Need help figuring out how to hide this U ducting. Direct link to the Imgur album (so sorry if this is not the right way to share, still trying to figure out how to create a thread properly. Tried to add with new photo but it wouldn’t let me add by URL): https://imgur.com/a/9xdkYrP
Background: We’re finishing our basement and changing to ducting for HVAC. The HVAC contractor called us in and showed us this U duct next to the support beams in the middle of the room. There is no way - and I mean NO WAY - to do anything else with this U. The ducting has to cross there and the beam has no space above it. The floor joists also apparently run the wrong way so they can’t just put the ducting up above and to the side.
So we need to figure out what to do to hide this. It has completely stumped us and our GC. Drywall a weird U in front of this post? Make a fake cabinet? Build it out and put fake lights in front of it? Totally lost.
Geez. That is ugly. Couple of observations:
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the rafters are paralleled to the ‘turn’ it’s making to cross the beam. The photos suggests there is space above the support beam between the rafters. Are your contractors 100% positive that space can’t be utilized for this turn?
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This is ugly enough that I might consider totally re-doing that run of the ducting, and whatever else it might affect. Have your guys offered any such options? It’s probably expensive, but it’s probably better than an ugly-ass ‘something’ in the middle of the room.
Thanks, I completely agree. It is beyond ugly.
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Your first point: there is actually NO space above the support beam. Our HVAC guy grabbed a ladder and showed us. That beam is like 2-3 feet deep and goes all the way up. And they can’t cut through because we’re on a mountain and it has to support several hundred pounds of snow load.
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There is truly nowhere else to put the ducting. We walked all through the area with the HVAC guy and suggested idea after idea and there is physically no other location to run it. Hiding it is the only option, as horrifying as it is, unless we tear out the entire new HVAC system (which we can’t do).
Bleh, yeah it can be hard to wrangle HVAC stuff. For that reason, I’ve put off my HVAC redesign here for a few years and have been heating strictly with wood until I can come up with a design that I like. Contractors will rarely take the time to make a design that will work with your space in an attractive way
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Anything in particular the room will be used for?
A couple of different strategies:
- repeat the shape of the duct for more consistency after drywalling, such as wrapping the spahe around the top of the beam? Likely not ideal since that’d waste more space.
- show off the ducting somehow? This is dependent on the design of the room and is probably not what you’re going for. But you could incorporate it into the look of the beam perhaps.
- Fake it with middle of the room storage. Perhaps a bookshelf or cabinets around a column with the ducting being well hidden? Such as painted/shaped book spines if it’s a bookshelf, or a fake cabinet like you pointed out.
Hope this helps, and good luck on finishing up your basement! It looks like a nice space regardless of what you choose to do with the ducting.
Build some vertical storage shelves underneath it! Make them run all the way up to where the U is, then drywall over the U or something so it isn’t sticking out. Maybe even make a bigger covered space on top of the top shelf. Make the thing go all the way from the floor up to where the U meets, maybe some of those real dark aged bronze type metal supports that seem to be popular as finishes these days.
If it was me I guess I’d just soffit it out and try to make the soffit look interesting. It’ll always be kinda weird, but whatcha gonna do
I actually came up with an idea - there’s a woodstove in the room, so we are going to frame it out and make it look like deliberate tall, skinny log storage. We’ll see how it goes.
An idea could be lowering the ceiling to create a faux-corridor or a “reverse island” and installing recessed lights on it. If you’re into it you could also extend the base of the new lowered ceiling to form a shelf and then put plants on said shelf.
That’s an interesting concept, I’ll have to find some inspiration to figure out what that would look like
