 the length and the other at 1/3. There is a reason for this.

I installed a 12″ Linear actuator @12V DC to lift the door. A 220VAC DPDT relay is wired to control open/close by activating/deactivating it. The 220VAC relay is controlled using a TP-Link Kasa Smart Switch and this is linked to Google Home. By the command, “Ok Google, turn on Drawbridge” the door opens. Videos of functioning door and Scissor lift at page bottom.

As all the devices are controlled using my Bose V35 which uses a Radio Frequency remote, line of sight is not required making the hidden console perfect. This may also be achieved with a Logitech universal remote that operates on RF.

And the reason for splitting the door, in the event the actuator fails, the smaller door gives access to the connection pins of the actuator to be released and allows the full door to be opened. Otherwise, you will have to break open the door. Often, maintainability is a key aspect that is overlooked in design.

Being a movie fanatic, the only device that may require access periodically is the Blu ray player. And my solution was to make a scissors lift. I have never done one before and research indicated a few different styles to do it. I again used a linear actuator. Trigonometry of TOA CAH SOH was fun, and had a high school kid to remind me some of the formula. I had to ensure that it seats in perfectly, when retracted but be taller than the door when raised. This was a very fun project. For safety reasons this was not linked to Google Home, but a switch that was conveniently reachable when the door fully opens.

If you notice the scissor structure, you can see a bar joint to the scissor plate randomly. Without this bar, this lift will not work and drop side ways. Simple Trigonometry was applied to find the correct pivot spot(thanks to my niece in high school re-educating me with the formulas). And when it worked perfectly, that is satisfaction and gratitude to Math. I used flat Stainless steel bars which are heavy, expensive and a little soft. Tubular aluminum make take more space, but could have been a better option.