Mounting Surround Speakers

[timmre]

Hey guys, I'm new here so hello to everyone and thanks in advance for any of your advice you might provide.

I'm moving to a new house next week and the family room is already wired for surround sound nicely through the wall. I have a 5.1 system with JBL L-series speakers in the front. My problem is that I plan on using some old JBL S38 bookshelf speakers for the surrounds. They are good speakers (in my opinion) but are rather large, about 25lbs. I haven't been able to find any info on wall mounting these speakers.

Does anybody have experience mounting large bookshelf speakers for use as surrounds. If so how did you do it and where did you get the materials to mount them. I'm hoping to make the mounting look fairly clean; building a platform out of plywood and screws will not be an option because I'm married.

[musicman1999]

Is using stands an option? I have large rear speakers as well and have them mounted on stands filled with sand and lead.I find this set up works very well.The speakers are blutacked to the stands and the stands have spikes.Each side weighs about 50-60 pounds so in order to knock them over you would have to really want to.

bill

[timmre]

Thanks bill,

The previous owner had run wires through the wall so there are a couple of wall plates with speaker connections on the rear wall up about 6 ft. off the ground. I'd like to use the wiring already installed if possible. The wall plates will be kinda ugly without speakers covering them up and I don't want to have to run new wires if at all possible.

If I can't find a wall mount solution I'll hit folks up here to recommend some stands. It sounds like you have some pretty good ones.

[hydroman]

My house was obviously owned by an audi-head at some point as well. He screwed gi'Normous eyebolts into the ceiling and must have held them by chains by the looks of it...

BUT - he did well-insulate the basement when he finished it (Heretofore reffered to as the Man-Cave!)

[timmre]

I have an unfinished basement that hope to eventually use to create my own mancave in a couple years; no $ for it now though. I'll bring all my current audio stuff downstairs and get something dainty looking (scoustimas style) for the upstairs familyroom. I think a native 1080P projector thrown onto a 10' screen would do the trick on the video side and I'll have to throw down for some MLV to soundproof a bit too I suspect. It seems like it is always easier to come up with ways to spend money then to make it.

For anyone else looking to solve the same problem I have with "too big" surrounds, I think I have a solution. There are some wall mounted shelves that are designed for components (receiver/dvd player) that look to be the right size and hold up to 30lbs. The ones I'm looking at are glass and very modern looking:

http://www.amazon.com/OmniMount-Component-Shelf/dp/B000ENA3EQ/ref=pd_bbs_1/103-5311910-8365425?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1188432496&sr=1-1

I'll have to figure out a way to tilt them down slightly without having the speakers come tumbling off.

[nightflier]

Tim,

One thing you want to keep in mind is that wall mounting rear speakers does little for saving space since the area underneath is usually too cramped for traffic- they will extend well into the room at a height that everyone but a 2-year old will find annoying (not to mention that 2-year olds don't stay that short very long and eventually will want to reach up and hang on them). Since the space underneath is wasted, you might be much better off with stands that will lift the speakers to the height of the plates and thus hide these from view. This will also be safer and provide better sound.

That said, you can easily mount 25lb. speakers if you ensure that you are drilling into something solid behind the drywall. If you do mount, consider that you will need enough space for the speakers, the brackets behind them and any extra space for angling them towards the optimal listening position. That's a lot of weight hanging out there and so you might want to consider getting something more wall mountable and use the JBLs somewhere else instead. Personally, I like the W3 from Axiom Audio (http://www.axiomaudio.com/wallspeakers.html) or if you have more money to spend, you might want to consider the ones I settled on, the Vienna Weberns (http://www.sumikoaudio.net/va/prod_webern.htm#spec), which also sound pretty incredible for on-wall speakers. Both will come with wall-mounting brackets and instructions.

[PeruvianSkies]

Tim,

One thing you want to keep in mind is that wall mounting rear speakers does little for saving space since the area underneath is usually too cramped for traffic- they will extend well into the room at a height that everyone but a 2-year old will find annoying (not to mention that 2-year olds don't stay that short very long and eventually will want to reach up and hang on them). Since the space underneath is wasted, you might be much better off with stands that will lift the speakers to the height of the plates and thus hide these from view. This will also be safer and provide better sound.

That said, you can easily mount 25lb. speakers if you ensure that you are drilling into something solid behind the drywall. If you do mount, consider that you will need enough space for the speakers, the brackets behind them and any extra space for angling them towards the optimal listening position. That's a lot of weight hanging out there and so you might want to consider getting something more wall mountable and use the JBLs somewhere else instead. Personally, I like the W3 from Axiom Audio (http://www.axiomaudio.com/wallspeakers.html) or if you have more money to spend, you might want to consider the ones I settled on, the Vienna Weberns (http://www.sumikoaudio.net/va/prod_webern.htm#spec), which also sound pretty incredible for on-wall speakers. Both will come with wall-mounting brackets and instructions.

Yeah, and those things could fall on the 2 year old.