On this week’s episode of Pro Acoustics Tech Talk, Nathan and Coltin are discussing the differences between tile bridges and rough in pans when mounting speakers in 70V commercial applications.
Hey everybody, thanks for joining us again for another edition of Pro Acoustics Tech Talk. I am Nathan and I’m Coltin.
Coltin, what on earth is all this stuff?
I have holes in metal. I have holes in what's called tile bridges. I'd man, I'll need to be educated on what I'm seeing here. But as always, feel free to get involved with us. You know, just share your ideas, you know, ideas for videos that you'd like to see. We want your involvement. But let's get the show on the road to talk about what's in front of us.
A little bit of tile bridge and rough-in pan talk coming your way.
All right Nathan. So, like I said, I have a bunch of holes with metal in them and I want to know, you know, what goes into the holes and what’s its purpose.
Sure. You got it. So, when you're doing 70-volt in-ceiling speakers in commercial applications, sometimes it requires some additional hardware to mount the speakers. Sometimes it’s sold with the speaker, sometimes it's not. Because as we all know, lots of times commercial audio takes place in places with drop tile ceilings like you have above. Right. If you ever wonder what a drop tile ceiling is, you never heard that term before. It's basically the two by two or two by four T-bar grids that you see like in the classrooms when we were growing up, in the library, a lot of convenience stores now have them, that kind of thing. It's that white tile with all the black and gray holes in it. So basically, that's a dropdown ceiling. You know, there's an actual ceiling way above that, but they drop it down and then they run air ducks and all that kinda good stuff through it.
Sometimes called false ceiling. Right. Yeah, exactly.
But problem is if you've got a speaker, that tile is light enough that you don't want to just mount your speaker to that tile. I repeat. You don't want to mount your speaker to that tile. Do not do that. One thing we want to make sure and go over before we get too far in this is, you always want to make sure and read all the mounting instructions for whatever you're looking at. Make sure and read the manual. If you have any concerns about what you're doing, you want to make sure to consult a pro, you’re going to want to consult a carpenter, and you also want to make sure and review local building code in your area. Because sometimes that does pertain to speakers and the mounting of speakers. Very important. If you do have a connection for a safety cable on a speaker, we will want to recommend that you always use that whenever possible.
So, basically, if you've got a speaker going into a two by two grid, you don't want to just mount it to the tile like we mentioned. So enter some of these two-foot-wide tile bridges. These actually lay into the T-bar ceiling and then the speaker itself actually mounts to the tile bridge. Gotcha. So, it actually is secured in, and it helps to distribute the weight across the overall ceiling. So it's not just the tile. These are important because, you know, depending on the speaker, many times speakers are mounted in, you know, seismic locations, California and places like that where the earth shakes and that kind of deal. You want to make sure you got something, besides, you know, or sometimes the roof leaks or the AC vent leaks or whatever, and that can cause damage to tiles, deteriorate them, and make for a big issue where, you know, ceiling speakers are no longer secured.
So that is where tile bridges come into play. This one is from Atlas Sound. This is the 81-8R. Rests on the grid, speaker mounts right to it. They also come in different shapes for bigger speakers, smaller speakers. This is for a Bose DS 16F. Popular. And you know, basically, the way it works is, you know, this lays in the grid, cut a hole in the tile, speaker goes in, adjust the dog legs or screw terminal. You know, screws, however, that particular speaker mounts, once again, reviewing the manufacturer's instruction manual. Yup. And then that tightens onto this brace here that helps to support the weight. Absolutely. There also are tile bridges for subwoofers. You know, like you see this big hole here. This is not a tile bridge, but we'll get back to that. There's, yeah, tile bridges for subwoofers and then also for even smaller speakers.
This one here is for a Bose satellite speaker, which is, as you can see, much smaller. But while I have this in my hand here, this is not a tile bridge. As you can see, it's a different, different width, first of all. So, it's not two feet wide, so it's not designed to mount across the tile. These can be different lengths and different shapes and it also has a whole lot more mounting holes throughout it. Gotcha.
So, what's up with that? Yeah, what's, what's that for? So, this is what's called a rough-in pan. So basically rough-in pan, rough-in plate trim ring. A lot of manufacturers have different languages for how they want to convey this information. But basically, rather than doing a tile bridge, which supports the weight across the ceiling cause the tile can't support it, rough-in pans are traditionally used in hard ceiling applications. So, things like sheetrock, wood ceilings, things like that, many times you might see a rough-in pan. Rough-in pans don't always come with the speakers and they don't always necessarily serve structural purposes. So sometimes the hard surface of the ceiling can hold the weight of the speaker. But we also have the scenario of needing to know where speakers are going to be mounted. And that has to be communicated on the job site of where are we going to be putting speakers in this location. So, you know, audio is a part of the construction business to a degree. You know, you've got just like you've got guys building the walls and building ceilings and run air ducks and all that. Everybody on the site's got to know where are we going to have speakers.
So that they can make sure and not build, you know, put a ceiling joist right above where you're putting a speaker and that kind of thing. So, a rough-in pan serves the purpose of, these holes line up with your studs in your ceiling and you basically nail these or you know, screw or nail these in place to where you should have an opening to where the speaker can be mounted. It does serve to kind of reinforce structural integrity as well. You know, in the case of a big subwoofer like this, being able to distribute the weight to a rough-in pan to the plate, you know, can be beneficial. But the main purpose once again is nailing this down across your studs, in whichever location, whether it's, you know, I'm not a carpenter, 22 on center, 24 on center, you know, all those different positions.
Come on Tim Allen. Yeah, exactly. Call me Bob Villa. But you're able to basically use this to mount. And then basically you have a position in the ceiling where there's a hole. So as a result, when your sheetrock guys come through, they can pop their sheetrock up there, either leave a hole for it, cut a hole for you, or let you cut the hole. But they know that's a space where a speaker's going to go. As a result, that should keep, you know, anybody from running a water pipe right through the back, you know, because they're going to see this whole indicated for, that's where speakers are gonna go. Yeah. We should also mention some other manufacturers have different colored tile bridges, or you know, to where they pop out a little bit better, you can see them a little better.
But for the most part, every speaker has its own rough-in pans or its own tile bridges depending on what you're mounting it into. Sometimes those are sold with the speaker, sometimes not. So, it's very, very important that you communicate with your sales rep like us. What are you doing? Where's this going? Where are you going to put it? And then once again, it's important to review local code because sometimes rough-in pans can be required, you know, to facilitate the process. Also, for this, some of the structural stuff that I mentioned, but it's always important to note this is the speaker I'm going to use, this is where I'm going to put it, what hardware do I need? And then you always want to review the manual and make sure if you're uncomfortable with anything you're doing with speakers placed overhead, you always want to consult a pro.
Absolutely. Yeah. I think a huge underlying summary of all this is, you know, audio a lot of the time is a afterthought of a construction build or anything like that. And you know, it's, it's very important that these things are, you know, considered, to make your audio system the best it could be. You know, contractors watching this or just if you're doing this out on your own, just, you know, as early in the process, you know, as possible, start thinking of these things and well then, the tile bridges, which one should you get? That type of deal. Like Nathan was saying, just don't make it an afterthought, like, unfortunately, a lot of projects end up being, and yeah, I think that's a huge takeaway for me as far as just the idea of tile bridges to them. So absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah.
And if you guys have questions about which tile bridges you need for your speakers, or which speakers are right for your project, if you need rough-in pans, if you don't need rough-in pans, all that kind of good stuff, feel free to reach out to us. Let us walk you through it, talk to you a little bit about it. You can always reach us on our website, www.proacousticsusa.com or you can reach us on our 800 number: (888) 256-4112. We do have some of these products available on some of our e-commerce stores and on our website. If you do need tile bridges and things like that, or otherwise, get back in touch. Let us help out. I can be reached at [email protected]. And I'm [email protected]. That's Coltin with an i.
Yup. And, definitely let us know if you're watching. If there's anything else we can help out with, any questions you have, we’re more than happy to help. Whether it's commercial audio, pro audio, home audio, sound masking, anything that we can help you guys with, certainly reach out. Let us know you're watching. And, don't forget to tell your friends. Like us, follow us on Facebook and subscribe and we'll catch up with you guys next time.
