room acoustics - is this possible

[shangoe]

i am looking to rent a room for my studio but most of the time the landlords like to rent >200sqmt space, to much for me...so i was looking for a partner to share the room. now i found a guy who l wants to build a drumming school.

its clear he needs to build isolated rooms for his drumming but its hard to make it 100% soundproof.

please imagine the folowing: one big industrial-loft. in the midle 2 walls mortarless construction building a passage and deviding the loft in two areas. in the drumming-school area are 2-3 decoupled rooms for the drums. in my side would be a one-room studio but not decoupled or "room in room"...

do you think this would be enough for not to get his kickdrum on my recording or is it a illusion? will it take more isolation to get it right?

thx!

[shangoe]

to make the concept more clear....

[jayfrigo]

Originally Posted by shangoe

do you think this would be enough for not to get his kickdrum on my recording or is it a illusion? will it take more isolation to get it right?

thx!

With the proper design, mass, construction techniques, and attention to detail, it could be reasonably isolated. I don't think you'd want to be recording solo violin pp passages while he's drumming Metallica beats, but for general work, you could get by. But that's a big set of "IFs" above.

However... and this is a big caveat... To properly isolate the drum rooms is going to be involved and expensive. Once it's sealed up tight, you'll also need proper ventilation, which is another place you'll need proper isolation. Any flanking paths or "acoustical shorts," like electrical outlets cut into iso walls instead of surface mounted, or a single door rather than double, or lack of gaskets, will sink you no matter how well done the rest of the construction is done. A 100 sq ft. TL 50 (Transmission Loss) wall with a 12 sq. ft TL 20 window gives you a composite TL around 29, so you can see that the weakest link drags you down quickly, and that's not even with any unintentional open spaces. Add a non- gasketed single door to that wall and the substantial original TL 50 wall is perhaps now only in the teens.

I think if you aren't planning floating isolation for your room, budget is probably a concern, and this means a lot of the details required for this to work are not going to be able to be met. You should at least do some simple quasi-floating technique on your side. Also, without a construction team experienced in this kind of construction, or at least an acoustician or foreman keeping a strict eye on them, again, you won't be able to meet your goals.

So, while I say it's possible, it's not cheap or easy, and I'm concerned that it's unlikely if what I'm reading between the lines about the situation is correct. Even a "half way" job will take time and money, and after even a moderate investment of the two, it would be quite unfortunate for it to be unuseable for you. My advice is that if you aren't willing or able to do it right, don't bother. It will only create stress and unhappiness for you later.