Garage Build - Novice builder- Rental Property.

Greetings JSRDF users and moderators. First let me say thank you for having this and let me state that just trying to read threads and posts I am WAAAAAY in over my head. I feel confident that with a bit of wisdom imparted I may be able to make this work. First let me state that I read the rules, and I hope that I am able to include everything needed so that users can answer me appropriately. AIM - To build a Garage into a workable single room studio, so that I can complete my home projects and record a drumset. I don't need to have the greatest build ever, especially because money is tight. I would hoever like to accomplish a good degree of sound proofing so that I don't piss off the neighbors. Budget - $1000 or less. (Should include some carpeting and some decorative fabrics to cover weird construction.) I have included pictures that should be self explanatory. The build will happen in the garage of the single family home I am renting in North Hollywood, CA. Landlady has been very cool with me doing as I wish, as long as I don't damage the property. She doesn't mind me drilling into the studs. I would like to a build that will be seen as an improvement, and that when it comes time to move out (in a few years) I will simply pull down the garage door wall covers and leave the open stud wall finished. I wanted to leave my ideas a bit open, and see what people thought I should do from the pictures. I have all dimensions if you need them, mostly I was hoping for advice on inexpensive but affective building materials. Neighbors are decently close, and I would like to be able to play a drumset (at reasonable hours.) I will not have huge mains, but I do have a subwoofer. I did not intend to build a vocal booth as of yet unless it made sense in the budget after the initial build. My idea for the main garage door was to build a frame around the door and then treat the same as the stud wall. My idea for the stud wall was pink insulation, soundboard (from home depot? is it even worth it?), and then drywall. Maybe sound foam or cloth on drywall? I have also seen on some posts that people are doing multiple layers of drywall. Why? I am such a newb I am not really sure what other info to post. Thank you in advance and I am so excited to find this resource. I am a frequent poster on Digidesign's Pro Tools User forum, and I am happy to exchange info if anyone wants to trade advice. Thanks again! I want to essentially permanently shut this door and wall it over. As you can see the studs are not perfectly built, they are on average 14 inches with a one on either side being about 7 - 8 inches. This door will be the entrance, I wanted to create a secondary inner door.

Hey there DrFord, and welcome! Nice to see someone who read the stickies, and did what they say! You seem to have a good space there, from the photos, but what would help more is a SketchUp model of what you have, with accurate dimensions, and a bit more info on your situation, such as distances to neighbors, etc. I guess you already know that a drum kit is the loudest of all instruments, and the hardest to isolate effectively. So if you aim to have enough isolation so that you don't disturb your "decently close" neighbors(???), then you need some pretty hefty mass in the way to block the sound. Your best bet is to follow the tried-and-true mantra of all the serious designers and builders here: fully decoupled two-leaf MSM wall and ceiling, lots of mass on both leaves, large air gap between, seal airtight, fill with insulation, and don't forget HVAC. That's a tall order on a US$ 1,000 budget. That will probably get you the studs and drywall, but not much else. (I'm figuring that based on the cost of materials where I live: hopefully they are an awful lot cheaper where you live!).

(Should include some carpeting and some decorative fabrics to cover weird construction.)

Forget the carpet. From the photos it looks like you have a decent concrete floor in pretty good shape. That's the best floor you can ask for! This is good news! Don't bother about covering it with anything, as it will just eat up your budget and you don't need to do that. Just use it exactly as it is. Go for an absorbent ceiling instead (live floor, dead ceiling). You can always drop in a couple of throw rugs if the acoustics turn out to be too live in that room once it is finished. So if you want to isolate well, beef up the inside of that existing wall with pieces of drywall cut to shape to fit between the studs, and seal that well around the edges with caulk. You'll probably need at least two layers. that will be your outer leaf. Then build another stud frame an inch or so inside that existing one, put a couple of layers of drywall on that, seal it airtight. That will be your inner leaf. Build a new ceiling in the same way, that rests only on your new inner leaf. Seal it all up tight, and presto! You are done! Except for HVAC, electrics, and acoustic treatment. - Stuart -

Stuart, Thanks for the post. I was searching around Home Depot and I came across Sound board, which was 4' by 8' at $9.95 a sheet. Do you have any experience with it? I was thinking if it was effective, I would install it over the Pink Insulation and then drywall on top. As I need to cover the metal doors, I was also thinking my budget may be enough that I do a first leaf, set up shop, acoustic treat, and once I get some more money budgeted, then do the second leaf. As far as the dimensions, the garage is an 18' square, with varying distances on the one corner. I did some clap tests, and the room is already a very interesting one, as it doesn't produce any slapback. Also I haven't really found any weird comb filtering corners... I guess the bizarre build existing helps with diffusion. On the drums, I was thinking I will have specific tracking hours while the neighbors are at work... LOL! At least for now. My closest neighbor is in fact very close, maybe 4-5 ft on one side. Really though I think it will be alright in general as I don't own any Studio Mains, only near fields. Any more ideas would be very helpful. I will post more pics as the room progresses. Specific material types and names would also be helpful. I am planning on doing the plans this weekend and then starting the framing... I think my first problem is already facing me... material transport!!!! Thanks again, D

check thread Dr before you build. http://johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=6968

Hey Dr. Do take a close look at the thread John directed you to. It is very similar to yours.

I came across Sound board, which was 4' by 8' at $9.95 a sheet. Do you have any experience with it?

I've heard of some people using it, but I'm not sure that you need it, and from your later comments, I think you might not be a understanding the concept of a two-leaf MSM wall properly: if you put up anything at all on the existing studs, then that will be your second leaf, and it will be fully coupled to your first leaf, which you do not want!

I was also thinking my budget may be enough that I do a first leaf, ...

You already HAVE your first leaf! It is already there. You don't need to build it. You only nee to beef it up.

... set up shop, acoustic treat, and once I get some more money budgeted, then do the second leaf.

There are two ways of doing your second leaf, but seeing you have neighbors close by and you are going to do drums, then the only real option is to build a separate stud frame a couple of inches away from the existing frame, and put a few layers of drywall on only ONE side of that frame. Then fill the gap between the two frames with plenty of insulation (fiberglass or mineral wool). Of course, you only build this second leaf AFTER you finish beefing up the existing first leaf!

I did some clap tests, and the room is already a very interesting one, as it doesn't produce any slapback. Also I haven't really found any weird comb filtering corners... I guess the bizarre build existing helps with diffusion.

That's great, but it only tells you about the existing acoustic treatment properties of the room: it tells you nothing at all about the isolation. Isolation and treatment are two entirely different, independent and incompatible things. You can have a room that is fatalistically isolated but sounds like garbage, or one that sounds superb but has really lousy isolation. Or you can have the real goal here: A room that sounds superb and also isolates supremely. So your clap tests only tell you about the acoustics, not the isolation. With a single stud frame that basically has nothing but siding on it (in the photos you posted) your STC is probably around 20-something at best. Which is pretty close to being "no isolation at all".

Really though I think it will be alright in general as I don't own any Studio Mains, only near fields.

The speakers are not your problem: the drums are. You seem to be drastically underestimating the sound energy put out by a drum kit! An average drum kit played reasonably hard can easily produce 115 decibels of sound pressure level, and a really intense drummer can get even more out of it than that. An STC-20 wall (what you have now) means that your neighbors will be getting hit by close to 100 dB! You might think that that's OK, but I can guarantee that they wont agree with you, unless they are stone cold deaf already! And if they aren't deaf, then your drums will take care of that pretty quick: OSHA safety tables say that after roughly 90 minutes of exposure at 97 dB, they will suffer irreversible hearing damage... If you put "sound board" and a layer of drywall on your existing studs, you will imp´rove the situation by maybe 10 points, with luck. So instead of your neighbors having their ears destroyed in 90 minutes, it will now take 6 hours... So, if you want the relationship with your neighbors to not get you thrown in jail, then you probably should think about isolating your room properly! :) That means that you need to build a fully decoupled two-leaf MSM wall, with lots of mass on each leaf, a large air gap, and insulation filing the air gap. Anything less will not work. You already have part of the first leaf in place. what you need to do is to beef up that leaf by fitting strips of 5/8" drywall between the studs, sealing around the edges carefully with caulk, then putting on another layer in the same way Also seal the framing at the floor and roof. That is your first leaf. Now build another stud frame a couple of inches away, completely fill the gap between with insulation, put at least two (preferably three) layers of 5/8 drywall on only one side of that frame, seal it tight. Now build your new inner-leaf ceiling across the top of the new inner leaf wall, in the same manner. There must he no mechanical connection whatsoever between the leaves. Use a pair of doors back-to-back for access. Don't forget HVAC and electrical. - Stuart -

Stuart, your info is awesome and I know understand the concept. My budget will not allow me to do a second "floating" leaf or de-coupled (not mechanically connected to the first leaf). However I am trying to beef up the first leaf as you recommended. Currently I have finished the insulation and the first layer of drywall - I ditched the soundboard after reading more on this forum. Currently I have only spent $500 on materials and I think I am well on my way to a good 1st leaf. I guess I will have to wait on the drums for now or at least talk to my neighbors and find out appropriate hours to do them. Thank you so much for all the help!

Hey Dr.! Glad to see that you have a much better grasp of the concepts, now. A couple more comments:

My budget will not allow me to do a second "floating" leaf or de-coupled (not mechanically connected to the first leaf). However I am trying to beef up the first leaf as you recommended.

Beefing up the outer leaf is a good start, and will help a bit, but without the inner leaf you won't get the kind of isolation that you really need. You might already be aware of this, but there is a natural law in the physics of acoustics called "mass law", and it says that each time you double the mass of your single-leaf wall, you gain roughly 6 dB of extra isolation. That sounds pretty good at first glance, until you do the math... But!!!! (you just knew there was a "but" in here somewhere, didn't you? :) ) In order for most people to be able to say (subjectively) that they perceive the new sound level as being half as loud as the old level, the level needs to drop by roughly 10 dB. So doubling the original mass that was in your outer leaf, then doubling it again, will gain you about 12 dB of isolation, which means that most people would judge that any noise coming out of the room is a fractionally quieter than half the level it was before. If you want to put that in terms of STC rating (which isn't really valid technically, but gives you a ballpark idea of the math): Let's say, for argument's sake, that your original wall was giving you STC-24. Doubling the mass will take that to roughly STC-30, and doubling it again will get you roughly STC-36, theoretically. Assume that you needed to add one layer of drywall to get you your first doubling of mass. You would need to add an additional two layers to get to STC-36. So you now have the equivalent of 4 layers of drywall (whatever was on the original wall, which I'm assuming was the equivalent of one layer, plus thee more layers). And all that this gets you, is that folks outside say it is about half as loud. Half as loud probably isn't good enough (unless you have very patient, long-suffering, neighbors). (Think of it like this: If you have ten people screaming in your ear at the top of their voices, and eight of them stop while two carry on screaming for all they are worth, then the sound level has dropped to roughly half, subjectively. But it is still pretty loud!) So let's say that you decide that you need to get it down by half again, down to where your neighbors say it is now one quarter as loud as it was before. You need to drop another 10 dB or so. Mass law says that you need to double the mass one more time (6 dB gain), then double it yet again (12 dB)! So you need to add another four layers for your first doubling, and then another eight on top of that for your second doubling..... And you now have a grand total of sixteen layers of 5/8" drywall, which is a total of something like 10 inches thick, for an STC rating of roughly STC-48. Which isn't bad, but still isn't all that great. On the other hand, if instead of using pure mass, you decided that all that you should do was to put a single layer of "beef" drywall on the original outer leaf (which is what you are doing right now), then put another two layers of drywall on a separate stud frame a couple of inches away (for a total of four layers, instead of sixteen layers), and fill the gap with fiberglass insulation, then you would get roughly STC-63 from that wall!!! That's a huge difference! STC-63 is pretty good isolation, by anyone's standard. To get to STC-63 by relying on mass law alone, you would need (theoretically) yet ANOTHER sixteen layers of drywall, on top of your original sixteen, and still not quite make it.... I'm not trying to scare you off here: just to point out that the only way to get the kind of isolation that you need at a reasonable cost, is with a two-leaf wall, since mass law alone just won't get you there easily. Four layers of drywall on a properly built two-leaf wall is many, many times more effective than just putting more mass on a single leaf. So what I'd suggest is that as soon as funds allow, build that second stud frame and put a coupe of layers of drywall on that. It will get you very close to what you need, for much less money then trying to beef up a single-leaf wall. There is another alternative that might interest you, and is a perhaps bit less expensive: You could put some stuff called "Resilient Channel" across the existing studs, and attach the extra two layers of drywall to that. It decouples the drywall from the existing frame. The result won't be as good as for the second frame, but it will still give you pretty decent isolation. You might want to look into that as a possibility. - Stuart -