Studio in Cowshed

Hello all! First of all I must say I'm in agreement with all who say what a great forum this is. I've been studying it on and off over the last few months in preparation for my project of converting part of an old livestock shed into a studio. The shed is timber construction with a metal roof. At a later stage a floor of about 10cm (4in) concrete was laid and the roof and walls were insulated with polystyrene with an inner layer of plywood. My Dad uses part of the shed for guitar making with the occasional use of power tools. There is a room in between his workshop and the area I'm interested in – so not too much sound comes through. We are in a rural location so there is very little traffic – an occasional tractor perhaps and we don't have to worry too much about disturbing neighbours – the nearest is a house 50m away with tolerant occupants! The space is about 6m x 6m (or 20ft x 20ft). The ceiling starts off at 1.9m (6ft 3in) at the side walls and slopes up to 2.8m (9ft 3in) along the centre. There are 2 big wooden beams and 2 support posts in the middle of the area. There are windows on two walls. I've partitioned off the area I can use with a one leaf wall of plasterboard I've atached a sketchup of the empty area and one of a proposed plan – apologies for my rudimentary sketchup skills. My aims are to be able to record bands on a semi-professional basis. Most of the bands and musicians I am involved with play fairly gentle songs with acoustic instruments such as this: http://www.myspace.com/fursdonmusic My requirements for the studio would be to have a live room which was fairly well isolated from the control room – so that drums could be recorded in the live room and acoustic guitar in the control room without too much spill. I also need to make sure that the sound of heavy rain on the metal roof does not come in too much (The polystyrene and plywood has already done quite a good job here). It would be good to have good shaped rooms for recording and mixing. My budget is pretty modest – say £2000 at the moment – hopefully more in subsequent years. Due to the low budget my plan for ventilation is to use the existing windows and put windows in the inner walls and open them every now and then! My questions at the moment are: 1) What do you think of the proposed plan generally? 2) What about the control room? At the moment it will have a ceiling that slopes up from either side wall to central ridge running the length of it. This ridge will slope slightly up as it gets to the back of the room. This is to try and get as high a roof as possible in a cramped area. Do you think this could be problematic acoustically? Any alternative suggestions? Any comments will be gratefully received. Jake

Hi Jake, and welcome! Looks like you've been waiting patiently for comments! So here are my comments:

and the roof and walls were insulated with polystyrene with an inner layer of plywood.

So you already have two leaves? Anything that you do in addition is going to add a third leaf. That might not be an issue, though, since you did say that isolation isn't that important.

My Dad uses part of the shed for guitar making with the occasional use of power tools.

What type of power tools? A rotary hammer is rather different from a Dremel hobby drill... Have you checked the sound levels and spectrums ("spectra"?) that your dad produces with those tools?

The ceiling starts off at 1.9m (6ft 3in) at the side walls and slopes up to 2.8m (9ft 3in) along the centre.

That's pretty low. Yes, it will cause a problem for you with your proposed layout, since your CR ceiling will either be very low on the sides with your plan, or it will have to angle up from left to right across the room. Neither is good. can you re-position your layout so that the front of the control room is on one of those outside walls that are only 1.9m high? That would make the ceiling slope up and away from the speakers, until it gets well past your head, which is much better. Rotate your entire design 90° clockwise, then re-jig the rooms to fit again. I think that should work. Also, your control room looks rather long and narrow: what ratio are you using for it? Maybe you could try a different ratio that makes it shorter and fatter? That way, you might be able to fit in almost all of it between the outside wall and the room centerline.

Due to the low budget my plan for ventilation is to use the existing windows and put windows in the inner walls and open them every now and then!

Well, you can have operable windows, of you can have good isolation. But I don't think you can have both. At least not easily, and not cheaply! - Stuart -

HI, can you spin you whole design to the left 90 dec? Allowing you to have symmetry in your control room both with the ceiling and the door lay out.

can you spin you whole design to the left 90 dec?

I think you mean "90° to the right", Lil! Spinning it 90° left would place the rear wall of the CR at a location where the ceiling height can be a maximum of 1.9 m, and the front wall where the ceiling height can hit 2.8 m! Reverse-ceiling angle, anyone? Well, I guess you could spin it 90° left, then flip the CR end-to-end (mirror-image). That would solve both problems! - Stuart -

Many thanks for your replies, Stuart and lilith-envy. I don't mind having had to wait for your wisdom - we have just had our first baby (a daughter) in the time since I first posted so studio has taken second place! I had thought about having the control room with the front at one of the low walls. The main problem I saw with it was that the window to the live room would have to be on one of the side walls of the control room and if it was angled it would be angled so that it wouldn't be able to see much of the live room. I haven't tried drawing this yet, so I could be wrong. I will have a go at a sketchup and post it in the next couple of days. The door I have in the partition wall could easily be moved - so this isn't a constraint. Many thanks again guys, Jake

we have just had our first baby (a daughter) in the time since I first posted so studio has taken second place!

Wow! Cool! Congratulations on the addition to the family! I still remember what that's like,so I get what you are saying! Make the most of the time to enjoy your new baby, for sure! They just grow up so damn fast!

The main problem I saw with it was that the window to the live room would have to be on one of the side walls of the control room

Well. that's the way you seem to have it right now, so it wouldn't by much of a change! Your current window to the live room is on the right rear of your CR, as far as I can see from the SketchUp image you posted. - Stuart -

Hi Stuart and others, Thanks for your congratulations on our new daughter. I've managed to snatch a few seconds to do some more thinking!

Soundman2020 wrote:

That's pretty low. Yes, it will cause a problem for you with your proposed layout, since your CR ceiling will either be very low on the sides with your plan, or it will have to angle up from left to right across the room. Neither is good. can you re-position your layout so that the front of the control room is on one of those outside walls that are only 1.9m high? That would make the ceiling slope up and away from the speakers, until it gets well past your head, which is much better. Rotate your entire design 90° clockwise, then re-jig the rooms to fit again. I think that should work.

Yes I think you are right. I've come up with a new very rough layout based on your comments. It has several pros: 1) Uses the existing ceiling angle to it's advantage by using it for the front of the control room. 2) Larger and higher-ceiling control room 3) A bigger room that could be a vocal booth But the main con is: 1) Smaller Live Room - which is a bit long and thin with quite a length of parallel walls. If there was a way I could get a bigger live room and loose the vocal booth, that would suit my needs better - but I'm not sure if that is possible without compromising the control room size? Another question prompted by:

Soundman2020 wrote:

So you already have two leaves? Anything that you do in addition is going to add a third leaf. That might not be an issue, though, since you did say that isolation isn't that important.

Would it be better to remove the inner leaf of plywood? So that there would be only 2 leaves: The outer sheet-metal roof and an inner one of plasterboard which would make up the ceiling of the rooms and insulate with rockwool in between. I hope this all makes sense, and thank you once again for your constructive comments. Jake

Hello again everyone, I've had a break from designing the studio due to bringing up our baby - she is now 3 months old and I am no longer exhausted. I'm still planning to do this but realize it will take a lot longer and more money than I originally thought. My question at the moment is what to do with the roof and ceiling. Photos and diagram below show the current situation. My original plan was to build an independently supported plasterboard ceiling below the existing structure. However, Stuart pointed out this would be a 3 leaf structure. So would it be best to remove the plywood and polystyrene layers before building the plasterboard ceiling? If I do this, won't the outer layer be too thin - it's just corrugated aluminium - and it's not airtight at all. How can I add more mass to this leaf? The walls are very similar except it is one layer of wooden cladding instead of the corrugated aluminum. What would be the best solution here? Thanks in advance for any thoughts. Jake

Wow, I cant believe how short changed the corregated iron is at the top! The rim cap just makes the edge. Is there any insulation or sislation between the iron and the plasterboard?

Jake - unfortunately polystyrene is good for thermal insulation but not for sound. I would not class the corrugated aluminium roof as a leaf as it has basically no mass and is not airtight so your suggestion of building a new ceiling below it is the best way to go. For the area of exposed iron I would just line it with insulation and plaster and then build the new ceiling under it and decoupled from it. Yeah - that must be one big ridge cap Deanne, :)

Thanks very much for your advice, John - I'll do as you suggest. Yes, you're right Deanna, there isn't much overlap of the ridge cap over the corrugated aluminium. That top photo was from a bit of the shed that won't be used for the studio but it was just to show the structure is like behind the plywood and polystyrene layers in the section that I will be using. I'll carry on designing now... Jake