New tracking room/rehearsal room

Hey, The situation I've got the opportunity to make use of an ~5m x 5m x 2.3m garage in my families new house, and I'm planning on using it as a tracking room for my studio and rehearsal room for my band. With an adjacent room as my control room. We have neighbours very close by (my garage wall is in place of the neighbours fence for the length of the garage). Rough Budget I've already been given a rough idea of costs, including labor, being around the $15 000 Aussie dollars mark, which is roughly my budget. Goal I'm trying to get the greatest reduction of volume. Hence I'm running the plans past you guys before I take the plans to a builder. So far, given the small size of the room the design of the room isn't too elaborate, with a focus on noise reduction over pleasing acoustics, and to solve any acoustic issues as best I can post-construction with acoustic panels. As I plan to use the space as a rehearsal studio, in a loud "rock" band with drums, I'm expecting to generate levels of ~110dB SPL. While still doing whatever I can afford to do to make it usable for recording instruments. I'm expecting mainly to be using it for doing demos for your typical pop/rock bands, so guitar/bass/drums/vocals. Limitations You might notice in the sketchup file that there is no floating floor. That's because the garage is on a separate foundation to the house and I have limited space between the floor and ceiling. I also didn't draw in the rolling garage door, this is because we plan on removing the tracks from the ceiling, and leaving the garage door permanently down. When we built the house we selected a garage door which has space for placing acoustic insulation bats into it's frame. A further note on the sketchup file, the walls are brick, as you can see, but in the corners and midway along the wall there is a "pillar" consisting on an extra layer of brick, however for the sake of simplicity I took the brick walls in the sketchup file out to the extremities of these brick pillars, so there is actually a bricks width more air space than shown in the sketchup file around most of the internal room. Also, the door shown in the sketch up file is a door which goes outside to our verandah. Just in case that's important. Both the existing door and the internal door will be solid wood doors. Construction At the moment the plan is simply to have gyprock boards over the frame, with acoustic insulation behind them to form the internal wall. If after/during the purchase of materials there seems to be enough additional cash, I might look into putting two layers of gyprock together with some sort of sound proofing product between them, such as Green Glue, to form a leaf for the internal wall. My external wall is currently planned to be the existing brick wall, perhaps painted if anyone thinks it will help. I'm also open to the idea of leafing the brick wall if anyone thinks it is worth it. Primary Question/Problem My biggest problem with the design so far has been the ceiling, my father (who for many years was a carpenter specialised in building ceilings) has informed me that with this design the ceiling is likely to sag in the middle, but there is no room for a support beam across the ceiling to prevent this from happening. So I'm very much open to any suggestions about possible alternatives for the ceiling. I believe the pre-existing ceiling is simply some sort of plasterboard hung from wooden beams. But as we haven't actually moved into the house yet I can't check and tell you for certain. Miscallaneous Info At this point in my plan things such as ventilation and patchbays are just vague ideas, my goal at this point is to have a very very solid room design. However if it is important, there is currently 4 power points in the room, I have no idea how I'm going to make those accessible from inside the room, but I'm guessing the builder will have some advice. Also in terms of air conditioning I'm currently working under the premise that I can have a wall mounted unit inside the internal room, with the pipes leading through a small and sealed hole in the brick wall to the outside part of the air conditioner unit. Sorry if I've given a little too much information, but in acknowledging my inexperience in this matter I have to acknowledge that I don't necessarily know what is and isn't relevant. Anyway, if anyone can see any problems I've missed, or has any advice, or ideas for my ceiling conundrum it would be much appreciated :) Thanks, Anthony EDIT: Tried to make it more readable for everyone

Aloha and welcome to the forum, Here's a quick pic to refer to. More thoughts in a few... Aloha 8)

Aloha, Here's a helpful diagram...and a link to one person's soundproofing journey http://www.johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=2921 Aloha 8)

Welcome to RSD!

My biggest problem with the design so far has been the ceiling, my father (who for many years was a carpenter specialised in building ceilings) has informed me that with this design the ceiling is likely to sag in the middle, but there is no room for a support beam across the ceiling to prevent this from happening. So I'm very much open to any suggestions about possible alternatives for the ceiling.

Vague generalities don't help. What specifically is your father referring to? The drawing shows 123 mm x 66 mm joists on the side. Is the drawing to scale? This is a bit technical, but intended for your father to review. Using span tables for the US, douglas fir structural grade 2"x6" size on 12" centers upright is allowable for up to 15' 5" spans with a 20/10 live load/dead load and L/240 deflection limit with the joists on end. Good luck! Calculating, Andre

Unfortunately the drawing is not perfect. Before construction begins I'm hoping to work with someone to create an exact and far more detailed plan, so my apologies to everyone for not being able to supply more detail than I have so far. Avare, thanks, I'll get my father to have a look at what you have said, I on the other hand haven't a clue what you just said :D Thanks for everyone's replies thus far. I've got A LOT of reading to do! And I'm about to order Rod Gervais' book.

Antman wrote:

Thanks for everyone's replies thus far. I've got A LOT of reading to do! And I'm about to order Rod Gervais' book.

Your welcome. While waiting for the book, read the manual at the opening of the website. It goes with out saying to read every post and linked threads also. :D Andre

Phoar, I've done quite a bit of reading, and I think I've come up with a pretty coherent idea of how I'm going to construct things. Attached are some screenshots of what I came up with in Sketchup as well as the Sketchup file itself. Keep in mind that it is not to scale, more of a demonstration of technique than fine details. Now just to explain this diagram a bit, Yellow = Gyprock Black = Auralex Sheetblok Grey = Resilient Channel Pink = Insulation White = Existing ceiling board Brick pattern = Existing brick Concrete Pattern = Existing Concrete Lighter Wood = Wall frame and existing ceiling beams Darker wood = Plywood Flooring However with the framing I have actually only shown the frame as vertical wood pillars for simplicities sake, rather than actually building a frame. The thing currently running through my mind is "To resilient channel or not to resilient channel!" on the walls. Given, what seems to me, will be a fairly small space for an entire band during rehearsal (Drums, PA, Bass Amp, Piano, and 4 musicians plus a wheelchair), the idea of reducing the need for bass traps (since I will also be tracking in there) seems like an attractive idea, while I'm also very concerned about bass frequencies escaping and upsetting the neighbours. One idea I've had is to resilient channel the gyprock off the frame on the side furthest from the garage door. Thus furthest from any neighbours, but to attach the two layers of Gyprock directly to the frame at the roller door side.