Drum room: Isolation improvement?

Id add seals to both doors. I was just wondering if the benefits of the double room were enough on their own with a 1 solid door that a 2nd regular door would just be icing on the cake

NO! Andre

agree, add a pair of proper doors if you're going to do it. do it right. adding another door with poor acoustic performance could actually hurt your isolation value. you might just start with one good door and then add a second later if you needed it. on the air space question, if you have 2x4 walls, then if the drywall is on the outside of the exterior wall (beefing up not withstanding) and on the inside of the inner wall, then a1" (25mm) air gap is roughly 8" (200mm) which would be decent.

thanks Glenn, thats what I had calculated as well. And yes, right off the bat I would probably only have 1 new solid door, and replace the other one later when I had some spare cash kicking around. This may be the sort of project I complete in stages rather than all at once. Im trying to get in touch with an old neighbor of mine who is a general contractor to get a sense of price and time, materials, etc. Is it unreasonable to assume a metal/wood frame is something I could build on my own? I know drywalling takes at least 2 people, as I dont have access to one of the drywall panel lifters.

if you have someone who knows what they're doing to help, then no reason for you to not participate.

Well again... the finger thing means the taxes. If i have to pay someone to come in and do the work, even if im helping, that just eats into the overall budget. fyi, the tax thing was a Simpsons joke :o

then again, if you don't know what your doing and then have to pay someone to come in and fix it, then you'll pay for it twice. (that's a "do it right the first time" thing...) :idea:

indeed. well, i have time to research hot to build a drywall frame. i was thinking over the weekend, since IDEALY i dont drill the bottom plates into the hardwood floor to secure them, what if i were to use some sort of rubber spacers between the old bottom plate and new bottom plate. i know you dont want the new inner wall connected to the old in anyway, but in Rod's book, I think i saw quite a few times that he would use things to fill gaps and improve isolation. if i were to use some rubber spacers, it would be like when you lay tile and use those little white crosses to make sure the tiles stay correctly spaced between eachother, except in my case they would be there to ensure the new room doesnt slide around if someone decided to body check the wall or something. they would create a tight fit all the way around without needed to do any destructive bolting down. heres an image quick doodle... ...the rubber blocks/shims would keep the new structure from moving around, and in my mind, would dampen vibration trasfer between structures as rubber is not solid like wood or metal (substitute rubber with another more appropriate material if anyone has a suggestion). good idea or bad idea?

use isolation clips - WIC, RISC, etc are used to securely tie the walls together and are also decoupled. having rubber pucks laying around would not be a safe option without some way to secure them and then you have to wonder if they will be effective.

Glenn gave the right answer. The rubber pucks will connect the leafs, creating sound paths. Andre

i would think resilient channel which is solid metal would do alot more to connect the leafs than a few rubber shims. idealy im not putting anything in there and having it 100% isolated. i still feel the weight of the new walls, drywall, etc, will be more than enough to hold the room in place. some rubber lining under each base plate would probably help with sealing the air gap, and would also help keep those plates from ever sliding over the smooth wood. though, id rather bite the bullet and put some anchors into the base plate through the hardwood floors and face the task of patching them if i ever took the room down, than add the expense of RISC and creating a connection between both structures.

We seem to be diverging. To hold the walls in place without creating flanking paths, use Kinetics Noise KWSBs, Mason Industries DNSBs, or similar. With a double stud wall, resilient channel may make isoaltion worse. Andre

both those products use some sort of rubber, or firm yet pliant material to decouple the walls. so whats the difference between that and what i suggested besides the fact that these are manufactured products? they also seem pretty sizeable and if i use them they're going to eat into the limited space and close the walls in even further. and just to clarify my sketch above, these were just rubber shims on the floor to keep the base plates snug in all directions. they wouldnt continue up the wall towards the ceiling.

the difference is they are engineered products which support a given structure and have proven isolation. the Kinetics version of the WIC (Mason Industries) has a lighter weight rating than WIC.

but im not trying to support any load, its just to keep the base from moving sliding around on the floor.

Use caulk on the floor or an UNBROKEN piece of what ever you use, caulk is better and unbroken is ideal.

thanks Brien, but could you clarify that a bit? i was planning on caulking all seams around the new room, but what do you mean by an unbroken piece of whatever i use?

both those products use some sort of rubber, or firm yet pliant material to decouple the walls. so whats the difference between that and what i suggested besides the fact that these are manufactured products? they also seem pretty sizeable and if i use them they're going to eat into the limited space and close the walls in even further.

Yup. That's because they are specifically designed to do the job. They didn't just take a wild guess and hope that the rubber they use might sorta kinda help to do the job. Instead, they followed science, math and acoustics, designed, tested, modified, tested, modified, etc. until they got it right. They carefully studied the resilience and deflection and dimensions of numerous different types of rubber compounds, to come up with the perfect type that deflects by the optimum amount when optimally loaded in order to isolate correctly, while still being able to safely support the mass under all conceivable live and dead loads, stresses, tensions and sheer. Did you do that with your pucks? That's the difference between their design and your design: They actually do understand acoustics, vibration and construction... :)

i would think resilient channel which is solid metal would do alot more to connect the leafs than a few rubber shims.

And you would be wrong! :) Resilient channel is not "solid metal". It is specially designed to be "resilient" as far as sound-induced vibration on drywall is concerned. It only looks solid to you because you are not a sound wave traveling in drywall! If you were a sound wave traveling in drywall, then the RC would look pretty soft, mushy and springy.

i still feel the weight of the new walls, drywall, etc, will be more than enough to...

What you "feel" and what has actually been tested by experts in acoustic laboratories to work safely, are most likely two entirely different things... :) - Stuart -

Eikon wrote:

both those products use some sort of rubber, or firm yet pliant material to decouple the walls. so whats the difference between that and what i suggested besides the fact that these are manufactured products?

For your consideration. Drums and barrels are both round. Why can't I use barrels instead of DK Fearn drums? :shot: That smily fit perfectly. :yahoo: Andre

Eikon wrote:

thanks Brien, but could you clarify that a bit? i was planning on caulking all seams around the new room, but what do you mean by an unbroken piece of whatever i use?

Anything that you use to support the wall in an effort to "decouple", unless it is an unbroken, contiguous piece will have no benefit since it will have air gaps between the piece, or pucks. There is no data to support if a supposed decoupled framed wall will work in a better way than if it rests on a heavy concrete slab. I recognize that it is said around here, do this and do not do that, but in the end you will find that what was said to not do 12 years ago, no one is having an issue with these days. Still, no data...only applied use and acceptable expectations with little to no testing :)

thanks for the responses guys. stuart, i know they didnt just willy nilly pick "compound x" out of a hat and say this is what we will build our products out of. but theyr also aiming their products at a market that demands perfection to make things like recording studios possible. i am definitely not that market. andre, iv seen some pretty good drummers using buckets... they seem to do alrite :wink: so how bout this, since this will make life easier... i will go ahead with the plan that i will be anchoring the base plates of the new walls to the floor (if the day ever comes that i need to patch the hardwood, ill deal with it then). then theres no need to discuss hockey pucks vs. acoustic pucks, and my walls will not slide over the floor, and we will all live happily ever after!! :lol:

i was at Home Depot pricing out building materials. I've calculated about $1300 for all the lumber and 2 layers or drywall, 2 doors, 4 pot lights and housing boxes, and 10 tubes of acousti-seal. I know there will be other costs, but that was my starting estimate. then it occured to me... do I realy want to be installing potlights in the ceiling? i think if i create 4 holes in the ceiling, thats probably not good unless they're properly sealed. currently the room is wired to have the light switch activate a wall outlet and lamp, it doesnt turn on an overhead light. so i guess it makes more sense to keep that setup and just use a few lamps in the corners, or build one of those suspended combo units thats lights and absorber panels that hangs from the ceiling. though from a cost and weight standpoint, i dont like that idea. any thoughts or suggestions on that? is it easy enough to seal up the gaps that would be created by potlights? should i just build in 1 standard overhead junction box and then perhaps do track lighting (add lots of lights but with only 1 hole), or just go with the lamps?

"I know there will be other costs, but that was my starting estimate." Misc. fasteners, clavos, screws...your looking @ 100 additional bucks if you have not added that into your material list.

i did brien, thanks. i actualy factored $150 (20% is the safe estamate) for other things and misc costs.

track lights or ceiling mounted LED lights.

I definitely would not cut holes in your ceiling, if isolation is important to you. Yes, you could seal up the holes, and perhaps get it right, but why make your life difficult?