Ready to start!

Ok, here goes after quite some time of taking in information from this site and reading Rod’s book I feel I’m ready to start on the studio project. The overview of the project is: Location: Norfolk, England Budget: £7500-10,000 The construction will take place in an attached garage 24’ x 15’ x 9.5’ (internal) the internal wall is a typical 9” solid wall construction circa 1890’s with 1” rendering the external walls are typical cavity insulated block work circa last year (although the wife would point out that construction started quite some time before that!!!) There is a room above which is where a problem will arise, but I’ll discuss this later. Floor/ceiling joists are 11”. There is a double garage door to the east elevation (short wall dimension) and a single door in the west elevation in the corner of the south wall. Floor is 6” concrete pad and there is a further 4” clearance to build up the flooring. The use would be mainly for recording bands, playing at typical rock volumes and solo work. My nearest neighbour is 100’ away, we live on a busy road which produces quite a bit of traffic noise. I would like to construct a control room and tracking room and will block/brick up the existing garage door and replace with single door and window. But here is where the compromise begins. The construction should be capable of being converted to a flat at a later date. Yes I’m sure this will compromise things but I’ll post a couple of my ideas and maybe you could pull them to pieces etc. This means that there should be provision for living space, bedroom and bathroom. Due to drainage being at the rear corner near to the existing single door I feel this will limit the design somewhat. Control room would be double wall construction but i'm thinking of framing out the restof the walls with iso bars rather than full room within a room construction. Have not decided on HVAC yet. Back to the ceiling, this is 11” joists with a single layer of 12.5mm plasterboard filled with 8” Rockwool. Here’s where things get interesting. I have installed under floor heating in the bedroom above, unfortunately because we Brits are new to this the supplier would only guarantee the equipment would work with a max 20mm covering. I sought advice from the states who told me it would be no problem to lay a 12.5mm sub floor and then the 20mm hardwood on top of this. Unfortunately I erred on the side of caution and layed the hardwood directly onto the joists. I also used metal heat spreader plates rather than a dry sand cement fill (again on advice from supplier). I now have a VERY warm room but with poor sound isolation from the garage below (yes I know but I wasn’t going to build a studio at that point). Sorry USA I should have listened!!! There is a possibility of altering the floor construction at a later date but at the moment the wife would definitely cut a certain part of my body off if I even suggested it. Could I work on the underside of the floor now and then alter things later? Reading Rods book it would indicate that the existing ceiling should be removed and isolation bars fitted directly to the joists. I was going to batten over the existing plasterboard then use iso bars and 2x plasterboard but I guess this would work like boarding the inner sides of a double wall (have I got this correct) Ok some of my ideas http://www.saecollege.de/reference_mate ... /Plans.htm The corner control room could work with some re planning swap the kitchen door with the sink and it’s may well drop straight in. I found this design posted by eyvindur (hope I’m allowed to hijack other peoples work! Thanks or sorry eyvindur). I tried to post just the pic but could not work out how to do it SORRY and HELP. http://www.johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=9961 This design could also work with the bathroom/kitchen area going in the top right hand corner. Looks like a garage door in a similar position to mine and if the single door was move to the right wall of the storage space that would be a fairly good example of what I have at present (minus internal work of course). Eyvindur later posts a corner control room design which may also be a better option for me. Eyvindur if you read this how’s your construction going. http://johnlsayers.com/Studio/Mainpage/ ... ctions.htm This is the silva productions studio, again this may fit and looks about the same size as my garage. Again top right corner could be used for bathroom/kitchen area. It is probably the design I am favouring at the moment but the corner control room may give me a better layout? I’ve also looked at the Guruland studio and wondered if a scaled down version would work without the live studio. Scaling down may make this a no go but what do you guys think http://johnlsayers.com/Stuff/Plan_Detail2.pdf These are my thought so far please feel free to rip them to pieces any help would be greatly appreciated (how to post pics for starters!). Sorry I haven’t posted a sketch up plan of my garage but I’m very new to this and am still trying to get my head round posting on forums etc. Thanks Nick

i think you could readily use RSIC and hat channel to isolate the ceiling drywall (assuming the ceiling joist can handle the load). you might want to make some measurements on the space to see how much noise you're getting from the traffic esp low frequency stuff (trucks are one, 50,000W in-car stereos are also bad news) which can potentially hurt your recordings.

Thanks Glenn. I guess I will need to remove the existing plasterboard first? I'll double check the loading but fairly sure joists can take the weight. Would it be a good idea to use the same principle on the walls as room in room will take up too much space as i've said I'm having to compromise here. Would it be worth putting plasterboard up against the bottom of the UFH to increase isolation or wait and tackle the problem from above when her that must be obeyed clams down!!! Been meaning to get a noise meter for some time looks like a visit to evil bay. Trucks are my main problem its a 30mph road but we still get low rumble and a bit of vibration very occasionally. Thanks Nick

you're probably a good candidate for RSIC and a floating floor to avoid those vibrations.

Thanks again Glenn, Just ordered a noise meter so I'll get some readings as soon as that arrives. I'll get the ceiling up first, but I'm having a few problems locating RSIC this side of the pond? I'm sure I'll find a supplier eventually. I'm guessing from your second post you meant use RSIC on the walls as well as ceiling. I've got quite a lot of 2"x2" batons would these be ok to frame the wall then fix the RSIC to these. I'm hoping to off-set the walls so they are not parallel but not sure if I can get away with 12 deg, would it still be worth doing? Need to start thinking more about my final design as this may influence the framing process. Still not sure which will be best for me but its either the corner layout or a version of Eyvindur plan that I originally posted. I'm hoping to document the construction process and will post pics, hopefully by then I'll have figured out how to do this!!! Thanks again Nick

www.pac-intl.com - RSIC but also www.kineticsnoise.com and www.masonindustries.com have isolation products. you'll want to attach the isolation mount to the ceiling (walls etc) as recommended by the manufacturer, as i don't believe the 2x2 would be the right mounting. since you have limits on space, it might be best to make the walls squared and use treatments to create the angles. generally speaking its easier to remove the treatment walls later and be left with standard room shapes if you need to be able to resell the space. plus you might be able to take the treatment materials with you...