The back wall to opening is 240mm (closest we could get to get it in the back wall treatment)
Front wall to opening is 430... they are close to the edge of the room though so might fit in the soffic enclosures...
Just triple checking here: Like this?
At both the front and the back we are a bit off in terms of depth into the room. At the front by about 250 mm, at the back by about 200. I like to use the soffits and treatment to hide the HVAC as much as possible, but with the current design things are off by about that much. At the front, it's not such a big deal since the cloud will hide the registers anyway, but at the back they'll be visible.... However, I have something in mind that should work to extend things enough. Still got a few tricks up my sleeve here!
I should think I can get 24mm at 3m lengths.
Great! That's good news. If so, then we might actually need to slice a little into the shutters, so the sleeves can fit with a gap... but I'll see if I can come up with another method. But just in case: I assume you have a good power plane that you could get up there, to shave off a few mm if necessary?
we’ll find a way to get them there. I don’t think there’s going to be enough room up there to construct. I’m planning to have the mdf cut to size then we assemble on site.
OK. Then I would suggest building them down on the floor, but without actually fixing the sleeves in place: just press-fit to make sure they go in fine, then take them out again. Then raise up just the body of the silencer, without the sleeves, and slide it in from the storage room side, and maneuver it into place on top of the inner-ceiling. Insert rubber pads to decouple, then insert the sleeves from below, up through the holes in the ceiling, with abundant truck loads of glue on all surfaces, to get a good solid bond and seal. Then, once the glue has cured, do the backer-rod/flexible caulk thing. That would be the best way of getting them up there. It's going to be a tight fit to be able to maneuver the box into place!
I’m happy with ducted minisplit, I’d prefer lower running costs. I look forward to the details... I hope we can do outer leaf penetration at 150mm!
To correctly dimension the capacity of the unit, at some point I'll need an equipment list from you, with the power consumption of each piece of gear, as well as any other heat-producing thing you might plan to have in there (eg, lights, instrument amps, coffee maker, pizza oven... ) I need that to figure out the total sensible heat load, then I'll estimate the latent heat load from the occupancy figures we already discussed, and your climate. With that in hand, I can figure out the cooling capacity of the system.
There's no need to be crazy accurate on the equipment power consumption list: just estimates of the wattage of the gear you plan to have in the desk (console, rack gear, speakers, etc.) and other gear that musicians or WAG's might bring in for a session. That list of gear will also help me get the desk design right, so you have enough place to fit in all your fancy boxes within easy reach, built into the desk. (Most gear has the power rating listed on the serial number plaque, or if not then in the manual).
After consulting with the screeding company, they have high flowing finishing concrete which will do the roof and both internal floors in one visit...lower cost, no comprimise on the finish. I’m planning on all that going in at the end of next week.
Man, you sure are roaring through this construction at high speed! This is one of the fastest projects I've been involved in! Not
THE fastest, but getting close...
I just wanted to confirm my power into the inner room can be drilled through the inner leaf wall below concrete height and brought up through the concrete about 150mm into the room at the front wall...or maybe best nearer the door to the inner room actually as where it is terminated (distribution board in the room) should be accessible..
Right. I'd suggest putting in a sub-panel to the left or right of the doorway, but not directly up against it: leave a small space there. We need to figure out which way you want the door to swing open, so the panel can be on the latch side of the door, not the hinge side. You want to be able to reach the panel without having to fiddle with the door to get to it.
You also need to check with your electrician about what circuits to put on that panel. I would suggest breakers for the at least five circuits: one for the HVAC system, two for lights, and two for plugs. The reason I suggest two for plugs, is to have all your gear on one circuit, and "other stuff" on the other circuit. "Other stuff" being things like the coffee maker, cell phone chargers, laptops, and other stuff that people might bring into the room: you don't want those on the same circuit as your audio gear. Your electrician might suggest additional circuits, but I'd have at least those five. Also, I'd suggest star-grounding for all the plugs. And do make sure that your building ground is very well done, with low resistance to earth!
I think SWA (steel wire armoured) cable (3core 6mm2 conductors) should be fine.
Your HVAC is likely going to be something like 1 to 2 kw, probably towards the low end. When you add up all your gear ratings, lights, and the other stuff, that will give you the total load. Your electrician can then tell you what your local code requires.
Shall I run a separate earth cable for grounding or the 3rd core (which is combined with the steel wire armour) be ideal?
Not sure how able is made in the UK, but normally the three conductors should be independent from the armor. Where I live, the armor is a mechanical shield, and should not carry any current. The third conductor is the ground conductor. But once again, go with what your electrician says is required by code. For example, if your electrical code requires that the neutral and ground paths are bonded at the distribution panel, then do that.
They’ll be combined at buildings distribution board anyway but at a dedicated earth terminal block as opposed to the RCD protected inner room feed- basically could the rcd mess up the grounding interference?
Normally RCD's (a.k.a. "GFCI", "Earth Leakage Units", and a few other aliases) don't have an earth connection: they only use the live and neutral conductors. They work by detecting any difference in current flow between those two, and if the difference is above a certain very small threshold, then the device trips the power. The principle is simple: all of the current flowing through the live conductor should then come back through the neutral conductor. If it doesn't all come back, then the missing part is probably flowing through the ground conductor, or through you(!), which is not a good thing either way, so it detects the imbalance and trips. But the device does not use a ground connection, since it only cares about live and neutral. It only needs to know that there's a difference in the current flow between live and neutral: it doesn't care if that difference is going to ground or not: it only knows that there is a difference, and regardless of where that "difference" is going, it's a Really bad Thing so it trips. No reference to ground is needed to do that.
So: no, the RCD (GFCI, et. al) should not cause any issues with grounding, since it does not connect to ground. If the RCD trips, that's a good thing.
If your code requires bonding between ground and neutral, that would happen on the upstream side of the RCD, not the downstream side. Good RCD's cut both paths (live and neutral). If the binding was on the downstream side of the RCD, and there was a ground fault upstream, then it is remotely possible that there would still be dangerous voltage present on the neutral conductor, even though the RCD had tripped. Bonding on the upstream side prevents that situation from arising.
But with all things electrical, your electrician is the best one to tell you how things should be done, in accordance with your electrical code.
- Stuart -