House built around studio design/build thread

Gregwor wrote:

Sorry about the lack of updates guys! I didn't have internet for 3 weeks once we moved into our new place. I've spent all of my time installing appliances, mirrors, moving, running central vac (so that it wouldn't interfere with my studio areas), installing 240v electrical out to my garage to run my tools, removing a bunch of crap the builders put in that needed to be ripped out, installing a low handrail to the basement for my kids to hold on to, worked for 19 days straight and looked after my kids. It's been busy and productive, but over the last few days I've actually been able to work on my stuff. I have squeezed in some SketchUp time, but nothing post-worthy yet. Basically, I did some modifications now that I have the ability to check exact measurements in the basement. Also, I bought 3 different caulks to try out. I made some progress sealing the subfloor above and luckily, I found some cheap caulk that works well for what I need. For anyone interested, it is DAP Dynaflex 230. It has a lot of bad reviews for outdoor use, but for me inside, it applies clean and easy, dries pretty fast and remains nice and flexible. Also, since it's a small tube, it is way easier on the wrist than the Green Glue stuff. I also bought 30 sheets of drywall and 10 sheets of 1/2" MDF for my outer leaf ceiling beef up and seal. I took a good chunk of time to get my table saw all set up and true with the extension wing. Yesterday I took out 3 lengths of shorter LVL stud to sell to my buddy and bought one long length. My needs changed after the house rough ins happened. Unfortunately during the LVL moving, my brother and I had my basement door off (hollow core, but still pretty heavy) and leaned up. It was sturdy. My daughter went in behind it and pushed it over on top of my boy. His head put a hole in the door and it cut his forehead. There was blood everywhere. So I spent the entire evening in the hospital getting him stitches. I feel horrible about it. From now on I'm going to be a lot more cautious about where and how I store supplies. Luckily my wife wasn't too upset. I'm just thankful it was as minor as it was. Anyway, you can see that I've been working hard. I'll hopefully have more progress to share soon (30 joist spaces is overwhelming though!). Greg

Congrats on the move! It sounds like you've been really busy! Hopefully you can see some good results from all that hard work in the house. I look forward to seeing your progress with the build as you move forward Greg!

"where to put smoke detectors"

For the smoke detectors, make sure you get ones that can be wired as "interconnected". Meaning, when one goes off, they all go off. I'm pretty sure that they are required for new home construction anyway, but in case you were going to purchase/install them yourself, just make sure they are interconnected.

Quick update with pics. 99% caulked the entire ceiling. 60% snipped/grinded off protruding nails/screws. Around 25% of ceiling has drywall mounted on it. 3% of that drywall is caulked. My help is leaving tomorrow so I'm not sure how much more I'm going to be able to get up by myself. I might have to work on the design more which isn't a bad thing. Once this ceiling is all done, I can't really move forward without permits anyway. Here are some pics: Greg

Very nice Greg! I really like those "cleats" on the ceiling, must have been a hassle to cut them out to sit over the batten though! Is that plastic over the walls part of the inner leaf acoustic treatment to reflect highs? Or just to keep the fluffy in place and is inside the cavity? I look forward to some more pics!

Very nice Greg! I really like those "cleats" on the ceiling, must have been a hassle to cut them out to sit over the batten though!

Thanks Dan! The cleats were actually a breeze to make. I dug through the garbage bins around my neighborhood and found 2x4 cut offs from the framers building new homes. I just measured everything and left an 1/8" extra to allow the cleat to apply pressure to the drywall. After that, I set my table saw and made the one cut on a bunch of pieces, flipped it 90 degrees, set my saw and made the next cut on all of the pieces. After that, I set my saw to 3" and cut them all to that length. The longest part was drilling the screw holes. Using the strips of wood I'd cut out, I screwed together a little jig that allowed me to drill the holes very quickly. Damned near didn't let my finger off the trigger on the drill the whole time! It didn't take very long to make ~60 of them. 60 of them was only enough for like 20% of what I need though :-S I should mention that it took me 3 revisions to get a perfectly working cleat though. At first I tried some angled ones but they weren't strong enough. Here is that version 1: Sadly, they didn't work good.

Is that plastic over the walls part of the inner leaf acoustic treatment to reflect highs? Or just to keep the fluffy in place and is inside the cavity?

So that wall is actually the frost wall the home builder put up. There is a chunk of that wall coming down in order to widen the front portion of my control room (where the soffit wing on my right with be). Otherwise I'm leaving it. That plastic is the vapour barrier and I will be ripping it down and placing it on my inner leaf. Depending on whether the wall is an inside out design or not (I have a combination of both), the barrier will be in a different spot. Greg

Any more updates Greg? How's your ceiling going? Dan

Hi Dan, Thanks for the interest. I have a lot of the drywall up on the ceiling and everything is caulked. I need to move the cleats and fill those areas with caulk next. It's a lot of area to do so it's taking a long time. I'm not sure if it's due to extreme amounts of caulking and drywall cutting but I've injured both wrists/hands. I wear wrist braces for most of the day and of course throughout the night. The pain feels like which you hit your funny bone or a sprain. I have another doctors appointment and tomorrow I'm going to reach out to an acupuncture specialist. Having said that, I can't do much of anything for design work or construction. I can't even hold my steering wheel properly when driving. I will continue to slug away, but for a while, it's going to be a lot slower than I'd like it to be. Greg

It's been about a month since my last update. I just wanted to write and say that I have been working my butt off on the build. I'm close to being done the drywall beef up portion of the ceiling. I've also started insulating the areas where I'll be boxing mechanical in with MDF. I've re-routed a bunch of water and electrical lines to prep for this stage. Lots of time has been spent on tedious little things like removing or hammering in literally thousands of little stapes and things like that. I've modified a table into a nice out feed table for my table saw so I can cut the MDF easy. Lastly, I've been making a plan of attack for applying epoxy to the concrete. That includes what I'll use to grind the concrete. What to use and how to apply the epoxy. How I can lift my LVL stud off the floor to get it out of the way. One bit of bad news. One of my 2.5" diameter lengths of conduit that will have 120V run through it has water in it. I'm honestly not entirely sure how or why. I haven't removed the water yet to see if it is clean or dirty water or urine haha Maybe the concrete guys thought it was a drain and poured water in it. That, or I screwed up and didn't glue it perfectly. The strange thing is that when we dug the clay to install the conduit, it was very dry. Soooooo Hope you all had an awesome holiday season. I look forward to sharing some progress pictures with you. Greg

I've got my final little pieces of drywall cut and ready to install. Today my parents dropped off some power tools for me that my uncle indefinitely is lending me. It's a small old 6" jointer and a fairly new Dewalt 13" planer. I had to change the power cord end on the jointer out for a 20A 220v end instead of the old 50A one but both units seem to work well. The tables on the jointer seem nice and straight. I think I just need to clean up the tables, replace the blades and do a tedious set up on it. The planer seems to work well as is! Nothing better than free working tools! Here's a pic of my main wood working equipment now: Also, the power amp I'll be driving my main speakers with had a noisy fan. The fan sounded like it went full speed as soon as I turned the amp on. Not good considering the amp will live in my control room with me. So, I tore it apart and found that one of the 4 thermal switches is faulty. Also, a resistor in an unrelated part of the circuit looks fried. So, I have the parts on order: That's it for now. Greg

I've been too tired feeling to post regular updates. I am basically done with drywall on the ceiling minus the joist spaces at either end of the room which will require some major work cutting up the frost wall. I'm debating leaving that until I get the building permit as it is more serious. I've removed the rest of the rebar that was sticking out of the concrete (used to hold the conduit in place well during the concrete pour) minus 2. I sealed any spots in the subfloor where I am afraid water could get through if there was a major spill or leak on the main floor. I'm referring to spots where I will box MDF around things like water lines or sewer pipe, or duct. I moved some things slightly like water lines to make it easier to box in and also moved the temporary lights. Speaking of boxing things in with 1" MDF, my buddy Darren needs to build his silencer boxes asap and I'm at the boxing in stage. So, we bought two full truck loads of 1" MDF. It is quite a bit more expensive ($58/sheet) than Home Depot type prices, but it's the only place that carries heavy 1" MDF and I justified the extra price versus the headache of trying to glue together two sheets of 1/2"! This is almost 4000 pounds of MDF here: I started installing some insulation, and near the end of 2018, I called and solidified an insulation quote they'd honour for the month of January. There was a crazy insulation price increase (like 20% or something) that started Jan 1 so I thought it would be smart to buy it now and save hundreds of dollars. I figured out how much insulation I'd need in my MSM cavities and I called upon my friend Darren to come with me and use his small trailer to get it. It was a 1.5 hour round trip to get it from the cheap place. 35 bags of OC R24 tightly packed into 7 sleeves meant I could fit 3 in my truck and 4 on his trailer. We checked the load a few times but for the most part it was highway type driving so it seemed good. We hit my city and after 10 minutes some guy pulled up beside us and make some gestures suggesting to check our load. We were about 5 minutes from my house and had to remove some sleeves and disconnect the trailer. The trailer tongue was bent very badly leaving the A frame about 1cm off the ground! It was interesting but we eventually got everything home. Darren had to leave quickly so I didn't have any help to stack the sleeves any higher than two high that I could do myself. If you look at what two sleeves in front of his trailer axle did to his trailer, you'll imagine how heavy each sleeve is. I'm hoping to get at least 3 high so I have room in my garage. I wish I didn't have to stock pile this much insulation but I needed to buy it while it was cheap. After my ceiling is done, I'm going to do my floor epoxy. So I moved the LVL over to where I will hoist it up off the floor. I should have done this a while ago as it is so much easier to get around with my ladders! I can't wait to get the epoxy done so I can chop off the tops of the conduit! What has taken up a LOT of my time is refurbishing the jointer and planer from my uncle. I literally tore jointer apart completely and cleaned/fixed everything up on it. Lubed and installed new knives on it. It took a couple little squares cut off of a Coca-Cola can to get the tables perfectly coplanar, but it works perfectly now! The planer took at lot of scrubbing and lubing, but after a set of new knives, it took works perfectly. Both machines spit out wood with a glass like finish! I just wish I had a dust collector. But I'm not going to waste money on one. I've been hunting for some 1" stock to make my diffuser out of. I could make it out of MDF for "cheap" but it might look cheap. I'm already going to cheap out and use painted MDF for a lot of my finishes. So, I think I've decided to pay the big bucks and build the diffuser out of maple. I wish I was making more progress but I just can't seem to keep up with work and when I'm not working, I'm hanging out with my kids. I'm feeling tied down with life but I'm still very inspired and excited about how things are shaping up. Greg

Hi Greg, Thanks for the update man! It's looking really good. I understand how life gets in the way of building. It seems the longer a studio takes to build the more fatigue sets in. Would be great to see your progress in detail. Especially when it comes to treatments. Dan

Here is my ceiling so far: As you can see, I've finished a good chunk of the ceiling insulation. The 14" deep joist spaces are filled with R24 except the middle layer of 5 1/2" insulation is in strips which equal roughly a 3rd of if it were completely filled. Avoiding 100% filled cavities will save me a lot of money in the long run. Having the full batt on the top and bottom to dampen the subfloor above and my inner leaf ceiling sheathing will be great. This depth works out pretty much perfectly as I have a 2" distance between the bottom of the joists and my ceiling modules. So if you look closer at the picture you'll see that I'm leaving a few inches of insulation hanging. I have placed the 1" MDF between the joists but haven't fixed them to the joists yet. Thank goodness I didn't get that far. I'm an idiot and just realized that the joists are made with 3/8" OSB so they need to be beefed up as well :-( That means that I have to dig out MORE bloody spray foam nightmare crap too. I'm going to beef it up with 3/4" MDF. So that's the next thing on my list to do! Greg

I haven't done much on my personal build lately as I've been helping my buddy Darren with his design and build as well as working way way too much. I was inspired by another thread on the forum to change my 5 module diffuser to a 7. Of course I made sure that the distance from the front of it to my head was far enough away. It led to some other improvements in my design as well so I'm glad I tackled it. I could change my mind, but I think I'm going to build it out of maple. I also ripped all of the strips of 3/4" MDF I'll be using to beef up the vertical parts of my joists. I dry fit it to make sure that it will work. The 1" horizontal "boxing in MDF" will slide underneath the 3/4" vertical beef up MDF. As you can see, there are some other details I need to build and solidify for this dumb part of the build. I think I have it all figured out though. I'll need some assistance doing this so until then. . . That's all for now. Greg

Gregwor wrote:

I haven't done much on my personal build lately as I've been helping my buddy Darren with his design and build as well as working way way too much. I was inspired by another thread on the forum to change my 5 module diffuser to a 7. Of course I made sure that the distance from the front of it to my head was far enough away. It led to some other improvements in my design as well so I'm glad I tackled it. I could change my mind, but I think I'm going to build it out of maple.

Not preserved: 7 Module Diffuser Small.jpg

I also ripped all of the strips of 3/4" MDF I'll be using to beef up the vertical parts of my joists.

Not preserved: I Joist 0.75 Inch Beef Up.jpeg

I dry fit it to make sure that it will work. The 1" horizontal "boxing in MDF" will slide underneath the 3/4" vertical beef up MDF. As you can see, there are some other details I need to build and solidify for this dumb part of the build. I think I have it all figured out though. I'll need some assistance doing this so until then. . .

Not preserved: Dry Fit.jpeg

That's all for now. Greg

Looking good Greg. What frequencies you targeting with your diffuser? Is it fractal? The mdf looks like one of those boring but necessary jobs. Hopefully you'll get some help soon. I'm going to be installing ceiling modules soon on my build so am arranging to have a couple of helping hands for a few hours. I'm planning to build the modules myself and stack them ready to be fitted when I get the extra hands. Keep it up! Dan

What frequencies you targeting with your diffuser? Is it fractal?

You can read all about the performance here: http://arqen.com/wp-content/docs/Acoust ... -Arqen.pdf

The mdf looks like one of those boring but necessary jobs.

It seems never ending. I just need some solid 8 hour days with help to make some progress here. I feel like I'm stuck and with some downtime from looking after kids and working, I want to spend it with my wife, not MDF. I desperately want to finish the outer leaf beef up/sealing though.

Keep it up!

You too Dan! It's nice to have people working on the same stuff as one another to keep everyone motivated! Greg

After hearing how larger silencer boxes attenuate lower frequencies better than smaller ones, I decided to utilize the spaces I have for them. So, larger cross sectional area changes will help, longer paths, etc, etc. Also, I have learned that I can't get my hands on duct lined flex duct (only insulated), so I decided to make the turn with MDF + duct liner rather than flex duct. Here's the new one on the left and the old one on the right. The larger paths will lower my static pressure a lot too as the boxes were the main source of pressure drop! Greg

Depressing update: I made major progress with my ceiling. I've worked countless hours on it. It's crazy how long it takes to put up a few small little pieces of material when it's in a weird spot. A few hours away from completing the large main duct work runs. The pics I'm attaching are missing some critical pieces to complete a fool-proof beef up. There are several really short runs near the main beam I will need to box in, but honestly, those will be pretty easy. I estimate an 8-10hr day and I could get the small ones done. After that, the final ceiling nightmare will consist of dealing with the far end joist spaces where the frost wall is in the way. It might be easiest to three leaf those suckers because I don't see an efficient way to box in water and gas lines in there. I did beef up the rim board as you can see earlier in my thread. Anyway, I pulled down the top part of the vapour barrier and peeled back some insulation so that I could caulk up around the underside of some boxing-in MDF up behind the frost wall and I was shocked to see mold! I sent pictures to the home builder warranty lady and she said she feels there is no way it is mold because there is no food for the mold there and it must just be tar. I'm not 100% sure of the cause of moisture. I believe the sump pump float didn't engage properly (even though when I lift it up, it turns on) because when I checked, the water level in the sump was high. However, the moisture and mold is pretty much only up high on the walls, not low where I'd expect the concrete to wick up the water. However, the water in my one conduit run now makes sense assuming that there is a butt load of water under the house. Since the house builder said they don't warranty water issues like this, I'm now in touch with the New Home Warranty people to see where things go with them. There is a TON of other crap I could rant on about regarding house issues we've had (also water related), but I'm not going to get into it as it does not pertain to my studio build. I took some surface tape lift samples of the white and black crap from my foundation and the lab results show two different types of mold (heavy growth classification) as well as a ton of efflorescence. I've attached pictures of the actual samples under the microscope too. So, I sent these pictures to my home builder and the New Home Warranty. So I'm trying to dry out the basement now and I'm hoping to get a dehumidifier to expedite the process. I'm sure it will take forever to dry it out. Also, I'm terrified about insurance fixing the issue as it might take forever and really hold up my build process :( Could I have worse luck with this house? Greg

That really sucks, Greg! It's a brand new house, basically: You've only been in there a few months! How on Earth can the contractor deny that it's their problem? Pretty bad workmanship... especially after they screwed you over with the HVAC stuff initially. I really, really hope you get it sorted out fast, and that they have to pay for the remedy. It's just logical that it's entirely their responsibility. - Stuart -

Dang, so sorry to hear that. Hang in there, it'll get sorted. Better to find out now than down the road. Good luck.

Those home warranty people are so full of it....Always trying to skate out of their liability just like any other insurance company. I've had dealings with home warranty people myself. Sorry to hear about your problems. :( I'm sure you won't just settle for their BS like they want you to. Hope it works out.

Hey Greg, As much as I hate these type of lawyers. Find a Construction defect lawyer. They are better than dealing directly with an insurance company. They know how to work the system and usually get a settlement instead of court. Best T

Thanks guys. I have the plumber coming tomorrow to change out/fix the sump situation. Now that I'm manually engaging the sump pump the walls are drying out. I also have a dehumidifier going. I filed a claim with the new home warranty company and now my home builder is saying I should just deal with them. Reading the new home warranty claim notes, it looks like it could take up to 4.5 months before a report is even created. Plus it will cost me $50 + taxes. Right now I'm taking a supper break from working on the mold situation. I've removed all insulation and vapour barrier. With instructions from my bachelor of science friend, I'm applying a dish soapy water (an old windex squirt bottle is slow and hard on my hands!) and removing the mold with a wire brush --> I'm expediting the process using a small angle grinder with a wire wheel. It seems like it won't take long. After that I have to apply some other product that I haven't researched yet. I just don't want to wait 4.5 + months to get back to work in the basement. All of the snow is melting around here finally so if there is going to be water coming in, now is the time. Having said that, I suppose it's a good thing I have the foundation exposed to monitor it. I have to admit that I do feel defeated and exhausted between life and studio building/designing, but I am more inspired than ever to make progress on it. Greg

Have you figured out if the moisture is coming through the walls from outside, up through the slab, or from house interior humidity? It's important to identify the source of the water, in addition to cleaning out the mold.

I'm applying a dish soapy water (an old windex squirt bottle is slow and hard on my hands!)

Do you have a compressor? If so, then do yourself a favor, get a spray paint attachment, and use that to apply the cleaning solution. A lot easier on the hands, and you can control the spray in various ways. - Stuart -

Have you figured out if the moisture is coming through the walls from outside, up through the slab, or from house interior humidity? It's important to identify the source of the water, in addition to cleaning out the mold.

I have not 100% determined that. I can't believe the house builder hasn't sent someone out to try and identify the source of moisture. At this point, I'm quite confident it was water in the sump pouring out the side of the pump due to two things: 1. A intermittently working float (maybe just set incorrectly) 2. An oversized hole that goes a few inches below the weeping tile pipe (this is due to very sloppy workmanship) However, all of the mold has been up high on the walls which leads me to believe the source of moisture is from up high. I'm going to reach out to people and see if anyone will investigate this further. Again, throughout my ceiling beefup/boxing final stages, flooring, and HVAC installation, I will leave the foundation exposed to keep an eye on it.

Do you have a compressor? If so, then do yourself a favor, get a spray paint attachment, and use that to apply the cleaning solution. A lot easier on the hands, and you can control the spray in various ways.

I got 2/3rds of the foundation walls complete today. This type of work is about a tenth as difficult as every other aspect of the studio build, so it's been awesome to see immediate results and a normal looking foundation one stud bay at a time! I will finish off the mold removal by squeezing the squirt bottle, but to apply the Benefect solution, I will probably go the air compressor route. I do own 3 compressors and my oldest brother is an automotive painter by trade so I'll see if he has a paint gun attachment I can borrow! Great suggestion. Thank you Stuart! Greg

Hi Greg, you do seem to have some pretty bad luck sometimes mate. Glad to see you keeping your chin up though! You seem to be a pretty connected dude, so I'm sure you'll get it sorted. Dan