Redoing Old Studio construction - Port St Joe

My name is David, I recently bought a music store and studio in Port St Joe Florida. I have worked on the construction of some studios before but this one has no simple process of explaining what was done. So it is easier to talk about each wall and how it was seemingly constructed so you would understand what I am processing to make this a better sounding and treated studio. Live Room: Dimensions: 19ft 6" length X 15ft 3" Width X 10ft 2" height Wall #1 - Concrete block with 2' x 4' studs lying flat and home type "pink" insulation with OSB plywood Wall #2 - Big glass 46" x 92" separating the control room - OSB plywood +2' x 4' studs+ pink insulation+ OSB plywood Wall #3 - front of ISO room - Big glass 34" x 92" separating ISO room - OSB plywood +2' x 4' studs+ pink insulation+ OSB plywood Wall #4 - OSB plywood +2' x 4' studs+ pink insulation+ OSB plywood Flooring is carpet on concrete PLAN: Reduce width by 2feet but have a slanted wall with Wall #1 being a resonator wall ( width dimensions would be roughly 11ft on one end and 13ft on other end) Glass would have slight tilt facing floor ( maybe and inch between bottom of glass and top) - size (5ft wide x 4ft high) This wall would be separate from control room wall Wall #3 place Bass trap wall - slanted below glass Depending on time and budget - Place Hardwood flooring wall #4 Absorption panels and diffuser Place Absorption panel in center of ceiling Control Room: Dimensions: 14ft 3" length X 8ft 7" Width X 7ft 6" height Wall #1 - Concrete block with 2' x 4' studs lying flat and home type "pink" insulation with OSB plywood Wall #2 - Big glass 46" x 92" separating the live room - OSB plywood +2' x 4' studs+ pink insulation+ OSB plywood Wall #3 - Carpet on Wall over OSB plywood +2' x 4' studs+ pink insulation+ OSB plywood Wall #4 - OSB plywood +2' x 4' studs+ pink insulation+ OSB plywood with door, 2 washroom style cabinets Analog console was facing the window looking into the live room PLAN: Turn control room width-wise to benefit from the depth of the room The 2ft gained from live room makes the room more manageable Glass slight tilt size (5ft wide by 4ft high) 2 Bass traps in corners with monitors in front Remove cabinets and make 2 bass traps for back wall place foam on door as it would be middle of the room opening OR build movable GOBO Remove built up flooring get an additional 8in. Will try to slant ceiling Walls built would be 5/8 Drywall on 2 x 4 studs with Owen Corning 703 Project has begun and would be finished by End of October 2014. I welcome all suggestions and comments to assist

Have been doing a lot of cleaning out - Former studio owner had a lot of ART and Fostex and Behringer stuff. (No references to the gear being made - just using different gear). I have been looking at the Allen & Heath QU 32 as being the center piece. The building of the 2 walls should be on schedule for later this week. Wall #1 - The live room wall in between the control room is being demolished. I am going to have a slanted wall from 11ft on the wall with the concrete blocks and 13ft on the wall that is the ISO Booth. This would be independent of the wll in the Control room Wall #2 - The Glass would be coming out and I am just going to cut in half which would give me approximately 46" x 46" - that should be plenty of glass to see in the Live room from the control room. I am going to move that wall out 2 ft so the side with the concrete block would be 10.5 ft approximately and the other end of the room would be 8ft 7". I would be setting bass traps in the corners closest to the monitors which would take the usable space back to 8ft 7" if you are understanding what I am trying to do. Always feel free to give me any advice as you see more pictures going up.

Hi David, and Welcome! :) Just some general comments on your post:

Live Room: Dimensions: 19ft 6" length X 15ft 3" Width X 10ft 2" height

That's a nice size, with a decently high ceiling. Lucky you!

Flooring is carpet on concrete

:shock: Ooops! I guess the carpet will be the first thing to go! If the live room was carpeted before, it makes you wonder what else was done wrong...

Reduce width by 2feet but have a slanted wall with Wall #1 being a resonator wall

Is that necessary? Losing 2" of width sounds like a lot. Is there a reason for that? Does the room sound so terrible right now in the mids and highs that you need to sacrifice so much space for slot walls?

Glass would have slight tilt facing floor

What's the reason for doing that? It isn't needed for acoustic, and can actually make isolation worse (reduced air gap = higher MSM resonant frequency). Is the tilt for aesthetic reasons? Glare? Something else? Also, how thick is that glass, and what type of glass is it?

Place Hardwood flooring

:thu: Smart move! As long as there are no air gaps under it: hardwood flooring often does need air cavities. A really good alternative for studios is laminate flooring: that can look almost as good as real hardwood these days: there are some pretty nice looking ones, and the total cost is probably lower than going with true hardwood.

Place Absorption panel in center of ceiling

For a room that size with hard flooring, you'll probably need more than that on the ceiling. I'd suggest several clouds of various thickness at various angles, perhaps some fo them hard-backed.

Control Room: Dimensions: 14ft 3" length X 8ft 7" Width X 7ft 6" height

That's a pretty low ceiling! Do you know the reason for that? Is there any chance you could make it higher? That's also not a very good ratio. In fact, it's pretty bad; it fails two of the three critical tests used by the BBC for deciding if a room can be used as a studio.

Wall #1 - Concrete block with 2' x 4' studs lying flat and home type "pink" insulation with OSB plywood

Are the studs attached to the concrete block? If so, you have a problem... Also, when you say "OSB plywood", do you mean one layer of each? As in one layer of OSB plus one layer of plywood? How thick is each layer?

Wall #3 - Carpet on Wall

:shock: :roll: This sounds very much like it was an "amateur built" place before you took it over! About the only thing missing so far is egg crates on the ceiling... :)

Turn control room width-wise to benefit from the depth of the room

In other words, you will now orient it so that the speakers are firing down the longest axis, and the front of the room will be the shortest wall, correct?

2 Bass traps in corners with monitors in front

have you considered doing proper flush mounting for your speakers (sometimes called "soffit mounting")? That would be the best solution.

Remove built up flooring get an additional 8in.

Excellent! That will also improve the overall isolation.

The 2ft gained from live room makes the room more manageable

Ahhh ! OK, now I get it: when you said you were going to take 2 feet off the LR, I thought that was for the slot walls: now I see it is so you can make the CR wider. That makes sense.

Will try to slant ceiling

I wouldn't do that in your case: the ceiling is already low, and angling it will only make it lower. Even after recovering the 9" from the lousy floor, it's still not enough to justify an angled ceiling, since you won't be able to get enough angle on it to be useful. 12° is what you need (minimum) for flutter echo, and more if you want a true RFZ. You might be able to angle just the front section, but I'd suggest that the best solution is to just hang a hard-backed cloud at an angle. Simpler, less expensive, and still very effective. Comments on the photos:

Difficult to even get a slanted ceiling in control room.

:ahh: Hoo boy! You sure do have your work cut out for you! :shock: I'm very surprised that the framing passed inspection... Oh wow! I'm assuming that is a view from above? If so, it seems like you have lots of space up there to build your new ceiling much higher. And that HVAC duct... :roll: 8) What can I say? What a mess....

Looking at the ISO booth from the Live Room

Only single doors? No threshold seals? And those look like typical "Home depot" style doors, hollow core, no seals, light weight... I'm guessing that there is no isolation at all right now, between rooms. I guess you are planning to change all that, with proper dual doors, back-to-back, all around, heavy, solid core, with double seals all around, including threshold?

Live Room Window.jpg

Gotta love the tiny patch of packing foam above the window! That seems to be the sum total of all acoustic treatment in that room.... and probably about 1% of what the room actually needs. Is that a drop ceiling up there? It sort of looks like it might be. If so, then you probably have even more space above, to make the LR higher.

Former studio owner had a lot of ART and Fostex and Behringer stuff.

... to go along with the carpet, "floated" floor, and unsealed single doors....

I have been looking at the Allen & Heath QU 32 as being the center piece

Nice. So digital snake and digital personal monitoring too?

Wall #1 - The live room wall in between the control room is being demolished. I am going to have a slanted wall from 11ft on the wall with the concrete blocks and 13ft on the wall that is the ISO Booth. This would be independent of the wll in the Control room

It's excellent to have the two sides of the wall independent, but why do you want to splay the wall of the CR? That isn't necessary, and wastes space.

Wall #2 - The Glass would be coming out and I am just going to cut in half which would give me approximately 46" x 46" - that should be plenty of glass to see in the Live room from the control room.

Are you sure you can cut it? Not all glass can be cut. If it is tempered glass or laminate glass, for example, then you cannot cut it. On the other hand, if it is ordinary window glass then it has no business being in a studio in the first place, unless it is very thick!

I would be setting bass traps in the corners closest to the monitors which would take the usable space back to 8ft 7" if you are understanding what I am trying to do.

Not really! :) A diagram would help... - Stuart -

Your suggestions are very helpful. Sorry it has been some time and got caught up in the other areas of the music store and the music lessons. Here are more photos and some of your suggestions incorporated. Check out the pics. I am doing some basic room treatment. My business partner who is not a musician is harping on the fact that the previous owner was making money in the lousy sounding room so why are we putting time in making it sound better.

Looking to finish off the wall and start working on the control room. This is a phase I aspect to control the acoustics. Need as much help as I can get.

Well, it is a standard wall assembly, not decoupled and you have a drop ceiling. Exactly what or where is it that you need help my friend?

My business partner who is not a musician is harping on the fact that the previous owner was making money in the lousy sounding room so why are we putting time in making it sound better.

It is said that the Beatles started out with really lousy sounding, cheap instruments, but bought much better ones after their first few gigs with some of the money they made. One has to wonder where they would be today if they had taken your business partner's attitude, and not bother to upgrade their instruments and equipment because they were already "making money on the lousy sounding instruments"... It is also said that the Beatles put a lot of time into rehearsal, so they could sound better: I wonder where they might have ended up if they followed your business partner's advice, of not bothering to "put time in making it sound better"? Perhaps you should be looking for another business partner, who DOES understand music, and the music industry.

I brought out the wall 2 inches and going to 0 inches at the door.

Why? That's not enough to make any real difference. And as I pointed out, isn't necessary.

I did angle the window very slightly, I always thought that the angle causes the dispersion of sound to not go back to the singer in a straight line.

You thought wrong, and by angling the glass you also reduced the isolation between rooms, so it is now worse than it would have been by keeping the glass straight. Here's why: In other words, by not taking our advice, you have wasted time, made your isolation worse, and not improved room acoustics.

I stuffed R30 Insulation in as tight as I could have gotten them.

Bad idea. By "stuffing it in tightly" you have compressed the insulation, thus making it more dense, and therefore reduced isolation in low frequencies, as well as potentially creating additional flanking paths across the wall cavity, linking the two leaves. Insulation should only be put in place sufficiently to just fill the cavity, and no more. Compression increases density, and more dense insulation has worse damping properties for low frequencies So once again, instead of increasing isolation, you have reduced it.

Acoustic Caulking and ensuring that there are no gaps

Wrong again! I see HUGE gaps in there! You have cut large HOLES in the wall, and then poked some electrical boxes through those holes, which basically means that you have totally eliminated all of the isolation you might have had. So you wasted a lot of time and money on all that caulk, since it is doing nothing at all. Those enormous gaping holes for the electrical boxes totally wreck your isolation. It is a fundamental rule of isolation that there can be NO penetrations of the wall at all, except where the missing mass and isolation has been duly compensated for, using the applicable technique. From the photo it also looks like you built that wall on top of carpet! :shock: Is that correct? It certainly looks like the sole plate is sitting on top of the carpet. If so, then you have lost even more isolation like that, and I'm also very surprised that the framing ever passed inspection if it is resting on carpet! You DID get a building permit before you started, and all the legal inspections along the way, right?

DIY Bass Traps

Plus more gaping holes in the wall, and it looks like you only used 1/2" drywall, and did not mud/tape the joints between drywall panels. There also does not appear to be any sealing around the window glass, there seems to be only one pane of glass in that window with no room for the absolutely necessary second pane, and there appear to be no header or cripple studs above the window. And as Brien pointed out, the wall is just a plain old standard fully-coupled house wall, so it would not have gotten you much isolation anyway (30 dB at best) but by adding all the other things you did wrong, I'd be surprised it it gets much more than about 20 dB isolation! If you would have built it properly, you could have gotten about one thousand times more isolation... Then there's the drop ceiling, which Brien also pointed out... If you want good isolation and good acoustics, I'd suggest that you take that wall down again, and re-build it correctly.

DIY Bass Traps

"Traps"? Plural? I only see one bass trap in there, not more, and it is very small. How did you build it? What is it made of? Where will all the other bass traps go? - Stuart -

Thank you for all the suggestions.... Let me address as many as I can remember... 1. There was only one pane of glass before, I angled it but there is another glass pane in front of the iso booth that is not angled. The angle is slight at best. Now earlier I was going to put up a second wall and I thought you suggested that I only have one wall between the control room and the live room, did I get that incorrect? 2. There is only one bass trap up but the bass traps are going in each corner, both in the live room and the control room. The bass traps have corning 703 and it is 4 x2 sheets that are 2" thick and I use 2 with a canvas-type material that I found in a local store they did not have burlap. 3. The doors are going to have thresholds with seals. 4. I am going to come back to put in laminate flooring but that is later in the process. 5. The ceiling is going to have 4 x 2 absorption panels as recommended. I think that I accounted for 3 on the ceiling that would be hung about 6 inches from the ceiling. The ceiling is not a drop ceiling it is OSB with 1" strips to create a drop ceiling look 6. The walls are not mudded as yet, not is the seal placed around the window as yet. 7. The empty electrical boxes were removed and the insulation is well placed ( Not tight as in cramping). The hole in the wall is for the cords and cables which would be stuffed with foam until we get our digital board and then we would seal the hole as everything would be done through a single cat5 cable. with full personal monitoring and d snakes. 8. I think I have convinced my business partner that this process if ever evolving and we would constantly need to improve the quality of the sound. 9. The city has inspected initially and have come by during the process to ensure we are keeping it to code.

More updates.... Need help as to what to do with the live room wall between iso room - Should I make this a resonator wall? I treated the four corners of the control room with absorption above the door ad right behind the monitor screen on the desk should I treat the ceilings?

I treated the four corners of the control room with absorption above the door ad right behind the monitor screen on the desk should I treat the ceilings?

Probably, but I'd suggest that you do a REW test in the room first, to see how it is doing, then decide on treatment based on that.

Need help as to what to do with the live room wall between iso room - Should I make this a resonator wall?

That's one option, yes. I would tune it as a broad-band device in the mid range, but once again do a "before" and "after" test with REW, to see how effective it is, and check that is is hitting a useful range.

Finished acoustic treatment behind desk...

It doesn't seem to be in the right place. Also, your desk seems to be too close to the wall: How are you going to get your speaker stands in there, between the desk and the wall? - Stuart -