Control Room Acoustics Renovation

Hello everybody, I'd like to first introduce myself and give thanks for all the great information I've gathered from this website in the last few months. We here in Richmond, VA have used your information extensively for our live room renovation and I will post some before and after pics later if anyone is interested... Thank you! We are currently attempting to improve the acoustics of our control room after the acquisition and restoration of a new console (Daniel N Flickinger console out of Paragon Recording in Chicago) so I suppose you could call it a rebirth of the studio! Attached will be a series of pictures documenting where the room is right now, and after that is posted I will attempt to show everyone where I am at as far as my plans for the room. Here are the dimensions (i am in the process of attemption a sketchup but It's taking me FOREVER and looking pretty haggard! Floor Dimensions - 17' 4" wide x 19' 4 1/2" deep Ceiling Dimensions - 8' 7" at front wall / 15' 6 1/2" at back wall with a peak 5 feet from the back wall at 16' 10 1/2" Window Dimensions - Large window- 4'x6' opening starting at 3'3" off the floor Small window- 4x3 opening starting at 3'3" FYI N= control room wall LEFT E= control room wall FRONT S= control room wall Right ... -Adrian Olsen

here are the last couple of pictures

Okay ~ CEILING So far I have planned (and started the construction of) acoustic hanger bass traps for both the rear of the ceiling and flanking the blue colored panels already in place of the mix position. The panels will be wrapped in burlap with lights above to maintain a bigness to the room that people seem to like. The goal here is to balance out the bass response of the room. The planned dimensions of the hangers would be half sheets (triangular) of 4x8s with full 4x8s in the back of the room. The hangers would start above the first (eastern) AC vent and continue until the top of the book case. FRONTWALL In addition to the hangers, I want to readdress our front wall. Right now it's basically just a wall of 2" glass with huge rolls of light john mansville insulation back behind it in the corners. I'm thinking we need to redo the speaker stands and actually soffit mount them and then add much more dense amounts of 703 or rockwool (we have a good bit unused from our old live room) in the vertical and horizontal corners as well as the backwall? Maybe hangers here too? Any ideas would be greatly appreciated! SIDEWALLS On the front side walls (where the 'abfusers' are) I was thinking of angling the walls from around where the outside corners of the mains are and having them die into the sidewalls for a more traditional control room shape. this 'false wall' would be two triangular slot resonators that would be symetrical until where the window starts. The rest of the side walls kind of have me miffed and any design ideas here would be great. I suppose I could move the abfusers to the back of the room? BACKWALL The plan here is to build 3 QRDs in replace of the rectangular book shelfs on top of the window, door, and flat piece of wood subbing for a window on the North side of the backwall using 3/4" plywood OTHER I have some material to build 4 17" tube traps (2" glass) for under the nearfield monitor stand (directly behind the console). OK! I think that is more or less where I am right now. I hope this makes sense and PLEASE bring up any holes you see in my logic or things I might be totally missing. Best and many thanks in advance - Adrian

under the hangers i would put some clouds on angles so you can create a wave guide effect and direct LF up into the hangers. definitely restructuring the front wall with proper soffits is a good idea.

Thanks for the response Glenn! When you say angled clouds do you mean angled so that there is more of an opening towards the front wall? I'd try a sketch but I'm out on the road for the next week!

yes

So we got the hangers done and it really focuses the room. We started taking the old false wall in the front down today and got one of the mains out of there and am not totally sure about what to do on the side walls in front of the listening position and also how to pick the best spot for the mains before soffiting them. I guess get them close and listen but it's pretty difficult when they weigh so much!! Any help or feedback would be awesome. -Adrian in Richmond

is it possible to move this thread into a different section of the forums?

i cannot move the thread - but this forum location is OK for this since its about your construction process. on positioning - consider some heavy stands for the speakers and using something like REW to measure the effects of various placement - spread and listening position - understanding that if you are building hard soffits for them that most of it will change (for the better) but at least you can experiment with sweet spot etc.