Chris Garage Studio - Design Phase

Hi, Firstly and foremost, THANK YOU John for this website and for what you do. I've been lurking these forums for about two years trying to absorb as much as I can to formulate a plan to build a place to call my own. (I'm still learning and still pretty dense when it comes to things like modes and nodes.) Background None. I am not construction or electrically or acoustically inclined. (I do have an HVAC friend) Goal My goal is to be able to have a room that will accommodate tracking, mixing, and jamming (3-5 people) while also using the room for my daytime office job. I would like to get enough sound isolation to be able to jam/record and also have my room be acoustically optimized to the fullest posible extent (given my limitations). How Loud Most of the time I won’t go above 90db. Fairly quiet street save for the occasional souped-up Honda muffler going by every so often. I am indirectly above a flight path with the PDX airport 10 miles away. The house 2 two story with attic, garage is bottom floor. Not as much worried about sound getting in as the sound that would get out and disturb the neighbors as their garage is 10-12 ft from the outside of west my garage wall. Budget $2000 initially, but we all know how that goes. I have a tight budget right now. I already have the heat pump. Plan Floor space is limited so I am going to do John’s Inside-out walls with 2 layers of sheetrock and green glue in between. Wood frame will be on neoprene on concrete. Layout is the way it is because I need to have the water heater/furnace path clear and also cannot block the electric panel. Run HVAC from the Heat pump and tie in to the house’s air return, use silencers, etc. (more on that later) Questions Will the closet/booth in the design significantly affect the isolation to the outside. Is there going to be a third-leaf thing going on? I don’t want to go to the effort of totally decoupling it so if it’s going to be a Hugh factor, then it can go.

The closet, as a coupling factor, will depend on what kind of noise it will encounter from the exterior for me to consider if it should go or not. I would make it go away or break it loose completely. Then there is your room geometry. You want the room to open up to your back, to be able to let the lower frequencies develop and then make attempt to trap them. As it is now, yours is backwards :) No big thing really, swap it end for end and then take a look and see what kind of issues you run into.

xSpace wrote:

You want the room to open up to your back, to be able to let the lower frequencies develop

Shoot, in all the designs that i've looked at on this site and others, that never ocurred to me. Went back and looked and sure enough, every Good design has the splayed walls opening to the back. I'll chage that tomorrow. Course now the closet will definitley have to go (sigh). Thanks, -Chris

In your current design the closet may be an issue but once you flip it over, ya never know :)

Okay, I swapped everything around. On the Soffit should I go ahead and have a center wall/face (pictured in red) parallel to the back wall? If so what length? My soffits are at 30 degrees, and 4ft 2.25in in length. Thanks, -Chris

Update: Lost the closet/booth :cry: and put and center on the soffit. Thanks, -Chris

Another question, in the rear of the room I was first thinking of puting in hangers in the corners. Now I am re-thinking that idea and that there isn't enough room for the bass hangers to be effective and maybe i'll go the super chunk route. The area in the corners are 217.88 Inches squared. Thanks, -Chris

I just re-read the Hangers sticky again (i need a flow chart for all this stuff). http://www.johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=12365 I am going to go with hangers instead of super chucks in the corners. -Chris

New screen shots with hangers. Thanks, - Chris

I am thinking about putting a cloud over the mixing desk and am not sure exactally how to go about it. so far i've come up with an trapezoid shaped cloud that will contour the soffit fact and slope up a 20 degrees. I put 4 inches of 703 in the cavety, but should I add plywood to the back of the cloud (closest to the ceiling)?

A couple of things to really send you over the edge: http://www.gearslutz.com/board/bass-tra ... stion.html http://www.whealy.com/acoustics/Porous.html It doesn't answer your question about the hard back, but may allow you to get some information that you had not considered yet. Required reading... http://johnlsayers.com/Recmanual/Titles/Acoustics2.htm

Space that was alot for me to chew on, thank you. I am going to table the cloud idea until i can get an RTA in my room and see how it responds at what frqs. Next up...Ceilings! I am going back and forth between putting the layers of sheetrock on the inside or the outside of my room. If I put them on the inside i am definitly going to want to have a cloud on the ceiling to avoid the floor/ceiling parallel issues. If I put them on the out side I will have a cloth face over my joists with insulation in them. If I do end up putting a cloud with the sheetrock on the outside I worry about it being to dead in the room. Walls... Just a note for me, I was considering putting 2x6's as wall frames but scratched that idea after reading some data on the John Manville website, and it looks like there's not much to be gained from using 2x6 over 2x4. 3 5/8" (92mm) stud walls 3 5/8" (92mm) batts Type X Gyp One Layers 5/8" Gyp, Both sides - STC 50 6" (152mm) stud walls 6 1/2" (165mm) batts Type X Gyp One Layers 5/8" Gyp, Both sides - STC 51 I'll be using 5/8" and 1/2" gyp with greenglue in the middle. -Chris

Here's the electrical plan. I havent totally decided if i am going to go track or recessed lighting. I have 8ft ceilings so i'd like to go recessed. Either way, i think i am going to bite the bullet and get LED.

i'd like to go recessed.

How are you going to install recessed lighting without cutting any holes in your ceiling???? (If you cut holes, you wreck your isolation...) - Stuart -

Ah, Stuart you are right. I don't know why i was too blind to see that. So the only way I can do recessed lighting is if i decide to put in a large cloud and incorporate the lights into that. I think track lighting might be the way to go. Thanks, -Chris

People have built boxes to allow for the recessed cans. The trick is you have to get the space that the manufacturer suggests in order to do this and have it work in your favor. That would be something you would need to know first, in order to see if you can comply with your ceiling height and whatever other restrictions you may encounter.

Rod, looking at a post you made on another site for someone else is confusing me.

Rod wrote:

...you are much better off with 2 x 6 inner walls (24" oc) because they give better sound isolation at lower frequencies than 2x4 construction (@ 16" oc.)

I thought there wasn't too much to gain by using 2x6 over 2x4 construction, but you're saying 2x6 will help mostly the lower end. My room is small 14'x9'x8' Should I switch my frame from 2x4 (16" oc) to 2x6 (24" oc)? Thanks, -Chris

I thought there wasn't too much to gain by using 2x6 over 2x4 construction, but you're saying 2x6 will help mostly the lower end.

There is something to be gained, and it will help. - Stuart -

Stuart wrote:

There is something to be gained, and it will help.

Right. but if I am only going to gain 0.38db (that is not a real figure) of TL is it WORTH it for me to go to 2x6? I am just asking the experts here because i am anything but an expert. Thanks, -Chris

Chris - it's going to increase your stud cubic feet by around 22% - run a costing on it.

John, I seem to recall Rod saying that it going from 2x4 16 O.C. to 2x6 24 O.C. hardly changes the total amount of lumber at all (except for some extra in the top and bottom plates) since even thou you are using bigger studs, you use fewer of them as they are spaced further apart. I didn't realize that the bigger top and bottom plates would add up to 22% more lumber. You live and you learn. So I guess the question is: cost/benefit! Is that 22% extra stud cost significant in the entire build cost, when compared to the extra isolation that you gain? - Stuart -

Stuart - I just ran a simple spreadsheet on a 4m long wall and compared the cubic meter result. - 0.15m3 v 0.18m3 with a single top plate.

blaumph2cool wrote:

Rod, looking at a post you made on another site for someone else is confusing me.

Rod wrote:

...you are much better off with 2 x 6 inner walls (24" oc) because they give better sound isolation at lower frequencies than 2x4 construction (@ 16" oc.)

I thought there wasn't too much to gain by using 2x6 over 2x4 construction, but you're saying 2x6 will help mostly the lower end. My room is small 14'x9'x8' Should I switch my frame from 2x4 (16" oc) to 2x6 (24" oc)? Thanks, -Chris

The post I responded to had to do with recessed can lighting and now I am getting called by a different name.

Haha sorry space, I kinda took a sharp turn because of a thread I saw Rod post in over on RO regarding 2x6 wall frames.

I suspect that Rod would have appreciated if you had made that post @recording.org in direct connection with whatever he was responding to. I know it was confusing to me...