Outhouse attic controlroom and studio/rehearsal room

Hi! I'm planning a small homestudio in my outhouse attic where there will be a controlroom, a live/rehearsal room and a vocal booth. I've been reading through alot av posts here and studied Johns plans and theories etc etc. I have tried to make out the most of my available space. The controlroom is optimized regarding listening position (38% of length) and I've raytraced my *** off:) The outhouse is 4,5 x 9,65 m and the angled ceiling is 2,1 m high in the horizontal part. The lenght of my controlroom is restricted by the hight of my monitors and the width has been adapted to the placement of the doors. The walls and roof will be built like this from outside in: Wood panel / tin roof Insulation 120 mm Diffusiontight plastic Drywall 13 mm which I will caulk. Airgap 30 mm Insulation 70 mm Molton cloth Slats The controlroom and liveroom will be seperated with an airgap between the insideout walls. Since I live in the countryside I don't have to worry so much about disturbing anyone, except my wife. i'm building it myself in my sparetime with a small budget so it will take some time to finish. I will mostly record drums, guitars, bass and vocals. Rock stuff. And finally some questions: 1. Does the woodpanel count as a leaf? It's not an airtight layer. 2. Is it ok to put insulation in the back of an resonator? I don't have to but I'm curious. I'm thinking about the slat resonators on the sides in the front of the controlroom. 3. I've planned to put hangers in the space left before the front wall of the controlroom. Will these do any good or are they unnessecary? There will also be hangers in the space left in the top of the ceiling. Check out the section plan. Please check out my plans and let me know what you think. Any suggestions are welcome. The sketchup file was too big to attach so pm me if you want it. Hopefully I've managed to fulfill the rules for posting:)

Hi "hellviz", and welcome to the forum! :) One thing I would be concerned about with that orientation of the control room, is the steeply angled ceiling both in front of you and behind you. I get the impression that that would create serious problems with reflections, and cause many complex artifacts. I'm thinking it would be better to rotate the control room 90° anti-clockwise, so that it is facing the live room. That would be put the ceiling angles on each side of you, symmetrically, but leaving the front-to-back ceiling flat and level, with no major artifacts coming off it. That would also allow you to make the control room longer, if you wanted to, or wider, or both, and it would solve the problem with your speaker height too. I think it just makes a lot more sense to do that. The acoustics with the way you have it oriented now, would be very complex to predict, very hard to understand, and even harder to treat.

Since I live in the countryside I don't have to worry so much about disturbing anyone, except my wife.

OK, but what about outside sounds disturbing YOU? Wind, rain, hail, airplanes and helicopters flying over, cars arriving / leaving, roads / railways nearby, animals, neighbors, phones ringing, TV, radio, vacuum cleaner, washing machine, water running, toilet flushing, doors opening / closing, and many many other things. All of those could be a problem.

1. Does the woodpanel count as a leaf? It's not an airtight layer.

Yes, it still counts as a leaf. It does not need to be sealed, in order to act as a leaf.

2. Is it ok to put insulation in the back of an resonator? I don't have to but I'm curious. I'm thinking about the slat resonators on the sides in the front of the controlroom.

You HAVE to put insulation in them! Right behind the slats you put some black cloth, and right behind that you put insulation. If you don't have insulation in there, then there is nothing to damp the resonance, and that's what the slot wall is there for: to remove energy at certain frequencies, by damping the resonance.

3. I've planned to put hangers in the space left before the front wall of the controlroom. Will these do any good or are they unnessecary? There will also be hangers in the space left in the top of the ceiling. Check out the section plan.

The way you show them there, they would not be much use, as they are inside the wall cavity. But there might be a way to arrange things so that you could use that "lost" space for bass trapping. It seems a shame to have it there and not be able to use it! On the other hand, if you rotate your room as I outlined above, it would be much easier to use those spaces.

Hopefully I've managed to fulfill the rules for posting

You sure did! :) :yahoo: - Stuart -

Hi Stuart and thank you so much for your reply! I'm very greatful for your input! The first thing I considered when I started planning my studio was the placement of the control room. I tried several different placements and shapes. In the end I decided to go for this version for these reasons: 1. If I turn the room 90 degrees I get less room left for my rehearsal/live area. 2. If I place it facing the live room it gets harder to squeeze by the consol to get to the chair. If I place it facing the window I won't be able to have visual contact with the live room. (I've planned to put a window in the control room later on that's not in the sketches yet). 3. I've seen two John Sayer designs placed like this. One is Ellamy and the other is Scott Whiteheads mastering room. The latter looks very much like my ceiling but I've chosen a wall layout closer to Ellamy. I figured if it works for John why shouldn't it work for me:) But otherwise I think you're right and I would have chosen that layout if it was only the acoustics I had to consider. Here's some old layouts

OK, but what about outside sounds disturbing YOU? Wind, rain, hail, airplanes and helicopters flying over, cars arriving / leaving, roads / railways nearby, animals, neighbors, phones ringing, TV, radio, vacuum cleaner, washing machine, water running, toilet flushing, doors opening / closing, and many many other things. All of those could be a problem.

It's VERY silent around here so that's not a problem. And the outhouse is not connected to our house.

Yes, it still counts as a leaf. It does not need to be sealed, in order to act as a leaf.

Ok, great!

You HAVE to put insulation in them! Right behind the slats you put some black cloth, and right behind that you put insulation. If you don't have insulation in there, then there is nothing to damp the resonance, and that's what the slot wall is there for: to remove energy at certain frequencies, by damping the resonance.

Ok, I meant in the back of the resonator. If you look at my sketchup model you can see what I mean. I have put insulation both right behind the cloth an in the back against the drywall. I just want to know if it make things better or worse:)

The way you show them there, they would not be much use, as they are inside the wall cavity. But there might be a way to arrange things so that you could use that "lost" space for bass trapping. It seems a shame to have it there and not be able to use it! On the other hand, if you rotate your room as I outlined above, it would be much easier to use those spaces.

Ah ok, I was thinking that basswaves would pass right through the front wall but if I get you right they won't do any good for the room?

You sure did!

Great :mrgreen: And a new question; Is molton cloth a good choise? I thought it would be good since it's allready "flamesecure". /Henrik