old bunker studio build

[Paul Greenway]

Hi there...me and my partner are building a studio from the ground up so i thought i'd share my journey and provide some pics.

I'd be thankful for any constructive feedback/comment because i know there are plenty of experts lurking around here.
Also if you got any question, i'll do my best to provide info. My partner is carpenter so he does all the major construction work....i help where i can, but i'm not really what you would call a tech savvy guy. I'll be more involved with the acoustics and gear fine-tuning. This studio will be a long time project so we are kinda urged to do it the right way from the get go.

The room we rented is an old bunker about 32 m².


Here he was working on the frame for the partition wall.







some days later



next step was the frame for the door







Here's the rockwool that we'll stuff the wall with. Thank god we have access to an extraordinary amount of rockwool that we can use for the wall and the acoustic panels. We have a truckload full of new unused rockwool from the previous tenant that he had to left behind. Saves us a lot of money. Plus we can freely experiment with DIY Panels and what works best.



and here's again the frame almost done




That's it for now. The frame is almost done, next step mounting the wall panels and filling it with rockwool. To be continued.


Of course at this point we are still left with some questions and i'd be really stoked if some expert could help us out.

1. We are kinda on a budget...we figured treating the floor with wood/laminate will cost us too much right now. But putting carpet everywhere on the ground will do no good either because it will take away too much highs...am i correct? So we thought we could just leave the hard soil as it is right now. Less vibration (?) and we would still be able to adjust some areas with smaller pieces of carpet. Is this a good idea? Well basically its our only solution since wood/laminate is not an option right now. We can still make it look good with some good ground paint i guess.

2. As you can see in some pics, there is an old airlock with a ladder in the back of the room. A problem we have to deal with unfortunately. The tracking room is gonna be on that side and i obviously want to hide it somehow cuz it looks plain out awful and it will probably affect the sound recording somehow. We can demount the door lock which would leave us with a thick glass window which we can't open. That emergency escape is closed but atleast it would be all flat without the door lock, which we could then just cover with an acoustic panel later on. But we'd still have to deal with the small ladder. How bad would this affect the actual recording seeing that it would be right about behind the artist/mic? (The mics will be placed right infront of the window frame, were the number 5 is seen on the blueprint). The monitor point will be vis-à-vis, where i took the picture.

3. Also, in the back right corner were we didn't paint any further, we thought it would probably be best to just straighten out that corner angle with a plaster board/wall. Or else how would you handle such hard-edged corner angles? Seeing that the tracking room will have a triangle-like form, how do we get the best out of such a space? Something important to consider?

That is everything i'd like to know as of now. I'd be thankful for any advice!

[nooneimportant]

this is gonna be freakin awesome... bunker studio!

[vespiz]

For what it's worth, we had a bare concrete floor in our studio that we painted.

We used white concrete paint which is petroleum based and we needed good ventilation and masks and it still got us a bit woozy.
Couple of layers and it's pretty good, but due to the imperfections on the floor, it's begun to flake off a bit here and there.

Acoustically, it doesn't matter if it's wood, plastic or painted concrete, it still reflects.
We use good oriental-type carpets as needed.

About the sharp corner, why not build a huge super-chunck out of it?
You're going to need trapping anyway in a room that size.

[pearldrum944]

If you are on a budget with the floor, you should acid stain it! I did it myself, total cost for my live room and control room: ~$150

Here are some before and after pics of my live room.

[erikdrink]

Good start!

[vespiz]

Originally Posted by pearldrum944

If you are on a budget with the floor, you should acid stain it! I did it myself, total cost for my live room and control room: ~$150

Here are some before and after pics of my live room.

We would have done this as well, but we got quotes with one zero added or nobody had any clue what we were talking about. Looks great!

[Paul Greenway]

I'm happy to see some action in here!
Unfortunately we didn't find time to work on the studio the last few weeks but we plan on having everything finished till late december.

I'm definitely gonna update pics as soon as we get back to work.

Originally Posted by vespiz

For what it's worth, we had a bare concrete floor in our studio that we painted.

We used white concrete paint which is petroleum based and we needed good ventilation and masks and it still got us a bit woozy.
Couple of layers and it's pretty good, but due to the imperfections on the floor, it's begun to flake off a bit here and there.

Acoustically, it doesn't matter if it's wood, plastic or painted concrete, it still reflects.
We use good oriental-type carpets as needed.

About the sharp corner, why not build a huge super-chunck out of it?
You're going to need trapping anyway in a room that size.

I wasn't quite sure how much of a disadvantage (sonically) it would be, to leave the concrete floor as it is. But i'm relieved we're not the only ones who thought about painting the floor with concrete paint instead of using lamination/wood. The floor is even, no cracks or anything. After cleaning it with a polishing machine, it should look pretty alright. Its no warm looking wooden floor but its something. We probably gonna paint it in black.

We're still in discussion regarding that corner angle. Either we hide it behind a plaster wall or cover it with large bass traps from top to bottom.

Originally Posted by pearldrum944

If you are on a budget with the floor, you should acid stain it! I did it myself, total cost for my live room and control room: ~$150

Here are some before and after pics of my live room.

I didn't thought about that! Looks nice.


Thanks for all the replies so far! Appreciate any input.

[Paul Greenway]

new pics!

We just realized today this wall takes a ridiculous amount of time to make DIY. But all the hours spent on this thing will be worth it in the end.





Here i began placing the rockwool









the window glass we're gonna use.




to be continued!

[rez]

nice place to fit a studio in, even if the shape is a bit on the odd side with that deep corner.

ha, ha, i think i know what the previous owner wanted to do with this place and the huge amount of grodan rockwool...

peace, rez

[Paul Greenway]

Originally Posted by rez

nice place to fit a studio in, even if the shape is a bit on the odd side with that deep corner.

We'll figure it out somehow. We're probably gonna stuff the corner with lots of rockwool and hide it behind wood.

I'm more concerned about the overall acoustic treatment. I'm worried we could do more harm than good, especially in such a big room. Neither of us is an expert in this field. The only thing we know for sure is that we're gonna use the grodan rockwool for panels on the side/back walls and ceiling. How much we don't know yet. We're gonna need live sound from speakers to test things out. But i have the feeling there's quite room for failure in this. I don't like that at all.

For the corners we thought it would be best to buy some ready made, quality bass traps. With such a high ceiling, is it advisable to fill the corners from top to bottom? Like one trap throughout?

Also if anybody has advice or feedback, anything you might think is important to consider in such a big space/room shape, id be happy to hear your thoughts!

Thank you.

[Paul Greenway]

Updates. The wall is almost done. Some last touches on the door and we can call it a wrap. The floor is up next.

Here are some pics from last week.

before:





after:








frame mount for the window.







The window gives the room a whole nother vibe. It came out beautiful.



close up:



Also we covered the back end corner with a wooden panel and painted it grey like the ceiling. Gives a nice contrast. Inside is stuffed with rock wool.

[MidasHatesGold]

Looks good so far... Is this a two room concept? The wall seems a bit thin for a good stc ratio. Rock on...!!!

[Paul Greenway]

Originally Posted by MidasHatesGold

Looks good so far... Is this a two room concept? The wall seems a bit thin for a good stc ratio. Rock on...!!!

Yes indeed. The back will be used for tracking, front for monitoring.

We will see how much sound will go through. There's still the option to treat the partition wall with absorber panels later on. Both rooms are gonna need a lot of room treatment anyway.

[solo-bration]

Midas brought up my same concern after looking at the dividing wall. Is the frame 1x3's? Also curious what material the outer panels (your "mass") are? It looks like crushed partical board of some sort?

[erikdrink]

Looking good!

[Joney Brain]

Updates?

[Paul Greenway]

Originally Posted by Joney Brain

Updates?

I will take some new pics soon. The wall is finally done!
We're gonna start with the floor this saturday.

Edit:

Also i'd be really grateful for any tips on acoustic treatment.

I've watched the dave pensado episode were they had thomas jouanjean as a guest. He said the acoustic panels should be atleast 4 inches thick. And they should be placed a few inches away from the wall. That shouldn't be a problem.

We plan on placing sorta like a wooden mounting rail on the side walls. That way we can move around the panels left and right at will, without having to mount them on a fixed position. In this regard, should we just wrap the rock wool in fabric and build a little frame around it? Can we leave the back of the panel free?

Also we're not sure how much treatment will be needed. In a room this big, 32 m², with a 3 meter ceiling (i will post an updated blueprint soon) can we possibly screw things up by placing too many absorbers? I believe our room has great potential to actually sound nice. But i have a feeling it will take A LOT of absorbers in both parts of the room. And i don't want to mess it up...i wanna get it right. I'm reading through a book for studio acoustics right now but every information i get out of it seems kinda broad and not really relevant to my case.

How should we do this? Where to start? I know every case is different but are there general things you always do the same way when treating a room?

I'd be thankful for any advice.