Let me first start this off by apologizing as I don't have much info to go on right now. This thread is posed for a friend of mine and I'm trying to help him out to the best of my abilities with my limited knowledge. Here we go...
He has a 2 car garage that he would like to convert into a studio/rehersal space. The exterior is stucco and I can only assume that it is 2x6 framing since that is typically the standard. Inside the garge there are cabinets that take up approximately 1 foot on either side of the garage and stretch the entire length. I'm trying to help him devise a plan that will produce the results he wants and spending as little money as possible. To make this design a little more difficult he would like to continue to be able to use the garage door to load and unload equipment.
We can't do any testing at the moment to see how much sound is actually escaping but I imagine the main culprit is going to be the garage door. I was thinking I could probably build two or three rolling "doors" made from 2 or 3 inch thick sheets of mdf that would go in front of the garage door and sealed into place by an upper and lower piece that would screw into the ceiling and floor. When he wants to open the door he would simply unscrew the upper and lower pieces and roll the mdf panels out of the way. Now for the cabinets I was thinking that they are already 3/4 - 1 inch thick doors so that has to be good for something regarding isolation except it creates a 3rd leaf :( . Without removing the cabinets, if it still provides ample isolation from outside and from sound reaching outside I was going to suggest to him that he fills the cabinets with 703 or mineral wool and he can open various doors for different dampening effects when recording in the room. He is not opposed to taking down the cabinets though if it is essential to achieve a reasonable amount of isolation. I've already informed him that he would probably benifit from putting another layer of drywall on the ceiling and backing it with green glue and he is on board with that. Honestly he doesn't mind building a room within a room but I know that route will not be cheap and if he can get the desired results without extra labor and cost I think he would be even happier.
Does any of this sound like it would work or is it a little to much on the wishful thinking side?
Garage Conversion for isolation
Originally posted at johnlsayers.com, topic 13668.
Short answer? Probably! :) But seriously, it's really hard to say without knowing what he wants to do in there. If he wants to rehearse and record relatively quiet instruments, such as acoustic guitar, violin, piccolo, flute, and a couple of vocals, then what you suggest might just do the trick. But if he is talking about a full rock band, with acoustic drums, bass, electric guitars, keyboards, lots of blaring amps, half a dozen stone deaf musicians, etc. the you are probably totally out of luck (unless his nearest neighbors are about half a mile away, and even then its iffy). If you can be a bit more descriptive of what he wants to do in there, how close the neighbors are, how annoyed the rest of the family inside his own house might be, what time of day / night he intends to play, the type of budget he has in mind, what he intends to do in there in terms of layout, recording, is it a commercial venture or just for fun, etc, and anything else that you think might be pertinent, then folks here might be able to help you out more. The more information you can provide, the easier it is for others to get the picture and offer advice. - Stuart -Does any of this sound like it would work or is it a little to much on the wishful thinking side?
Right, I should have thought to mention some of those things. It will be used for a rock band style rehersal with loud guitars and an acoustic drumkit. The nearest neighbor is about 20 feet or so away. The family is fine with the noise but the goal is to be able to record or play at any time day or night without disturbing the neighbors. I'm not exactly sure what his budget is but if I had to guess without checking with him first I would say about 3,000-4,000US. This isn't exactly intended for comercial use although he gets lots of people wanting him to do studio drums for them so it would be a plus for him if he can offer a really nice product. When I talked to him he wasn't sure where the control was going to go but it could possibly end up occupying some of the garage as well. A laundry room is in the next room. to me the laundry issue shouldn't be a problem... don't do laundry while recording but, I don't know how his wife feels about that. So basically one live room with a possibility of a control room in there but there won't be any other rooms for iso or anything like that. I'm not even sure of the exact dimensions because I haven't been there myself yet. I'm guessing it's the standard 22x22 or 22x24.
Another thing I should mention is that his drumkit is on steroids. Think Neil Pert, Danny Carrey or Mike Portnoy... I think it's something like 8x6. It could be slightly larger than that but only inches.
OK, with that additional info, I just don't see any way you are going to drop the extreme SPL inside that room (probably getting close to 120 dB), down to a level where neighbors 20 feet way are not going to hear it at 4 AM (probably below 40 dB), working the way you outlined. You really don't have much choice except to build a full "room-in-a-room" system, with plenty of mass on the leaves and a large air gap. Unless you can persuade the neighbors to move away, and leave their house empty!
Seriously, the cupboards will have to go, for several reasons: The three-leaf issue that you already identified, plus you are going to need to get access to the inside of the walls, to beef them up before you build your second leaf. And your garage door idea is not going to fly either: You need to seal both leaves absolutely airtight in order to get good isolation. even a small hole, crack or leak in one leaf will make a huge difference. What I've seen from many similar threads here, is that most people just seal up the garage door totally. They leave it in place for aesthetic reasons, or local code, but beef it up and seal it, then build an inner leaf, which is also sealed.
Regarding the "control room in a functional laundry" idea, I'm not convinced that would be a good idea at all: you don't want high humidity in a control room, and you do want symmetry and very carefully contrived acoustics. You also want a reasonable size room, and most laundries are postage stamps. Unless your friend's laundry is unusually large and can be completely gutted, it doesn't sound like a good proposition.
I'd suggest that you search the forum for threads by folks who have built )or are building) both a control room and a live room/rehearsal room in a two-car garage. There are quite a few of them! Read through those threads and I'm sure you'll find lots of ideas that you can use in designing a studio for your friend.
The other issue is the budget: 5k might go a reasonably long way to doing just a simple windowless single-door rehearsal space inside a double-garage, but I don't see it going very far at all towards doing that plus a control room as well.
There are also other issues like electrical and HVAC that you need to consider, and they don't come cheap. Cram half a dozen musicians into a small highly insulated extra-sealed airtight space with their instruments, amps, lights, and other gear, and the temperature will go up pretty fast, with the air getting really stale just as fast. That room will get really uncomfortable after a while. You need to cool the air, pump in fresh air, pump out stale air, and do it all without losing your isolation.
I guess I'm not giving you much good news here, am I?
- Stuart -
Unfortunately, that fact alone doesn't make it produce any less noise. There are 3 things at play. How loud the music is, how sensitive the neighbours may be, and what degree of sound reduction there is between the two. I don't like to bet on how sensitive neighbours are - or, in 5 years those neighbours move out and someone who doesn't appreciate rock music at 3am moves in. I wouldn't want to curtail your friend's creativity but 3am may be out - even 10pm may be out depending on ... The level of sound reduction. There is no way of getting around a room-within-a-room for some serious sound reduction. The new frame is expensive, as are the internal wall linings, although you could always do an extra layer of lining every 8 months for 2 years to allay the costs (3 layers total, provided that the exterior cladding on the garage has got a bit of mass in it).This isn't exactly intended for comercial use
Stuart and Seb are right on the money.
No it's not what I wanted to hear but it was the same conclusion that I kept coming to in my head... just looking for a possible shortcut for him. The thing I hadn't even consider, foolishly!, was the air exchange.
I know a good electrician that I can send his way to save him a few bucks but I know that wasn't going to be cheap even still. I don't even know how to price that for him to be honest because I know that little about electrical work. I've done a fair share of remodels but I've always gone "to the bathroom" when it comes time to do the electrical work.
I'll just have to tell him that he'll need to enclose the garage completly and that the pros don't see a way around that.
Regarding the control room I may have explained that incorrectly. The laundry is in a seperate room but, it is the room immediately on the other side of the wall. He keeps telling me that there is a room that is roughly 6x10 at the back of the garage that also houses the hot water unit. That's where he's wanting to have his control room. To me that just doesn't seem practical for use as a control room and goes against the very reason for having a control room to begin with. I'll try to explain to him what is going to happen should he choose not to build an decent control room.
I did a search a long while back for garage conversions but I never saved them and I couldn't seem to find them again and that's why I started this thread to begin with. I'll keep diging for them because I know there was one in particular that I really liked how it came out visually.
Let me ask you this... Would a 2x6 wall be strong enough to hold the weight of 3 sheets of 5/8" drywall or would it be best to use 2x8's?
BTW seb, I like that suggestion of slowly adding more and more layers. That may work out well for him.
Absolutely. Make sure and address issues you can't easily augment / access later, like isolated ventilation... although you could always do an extra layer of lining every 8 months for 2 years to allay the costs (3 layers total, provided that the exterior cladding on the garage has got a bit of mass in it).
Have you looked at these kits:
http://www.durra.com.au/downloads.html
Look at the "DIY Studio kits" PDF. It is an Aussie link but it is an international company. I couldn't quickly see the same brochure on the .com site but I imagine you could call them about it.
Oh, and I would have thought that 4-inch frames could hold 3x16mm plasterboard (at least with Aussie timber...), provided it is braced in the perpendicular direction to the plane of the frame - ie braced using the end walls or the ceiling joists.
Hi seb - yes those durra panels look interesting don't they.
I gather the Gold Coast Convention Center has all it's ceilings made of the stuff. It's fire proof, sound proof, it's light and very environmentally cool.
John, surely you don't really mean sound "proof"? :wink:
I'm not sure it performs any differently to how an 18.5kg/m^2 panel would be expected to perform. (It is basically the old Stramit/Ortech compressed straw panel, perhaps with some updated recipe). The test results on the S50 panel are STC 31 and the T58 panel (22kg/m^2) STC 34, although they were two completely different labs separated in time as well, so the results may not be comparable.
I think it's real potential lies in its usefulness to make "kits". A flat-pack "room-within-a-room", if you will.
hello again. I had abandoned this thread for a while because it was looking like my friend wasn't going to get the house but just last week he was given a closing date. So, I'm trying to gather more info for him again.
Here's where we are at. He's not budging on the garage door. He wants it to stay for exterior aesthetics and for possible resale in the future.. What are the best options for beefing the door up and sealing it? Second area that has me concerned is his roughly 6x10 control room. On its own it there may be enough room to kill flutter echoes and have a small desk and enough room for one person to be in but I can't imagine it being comfortable for 2 people for any extended period of time. I know he's not concerned so much as mixing in there. He rather send the files to me and have me mix for him but even as a reference room I would think it would only be useful if the acoustics were well treated. Any thoughts on this? It is a two story house. The master bedroom is right above the garage. I have expressed concern to him about the weight issues of beefing up the ceiling. His idea was to pull up the carpet in the bedroom and lay down more floor sheathing. To me it would make more sense just to add more layers of drywall to the garage ceiling and slap some green glue on them. Any thought or ideas of achieving isolation from/for the top floor without knowing the trusses baring weight capabilities? As of now the only true plans are to tear down the cabinets and inner drywall. Then add osb between the studs to the inner side of the outer leaf and calk it in and then follow up with the drywall that was pulled off and do the same with that and add some green glue to it and calk that in as well. He's agreed to build a room within a room. We will be angling the walls to minimize direct reflections. Are there preferred or best angles or formulas to use or is random good enough? I have done some rough math and figured that he could afford to have two layers of 5/8ths drywall with green glue in the middle for now. If he feels it needs more at a later time he can always do that. I was hoping for his sake that by beefing up the inner side of the outer leaf and using green glue there, having an air gap and two layers with green glue on the inner leaf would be enough to get him to a fairly reasonable STC and low frequency TL. He believes there to be enough electrical outlets already in place but I haven't seen it yet to confirm. HVAC will be an issue but this is in Arizona where its hot 11 months out of the year so many oscillating fans and scented air sprays will more than likely be the remedy for that situation until he is able to save up some more money.
Please any and all, feel free to weigh in with your comments and suggestions.
As long as he doesn't expect to actually open it, then that should be OK. Or at lest, not to open it until he moves out one day, then he can break the seal and tear out the studio...He's not budging on the garage door. He wants it to stay for exterior aesthetics and for possible resale in the future..
That really is small. I don't see him being able to get the speakers positioned far enough apart to give a good stereo image while also staying out of the corners! And that is 6" without any isolation or treatment yet? It will be even smaller by the time it is finished. How high is the ceiling?Second area that has me concerned is his roughly 6x10 control room.
It doesn't matter if you hang it underneath or put it on top: it is still weight, and is still resting on the joists! Just by putting on top instead of underneath does not change the weight! Also, what do you mean by "floor sheathing"? Plus, putting it on top means that the floor in that bedroom will be a couple of inches higher than the floor in the hallway, closet, bathroom, etc.... uncomfortable, and ugly too, if you ask me. He'll be tripping up and down that two-inch step in the doorway, all the time.I have expressed concern to him about the weight issues of beefing up the ceiling. His idea was to pull up the carpet in the bedroom and lay down more floor sheathing.
Any thought about that? My thought would be "DANGER!". I would not do anything at all without checking with a structural engineer first. Only he can tell you for sure how much extra mass you can add to that floor safely. Guessing would be a really bad idea.Any thought or ideas of achieving isolation from/for the top floor without knowing the trusses baring weight capabilities?
Any particular reason why he wants to use OSB instead of drywall? Kilogram for kilogram, drywal is usually cheaper than OSB, and much easier to work with.As of now the only true plans are to tear down the cabinets and inner drywall. Then add osb between the studs to the inner side of the outer leaf and calk it in
Except for the slight little problem that all of those are on the OUTER leaf, which will be totally covered up by the new INNER leaf.... Electrical is an issue that he will have to deal with. Don't forget that plugs, junction boxes and switches should all be surface-mount, because you do not want to cut holes for those in your drywall, if you can avoid it! As soon as you cut a hole, you destroy the isolation. It is possible to cut holes for boxes, but it complicates the matter greatly, since you then have to put mass around them and seal them up tight again. More expense. Much easier to surface mount.He believes there to be enough electrical outlets already in place but I haven't seen it yet to confirm.
I don't think your friend understands the issue here! He will be sitting inside a small, totally airtight, double-hermetically sealed box, with extremely thick layers of thermal insulation all around. It will be kind of like wrapping his head in a blanket, then putting a plastic bag over it, wrapping that with another blanket and putting a second plastic bag over the whole lot.... A couple of fans is NOT going to do the trick! He MUST have an inlet for fresh air, and an outlet for stale air. They MUST be silenced, and dimensioned correctly to move the right amount of air at the right speed. And in Arizona, I don't see him surviving without an air conditioning unit in there. Maybe if he lived in Antarctica he could get away without one, but Arizona???? I get the impression that your friend has totally unrealistic expectations about this whole thing, to be honest. It sounds like he doesn't think that the laws of physics will apply to him: but they will, of course. Anyway, happy New Year! - Stuart -HVAC will be an issue but this is in Arizona where its hot 11 months out of the year so many oscillating fans and scented air sprays will more than likely be the remedy for that
hahaha not unrealistic goals so much as he knows less about all of this than I do and that's not saying much at all.
Yup no treatment yet and its that small. I'm not positive on the height of the ceiling in there. It may be 7 1/2 - 8 foot. I am going to try to convince him to go with at least a 12x10 room. He likes to kick back and listen to music so I think he may be aprehensive now but will apppreciate the elbow room later on as well as the better sound.That really is small. I don't see him being able to get the speakers positioned far enough apart to give a good stereo image while also staying out of the corners! And that is 6" without any isolation or treatment yet? It will be even smaller by the time it is finished. How high is the ceiling?
Sorry. Perhaps I called it the wrong thing. By sheathing I was refering to the osb on the second story. I agree about it looking funny or ugly. That's the other thing I mentioned to him when he proposed the idea. I was suggesting that if the trusses/joists could bare the weight that drywall on the garage ceiling would be the better route. I understand that weight is weight no matter what side its on.It doesn't matter if you hang it underneath or put it on top: it is still weight, and is still resting on the joists! Just by putting on top instead of underneath does not change the weight! Also, what do you mean by "floor sheathing"? Plus, putting it on top means that the floor in that bedroom will be a couple of inches higher than the floor in the hallway, closet, bathroom, etc.... uncomfortable, and ugly too, if you ask me. He'll be tripping up and down that two-inch step in the doorway, all the time.
That was actually my suggestion. I hadn't looked up prices yet but back when I did remodels I could get 1/2" osb for around $5 a board. I thought it would be better to spray the osb for weatherproofing in case any elements made it through possible cracks in the stucco vs having the drywall take the hit and possibly growing mold. Overkill?Any particular reason why he wants to use OSB instead of drywall? Kilogram for kilogram, drywal is usually cheaper than OSB, and much easier to work with.
Yeah I know he'll have to move the outlets but the fact that he might not need to add another breaker box will save him a fair chunk of money. By surface mounting what do you mean? Any pictures? I had planned on mounting the boxes the normal way and sealing them but if there's a better way I'll definetly have him do that.Except for the slight little problem that all of those are on the OUTER leaf, which will be totally covered up by the new INNER leaf.... Electrical is an issue that he will have to deal with. Don't forget that plugs, junction boxes and switches should all be surface-mount, because you do not want to cut holes for those in your drywall, if you can avoid it! As soon as you cut a hole, you destroy the isolation. It is possible to cut holes for boxes, but it complicates the matter greatly, since you then have to put mass around them and seal them up tight again. More expense. Much easier to surface mount.
I think the best he could do at the moment would be to link into the existing duct work. I've never done that before and don't know much if anything on what to do and what not to do so I hadn't even offered that up as an option at this point. I believe his long term goal would be to have a seperate ac unit for the room but that would take his entire budget. Do they have "gate systems" for duct work. So he could push a button or pull a lever in a different room and it shuts off air flowing into the garage so that while tracking he can shut it off and after tracking or between long breaks he can open the duct work back up. I've seen some threads where they are dealing with the duct work but none of it had applied to a situation that I would be in so none of it stuck in my mind. I know that you want to snake the duct work to eleimenate sound from traveling to and from the room but thats all I can truely remember at the moment. I'll have to search a bit and see if I can find some info on the matter. Happy New Year to you Stuart! Thanks for your help as well.I don't think your friend understands the issue here! He will be sitting inside a small, totally airtight, double-hermetically sealed box, with extremely thick layers of thermal insulation all around. It will be kind of like wrapping his head in a blanket, then putting a plastic bag over it, wrapping that with another blanket and putting a second plastic bag over the whole lot.... A couple of fans is NOT going to do the trick! He MUST have an inlet for fresh air, and an outlet for stale air. They MUST be silenced, and dimensioned correctly to move the right amount of air at the right speed. And in Arizona, I don't see him surviving without an air conditioning unit in there. Maybe if he lived in Antarctica he could get away without one, but Arizona????