Hi!
Our basement ceiling joists are 7 feet from the floor. The old 1960s ceiling grid that we are removing was suspended 2 inches below. We want to Any new suspended system will need a minimum of 3” drop. I’m looking for advice or experience with the direct or surface mount grids.

Does anyone have experience with Ceilingmax , Armstrong easyup, or ceiling conned?

Lithonia led lights: Can the 6” lithonia LED lights be inserted into any tile I see on the market? I would think that the plastic like Celime is too flimsy to hold them? Our electrician was going to put led lights into the Armstrong 2 foot drop tiles, and not sure if he could into other materials. Also, some of oyr electrical cable goes under the joists instead of through. If we put a 1/2 inch or 1 inch block between each joist and grid point is that enough for wires, or can we even do that

dIY vs installer: we would love to have an installer put up the grid. We recently had an estimator come out but he only seemed interested in the traditional suspended. Is the surface mount a DIY project?

That’s all! There are surprisingly few discussions about surface mount systems, which has me wondering...