2nd floor Studio

Hello, I've been lurking around here for a couple of months, I just joined, and this is my first post(Gulp!) My name is Adam and I'm from Glenview, Illinois(like ten miles north of Chicago). I have a room in the city that is on the second floor of a building. It is 825 sq feet. it is rectangular in nature with approximate demensions of 22'x37', with 12' ceilings. there are no poles in the middle of the room. The construction of the walls and ceiling are typical drywall. The floor is wood, not wood flooring, but actually timber which is at least 1 foot thick. The unit is already equipped with it own Hvac sytem. The hvac box is located in a 4x6 closet which resides in the corner of the room. The Vents run across the ceiling and are exposed, additionally the sprinkler system also runs across the ceiling. One thing that attracted me to the room is that I have no neighbors in the building, in that I'm surrounded by hallways on two sides and outside walls on the other two. each outside wall has two windows in it. The studio will be used for music recording(mainly rock some hip-hop) and I imagine It will be pretty loud. I've just recently finished reading Rod Gervais' book, I learned a lot, mainly that I need more help. My overall budget for the build is between 10000 and 15000 american dollars. I have a couple of questions which I have been having trouble finding answers to here on the site. Not that there not here, but more likely that I'm pretty computer illiterate. 1) is it even worth it to try to build a studio on the 2nd floor? 2) is my budget reasonable, or will I need more money(in which case it probabally won't happen)? I'm sure I forgot to mention many things. My project is just in the planning stage and I havn't worked all the kinks out yet myself. I read the stickies at the top of the forum and did my best. Thanks in advance, Adam

Hi Adam. Welcome to the mad house!

1) is it even worth it to try to build a studio on the 2nd floor?

It CAN be done. The question is if you can get as much isolation as you need, on the budget that you have. So first you should probably try to put numbers on that. figure out how much isolation you already have, how load you are, and how much you need to get the "loud" part down to the level where nobody else on the building is bothered by it. The best way to do that is to make some actual noise in the room as it is (of the type and intensity that you expect to make in the finished stdio), and use a sound level meter to measure how loud that noise is in all of the locations where it could possibly be a problem, such as in the rooms below, above, and on the other sides of those hallways. With that data in hand, you can figure out how much isolation you need, look at different ways of getting it, and see if they fit your budget. With one foot of solid wood underneath you, that's a good start. But what is below that? Do you have neighbors down there, or just a storage room / garage / bathroom / something similar? In the worst case, could you do some isolation treatment in the rooms below your floor? for example, is it possible, and would they allow you, to rip out their ceiling and walls, install resilient channel on the joists and studs, and a couple of layers of drywall with Green Glue, if you cannot get enough isolation any other way? But you might also find that your biggest problem is not below you, but right across the hall, on the other side of that hallway. It all depends on the way the building is built, how loud you are, and how sensitive the folks on the the side of the hall are. Just some ideas to give you a start in the right direction... - Stuart -

Thanks for getting back to me so quickly Stuart. thanks for the tips. I'll have to do some more research and then repost. Would you suggest playing loud music inside and testing the levels in the hallway, room under, and room over? I will say that my larger concern was for isolation between my rooms. The building I'm in is rented mainly to artists and artisans for studio space so most of the neighbors shouldn't have a problem. also the landlord already knows that my intention is to build a studio. Thanks again, Adam

The building I'm in is rented mainly to artists and artisans for studio space so most of the neighbors shouldn't have a problem. also the landlord already knows that my intention is to build a studio.

Well, that sounds like good news, .... in the "going out" direction, at lest. But what about the "coming in" direction? I mean, you are planning to record in there, so you don't want noise coming in from your neighbors, the street, building equipment (elevators, HVAC, water pumps, etc.), and the environment (aircraft overhead, wind, rain, thunder, hail, trains, etc.). You can't just stop noise going in one direction, unfortunately: it's a two way street. Even if you don't need to block outbound noise, you probably still need to block inbound noise. At least, that would be my guess. I can't think of too many places on the planet where you could record any time you wanted without having some kind of acoustic isolation around you! Also, you can't just isolate the wall between two rooms if you don't also isolate the walls, ceiling and floor AROUND those rooms. If you just built, for example, a wonderful STC-70 wall between your LR and your CR, but did nothing to the normal building walls and ceiling on the other sides of the rooms, which probably only give you STC-35 or so, then all that you have is STC-35 between your rooms. Your STC-70 wall is a huge waste of money in that case. Your entire room is only as well isolated as the weakest link. If sound can get around your wall by following an easier path, then that is what it will do. So if you want to isolate your LR from your CR, then you need to have the same amount of isolation on the other walls, and the floor, and the ceiling.

Would you suggest playing loud music inside and testing the levels in the hallway, room under, and room over?

Yup, that would work! Play a short loop of some of the music that you typically record, using good quality full-range speakers, and at the level you normally expect to have in your loudest room, (if it's rock, then you will probably be at least around 115 dB(C) in the live room, maybe a bit more). Measure that level with your meter ("C" weighting, slow response), and not down what you have right there in the room. Then go to other places in the building and measure again. Note down all the measurements. Now go back to the room, turn off the music, and watch the meter for a few minutes, to get the ambient level of sound in that room. If your meter has an averaging function and a peak function, use those. If not, then use your brain to accomplish the same function! You want the average and peak ambient levels over a period of several minutes, at a noisy time of day in the building. With those numbers you can figure out what amount of isolation you need, then look at methods of obtaining it, then figure the cost and see if it fits your budget. Hope that helps! - Stuart -

Soundman2020 wrote:

So if you want to isolate your LR from your CR, then you need to have the same amount of isolation on the other walls, and the floor, and the ceiling.

I think this is what my real question was. What is the best or preferred method for adding mass to a non-concrete floor? I'm assuming I'll probabally have to get an engineer out there to tell me how much weight I can put on the floor. Thanks again for your help. Adam

Hi Adam

What is the best or preferred method for adding mass to a non-concrete floor?

I don't think just adding mass to the floor is what you should be looking at. Probably the best way to add mass to a floor is with .... concrete! But that won't help much to increase your isolation! Mass law says that in order each time you double the mass of wall, floor or ceiling, you gain 6 dB of additional isolation. So if, for example, you have a four inch concrete slab right now, and it turns out that you need an additional 24 dB of isolation, then doubling the mass (thickness) of the slab to eight inches will gain you 6dB, doubling it again to sixteen inches gets you another 6 dB, doubling it again to 32 inches gains you another 6 db, and one more doubling to 64 inches gains you your final 6 dB... So as long as you don't mind a slab six feet thick, then you'd be fine with more concrete! :) OK. in your case you say its not a concrete floor, but the same principle still holds: To gain 6 dB of isolation, you need to double the mass, which implies doubling the thickness. 12dB gain requires four times the mass of whatever is there right now... Clearly, mass is not the way to go! Instead, you need some mass, but you also need to decouple. You need to have two separate massive surfaces, with a large air gap in between. Mass-Air-Mass. That implies that you need to either float a new floor above the existing floor (which you do NOT want to do! Read here: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=8173 ), or you need to get into the room below you, and decouple the ceiling of that room. Doing the ceiling below you is much, much easier than floating your floor, and much, much cheaper, too. Basically, you take out the old ceiling, and build a new decoupled ceiling on a new frame, probably just using resilient channel (or RSIC clips plus hat channel) on the existing joists. The new ceiling needs to have at least a couple of layers of 5/8 sheetrock, preferably with green glue in between the layers, and carefully sealed around the edges with acoustic caulk. While you have the ceiling off, you can use the opportunity to beef up and seal the underside of your floor, by using the old sheetrock from the old ceiling: carefully cut it to size, and fit it between the joists, up tight against the subfloor above. Hold it in place with cleats, and caulk around the edges abundantly. That adds mass to your floor. Do a couple of layers with more sheetrock, for even better isolation, and completely fill the entire gap between the new ceiling and the sub-floor above with rockwool or fiberglass insulation. That will give you really good isolation, without requiring huge amounts of mass. If you are also concerned about flanking into the walls in the room below you, then you might need to follow a similar strategy for those: decouple them by taking off the old sheetrock, installing resilient channel across the old studs, and adding a couple of layers of new 5/8 sheetrock, once again with green glue. That will take care of the guys downstairs, hopefully!

I'm assuming I'll probabally have to get an engineer out there to tell me how much weight I can put on the floor.

You bet! Smart move. A qualified structural engineer is the only guy who will be able to tell you how much additional load you can safely put on the building structure. And you will most likely be adding several tons of mass! Even using the Mass-Air-Mass technique for your new rooms, you still need LOTS of mass in your walls and ceiling. So explain to your structural engineer what it is that you plan to do, so that he can give you good advice on whether it is possible or not. - Stuart -

Thanks for all the help Stuart. I've decided to find a more suitable space. ADam

Adam I'm Chris. I've got a project going on in Northlake (near Elmhurst) and it's on a second floor as well. Here's a link to my thread if you're interested.viewtopic.php?f=2&t=4131&start=0