Basement Studio build with Sketchup

[thkaiser]

Hi all,
Putting together a studio down in my basement. I have enclosed some pictures from sketch-up. Forgive me for not putting in dimensions, but I did this all in a day and really am trying to learn the program better and don't know how to add dimensions. I will enclose some pictures of the actual space in a bit.

Here are the measurements:
Mix Room: 95" W, 160" L, 81" H
Drum room: basically 145" W, 185" L, 91" H
Vocal room: 71" L, 95" W, 91" H

Please note:
This is just a rough drawing and there are some things odd (like the speakers) and the drumset is not drawn to scale.
Also, there is already a drop down ceiling that is 91 inches (81" in mix room) from the floor.
We will be spray foam insulating the ceiling.

Furthermore, this does not include ANY sound proofing material.

Thanks for your comments.

[thkaiser]

Descriptions:

The room to the right (front view) is the vocal room.

The speakers will be mounted in the walls on angles.

[thkaiser]

Here are some pre-construction pictures....

[thkaiser]

and some more....

[tightswole]

Originally Posted by thkaiser

and some more....

Looks nice. Livin Luvin & Overdubbin.

[thkaiser]

Corners, corners and more corners. Mostly of the drum room. Fun stuff.

[Ethan Winer]

Originally Posted by thkaiser

Putting together a studio down in my basement. I have enclosed some pictures from sketch-up.

One problem I see is the control room portion has the loudspeakers firing the short way across the room. This short article shows the best way to set up a control room, and explains why:

How to set up a room

Another problem I see is the drum room is awfully narrow, with walls very close to the drums and microphones. Is there a way to use the space on the left for the CR, and the larger space for instruments?

--Ethan

________________
The Acoustic Treatment Experts

[Glenn Kuras]

Hello I got your pm. It seem as Ethan is giving you pretty much what I would say. If you do have to use the narrow room for the drum room I would plan on covering any walls close the drums or drum mics with absorption. Not sure of your ceiling height, but I would remove the ceiling tiles and replace them with panels above the drum set. Some drop ceiling panels are made from rigid fiberglass so all you might have to do is remove the plastic facing on them and recover with fabric.

[thkaiser]

Ethan and Glenn,
Thanks for your comments.

First thing is that drum set model is way to big. It makes that room look tiny!

Here are the dimensions of the rooms with the heights

Mix Room: 95" W, 160" L, 81" H
Drum room: basically 145" W, 185" L, 91" H
Vocal room: 71" L, 95" W, 91" H

So, the drum room is actually the biggest room.

Glenn, how many ceiling tiles do you normally need 2, 3 or 4?

[thkaiser]

My problem is how would people get into the mix room if it was going the long way? if you put it the other way you would have a similar problem with people getting into the vocal booth room.

[thkaiser]

Measurements....

Other measurements:

+The wedges where the speakers will be impeded will be: 23" deep x 25" wide
+The space in between speakers is 84"
+The closet in the drum room is 22" deep x 79" wide
+The beam in the drum room drops down 9" and goes from one end to the other
+The utility room is not finished
+I am unsure of the wall depths (forgive me) and they are not included in the sketchup

[thkaiser]

New idea with the drum room and mix room switched and not wall mounting the speakers. I think this is probably what we will do.

[jhbrandt]

Waaaay much better.

Although -- flush mounting your speakers is the most effective way to obtain a flat, accurate response.

You'll need to set up your RFZ by placing absorption panels at reflection points and you must trap the corners. Read up on how to set up your room at both these sites: GIK and Realtraps... and my pubs.

Now all you need is isolation. What do you have planned? You know... rock drums can hit 110 decibels. Normal 'home' partitions are lucky to have an STC28 rating, so you will need to do something.

For starters, don't go thinking that putting up blankets or foam will have any effect on the sound transmission to the other rooms in the house. These products will do nothing.

You will need to build some massive barriers, ie; double gypsum board walls or additions to the existing walls and ceilings. Good luck!

Cheers,
John

[thkaiser]

Originally Posted by jhbrandt

Although -- flush mounting your speakers is the most effective way to obtain a flat, accurate response.

I figure we will flush mount them right against the wall.

Originally Posted by jhbrandt

You'll need to set up your RFZ by placing absorption panels at reflection points and you must trap the corners.

I had in mind for the mix room something similar to the basic room design that Glenn had put on his site. Probably buying the room package 4.

For the drum room that will be a bit more tricky. I will spray foam the ceiling as well as put in 2-4 ceiling panels like on Ethan's site. As for the walls we will spray foam them as well as probably use some thicker material on both sides instead of just plaster.

Put some diffusers and some 2X4X2 panels or something on the four walls as well as bass traps in each of the corners.

For the vocal room planned to do a similar setup as the drum room. Again spray foaming the ceiling and the walls.

The tricky thing will be keeping those pesky drums from leaking out into the real world, ie, my wife's world.

[jhbrandt]

What is 'spray foam'?

I know of no such product that has any value acoustically.

???
- John

[thkaiser]

Maybe I am saying it incorrect. Spray insulation. They go in and spray foam instead of the regular insulation. Supposed to be great at keeping sound in. I don't think it is new technology but have seen it used a lot by contractors of apartment buildings and such.

[amishsixstringe]

Originally Posted by thkaiser

Maybe I am saying it incorrect. Spray insulation. They go in and spray foam instead of the regular insulation. Supposed to be great at keeping sound in. I don't think it is new technology but have seen it used a lot by contractors of apartment buildings and such.

Somebody lied to you.

Neil

[thkaiser]

Ok,
Read a post from Andre about spray foam from another thread. Good for insulation NO good for sound proofing.

I will stick with Rockwool

[jhbrandt]

The only spray that is recommended for acoustics within an enclosure is spray applied cellulose insulation. For example; Envirospray 300 data.

Cheers,
John

[thkaiser]

Okay,
So no more foam. We will use Ultratouch cotton in between the floor joyces and the drop ceiling.

For the walls we will be using John Sayer's design found here:
Recording Drums

Now we are looking to figure out how to run cabling to and from the mix room.
We have a 100 foot 24 ch. snake we could use, but I would like to instal microphone inputs on the wall that is in between the drum/ furnace room.

Also, we will be looking to insulate that wall correctly because currently it is just one side that is finished.

[thkaiser]

For the doors, we are looking at getting two solid doors with windows in them. Probably something that is 10"x20" double pane. No more french doors. Oh well. This is because the drum room ceiling is 81" instead of 91" in the mix room, so we will have to cut the door a bit to mount it with enough clearance.

[thkaiser]

New layout without the mounted speakers and the new door instead of the french doors (doesn't look as cool but will provide more soundproofing in the wall).

[jhbrandt]

Tom,

Lets find out what's above the dropped ceiling before you try to isolate the walls and doors.

You don't know what kind of leakage you may have until it is inspected closely. All the ceiling tiles will need to be removed for renovation and isolation wall construction.
----
I checked the link to John Sayer's 'Recording Drums' page and I was surprised that he said this;

"If you wish to go further you can double the layer of gypsum and even further by sandwiching a layer of fibre board between the two sheets of gypsum. (This is extremely effective because sound doesn't like going through changing medium densities)."

For speech, yes, it might be a little better. But this doesn't work well for music and the money would be better spent on an additional layer of gypsum board.
For example;
Orfield laboratories test report on Soundboard Wall Assembly showing STC46 with 'soundboard' and OL test report on Drywall Wall Assembly showing STC44. But for actual music transmission loss which includes frequencies below 125Hz the double drywall outperforms the sound board wall. Have a look at the STC graph where the TL figures go below 125Hz... It's down there where you will see (hear) the difference. The double gypsum board partition is 2db better at the MAM frequency and 3-4db better at 20Hz, +3db at 80Hz, +2db at 100Hz, -1db at 125Hz, -1db at 160Hz, and +3db at 200Hz. I think the pluses outweigh the minuses.

You would be better off simply stacking up the standard, type X, fire rated, gypsum board for the transmission loss required with your MSM/MAM assembly.

Have a look at the attached screen shots.

Here is a direct comparison between the Soundboard and Gypsum board wall with Green Glue. I am not trying to promote GG. If you look at the data, you can see what does what.

It would be nice to see this same testing data with OITC results. OITC features a modern calculation system and considers frequencies down to 80 Hz. For more information check this link.

Cheers,
John

[thkaiser]

Originally Posted by jhbrandt

Lets find out what's above the dropped ceiling before you try to isolate the walls and doors.

You don't know what kind of leakage you may have until it is inspected closely. All the ceiling tiles will need to be removed for renovation and isolation wall construction.

John,
Above the drum room is duct work. It extends in about 4 feet. Hence why the ceiling is 81" there as opposed to 91" everywhere else. Above the rest is what I believe to be nothing at all except the floor joices.

[jhbrandt]

Tom,

All of that duct work will need to be boxed in with framework, insulation, and two layers of type X drywall. - possibly attaching a couple of layers of drywall to the subfloor & filling remaining cavities with fluffy.. and covering with fabric. That's probably what I would suggest... but we really need to have a look at it.

The new isolation walls must seal all the way up to the sub floor above or the joists & also be decoupled from the ceiling/floor as well... There's a lot to it & from here, it just gets messy. The devil is in the details... and he gets mean! haha!

Cheers,
John

[thkaiser]

Some new:
Decided to take down the wall that I created for the vocal booth. It was just too small of a space for the control room/drum room. INstead we will buy some GIK screens to isolate if we need to do drums and voice at the same time. This will give us lots of room and hopefully a better space to record in.

Decided to staple mass loaded vinyl along the floor joyces as well as use the Ultratouch cotton. Hopefully it will keep out sound.

So, here is the final design minus all the treatment. I will add that in later today. Also, there is a door going into the furnace area which somehow got deleted but it is there in real life.

[thkaiser]

Looking at the layout and being on location a couple more times, we have decided to switch the drum room with the mix room. We are going to put the mixer near the furnace door and fire long way across the room. That way the bigger room can be used for more than just drums.

The ceiling has engineered 12" floor joyces. In between the joyce and the drop ceiling in the 91" room is around 2"
In the 81" room the distance is 10". The duckworth drops around 20". It is positioned about 3' away from the door. About a foot away there is a metal beam that drops 12". There is no insulation in either room.

I also took the time and put in some acoustic treatment ideas. (getting ahead of myself but necessary step eventually) I couldn't find models on sketchup of tritraps but I plan I putting pairs in every corner. My big problem will be the back reflections of the mixing console (and lack of space in a narrow room to fit a desk speaker stands AND acoustic treatment).

[thkaiser]

Some pictures of the joyces.

[jhbrandt]

Tom,

I'm trying to help you here... "Decided to staple mass loaded vinyl along the floor joyces as well as use the Ultratouch cotton. Hopefully it will keep out sound." -- Well, you can hope in one hand and crap in the other and see which one gets full first.
None of the above will help keeping sound in or out.

You don't have to hope or wish. I'm here to help and I have facts with documented proof of what works. Guaranteed.

You need to either; apply 2 layers of type X, 5/8" drywall directly to the sub floor between the joists, cover (fill between the joists) with fluffy building insulation, and then cover the joists with fabric. OR fill the joist space above with fluffy building insulation, attach resilient clips to the bottom of the joists, attach hat channel to them and then 2 layers of Type X, 5/8" drywall - stagger seams. The second option is the best for isolation but must not touch the walls.

Room switch is up to you. I recommend that you use the larger room for critical decisions... mixing. A smaller room that is trapped properly will enable decent recording of drums, guitars, etc & ambiance may be added in the mix.

Cheers,
John

[thkaiser]

John,
You crack me up. I just am trying to get it right and there are LOTS of ways doing this. The RIGHT way is a different story. I trust your opinion and know that you are correct in what you say.

IN regards to the mix room, still lots of debate which room should be which. I think this final layout will be good. However, Bryan from GIK told me that the mix room should only be 2x long as it is wide. Currently it is 8 feet wide. So that would make it around 16 feet long? Do you agree John?