So how did I wall-mount the plasma on my
home cinema page?
Firstly you need to know the construction of your wall, as this affects
how you will attach your plasma's wall bracket to the wall. If you've got
a traditional brick or breeze block wall which is then plastered, it's
easy, just get some big rawlplugs and drill away.
My wall however is what is known in the building trade
as "dot and dab" - that is breeze block/thermalite block with dabs of
cement on top, and plasterboard on top of the cement. This leaves about an
inch gap between the plasterboard and the breeze block. Good for hiding
cables without channeling out the wall, not so good for hanging 40kg of
plasma and wall bracket. Some people say that plasterboard will take that
kind of weight - citing a water-filled double radiator as weighing that
much - personally I would not risk an expensive plasma TV just being
attached to plasterboard.
Firstly, I marked out where the plasma would go on the
wall. To get the right height, you might want to make a paper cut-out of
the size of your plasma and stick it on the wall at different heights to
get an idea. You don't want it too high - you don't want to get a sore
neck looking 7ft up at the screen. The top of my plasma is around 6ft
high, which is right for the relatively long distance our sofa is away
from the screen (13ft) - if yours is less than this you might want it
lower.
Also if you are putting the plasma above the fireplace
(a common choice), you need to make sure you're not going to melt it. I
ran my gas fire on full blast for 2 hours, with a candle taped to the wall at
the height of the bottom of the plasma. After 2 hours, the candle was
slightly warm but not melting or warped. I considered this a worst-case
scenario, so figured the plasma would be OK.
Here is the wall marked out with the size of the plasma,
and also the markings for the wall bracket:
I have made a small hole in the plasterboard for pulling
the cables through, and "moused" a piece of string through this hole and
out another hole at the bottom left of the chimney protrusion. You can use
a straightened-out wire coathanger to help you do this. Here's the string
hanging out of the hole:
Now you can thread cables through the wall by taping
them to the string, and then pulling the string through the wall. Make
sure you have enough string at each end that you don't "lose" an end when
pulling a cable through. Here's the first cables pulled:
And here's the cables coming out at the bottom corner of
the fireplace: (I checked for gas pipes first!)
Next you need to bolt the plasma bracket to the wall.
Because of the gap between the plasterboard and the breeze block, I used
some long expanding anchor bolts from B&Q to
bridge the gap between the breeze block and the front side of the
plasterboard:
I drilled a hole through the plasterboard and into the
breeze block, filled the hole in the breeze block with "No More Nails"
(the "belt and braces" approach!) and inserted the expanding bolt. I then
tightened the nut to expand the bolt into the breeze block and hold the
bolt in. Here's the first one done:
Repeat 10 times - checking to make sure you are drilling
straight so your wall bracket will go over your bolts!. Then thread
another nut onto each bolt, flush with the plasterboard. This will give
the back of your plasma bracket something to push up against other than
flakey plasterboard when you are tightening the nuts. Then it's time to
attach the wall bracket. This might take a little brute force if your
bolts aren't quite straight - but hopefully it should go on OK...
Then just put another nut on top of each bolt with the
wall bracket in place, and tighten. The nut will push the bracket against
the nut you threaded on behind the wall bracket.
Wait for the No More Nails to set, and you should be
alright to hang off the bracket. I certainly was...
To attach the plasma to the wall bracket, you might have
to hacksaw off the tops of the bolts so they don't stick out too far.
Now just thread any more cables (including speaker
cables). You should put in the wall as many different cables as you can -
you don't want to be digging out the wall again anytime soon. I installed
YUV, VGA and RCA audio, but for more modern plasmas you
might want to install DVI or HDMI cables too.
I hid my Freeview digibox on the back of my equipment
cabinet - as it wasn't silver! I also mounted the multiway plug so I could
push the unit further into the corner...
All that's left to do now is polyfilla the holes you've
made, paint, attach the plasma, and here's what it might look like when
it's finished:
Back to my home cinema page
