Looking for help on Layout and design

Hi Everyone, I am just about to start construction on my basement studio. First off I just wanted to let you know that I did read all the stickies before I posted :) I had a question on the wall structure this afternoon that was promptly answered so I thought I would see if anyone had any ideas on the layout before a I begin. I am building a studio in my basement which is partially under ground level. I have a pretty good amount of space to work with but my Wife has limited my options as far as wall placement. In this drawing below you can see the dimensions and layout I am working with. She is pretty adamant that the vocal booth goes under the dropped ceiling portion of the control room. The ceiling height here is exactly 7' to the rafters. Here is a pic of the booth area. I have someone coming this week to move the gas line up into the rafters. The rest of the space has 7'6" ceilings. The ceiling construction is made up of 2x8 on 16"oc and in some place 12"oc. I am currently planning on setting up the console and equipment directly facing the vocal booth. I have still not decied where to install doors between the live room and the rst of the basement. I can currently access the live room from either side of the stairs. Here are some more pics of the space. Does any one have any ideas as to what the best layout would be? I have searched hundreds of posts and have yet to find one with similiar room dimensions and layout. Any help would be greatly appreciated. As you can see I love pictures so the construction will be well documented. Construction starts on Friday so I am anxious to finalize a layout. At which time I will be starting a build diary. Thanks Vince

From the pics and the rough layout of want the wife wants I can't see where the entry into this space is. I'm assuming that the door is where the stairs is? what is the measurement from live / rehearsal side basment wall to center of door? whats door size? The wall that you have drawn on your plan is the I beam with the two lolly commons? What are the measurments from the basement wall from the stair side to the center of each lolly column ( jack Post ). (they look like 4" in diameter in your pics) How thick are your basement walls? The bottom half looks like it's poured concrete correct? These few things I have pointed out will help us alot. hold off on starting construction till youve had a few replies it may take a while but not always. I have an idea for you space but I need the things I stated above before I can show you what I got in mind for your layout

Hi Doni, I apologize. The drawing that I thought I had posted had more deatils on it. I have updated quickly in MSpaint as it is all I have here in my office. Here is a brief legend: Currently the only existing walls are in red. The blue Lines are the I-Beams that span the entire space Black x's show where the steel beam supports are. They are in fact 4". From the basement wall next to the stairs to the lolly columns is 7ft The light blue walls are where I am planning and building the dividing walls between the rest of the basement and between the CR and Live Room. The orange lines are where the current windows are. and the Purple lines are where I was planning on putting the doors. currently there are no doors in the basement. The stair entrance is at the top of the drawing opposite the live room. The bottom half of the basement walls is 5" thick poured concrete. I hope this clears some things up. Thanks for your help. Let me know if you need any other information.

Vince here is a link to a cad (computer aided drafting) program this way you can draw everything as it is to scale Delta Cad Program The upper half of basement walls are 2x4 construction? How tall are the I beams? your interior dimensions are 23' by 39' Correct? Sorry for the late questions.

Great. Thanks for the link Doni. I will be home in a couple of hours and give it a shot. The upper portion of the walls are 2x6.

Based on roughly where you put the windows and entrance door and the measurements you provided this is what I came up with. one lolly columm I was able to burry in a wall

2 more 3D renderings

Thanks Doni. That plan looks great. The only problem is my wife wants to keep the control room on the other side so that large Live room opens up to the other side. Just the revers of how you have it. I just spent about 30 minutes re measuring everything. The initial measurements I had were left over from some drawings of the builder. Some of them are way out. I downloaded the cad program you recommended and I am in the middle of redrawing the whole thing with updated dimensions. Depending on how fast I can use this program I will have them up in about an hour. Your plans look great.

thats fine and dandy that she wants it there but im curious to what her reasoning for this decision? Not trying to be nasty or rude but is it your room or hers? Oh and when measuring the window, measure to the center and then measure the of it size it is same with the door and lolly columns The reason I designed it the way I did was cause you said she says that the one vocal booth you roughly drew in and from pics had a post up had to be there thats why I moved the control room to the other side of the room

Well they are married and he is smart to consider ner desires (keeps the sex great. trust me on this one :) ) So I have to side with his comments. make it work with her desires in consideration. :) Plus he has tons of space. His control area alone is what I had to build my entire 2 room studio. So for his entry just create a nice entry way trap that allows access to both the CR and the Live room independant of one another :)

Thanks guys, Bryan, you are a very wise man. :D When my wife is happy I am happy :wink: Doni, her reasoning is that she wants to leave the main part of the basement open. I do agree with her on this as well. The control room and vocal booth are my primary concern. I mostly record track by track anyways. I just figured if I was going to go through all this trouble I might as well soundproof the rest of the basement and use it as a rehearsal space for some of my bands as well as a live tracking room down the road. I just spent the last hour trying to get the dimensions right in the cad program. This is the best I can do so let me know if anything is not clear. I have included the cad file as well. The windows are 2'hx3'w. I measured them to the dge of the frame.

Ok point taken. Wasn't being an ass I swear. Now that I have new dimensions I'll work on it tonight a lil bit and should have something up here by tomorrow. I am sick so I took off early today and am not going to work tomorrow damn upper respitory infection. I see the top of the stairs jut out into the live room unlike they did in your original drawing. Umm how wide are they? The 2 circles in the drawing against the wall with 2 windows are drainage pipes? if so will you need access to them? The dimension to the edge of the window (on the left side of drawing) is that to the center of I beam or to the edge of I beam Oh and your forgot to include where your breakerbox is located also just remembered that Can you post some more pics from different angle then what you have on here.

DreaminDrumBeats wrote:

Ok point taken. Wasn't being an ass I swear. Now that I have new dimensions I'll work on it tonight a lil bit and should have something up here by tomorrow. I am sick so I took off early today and am not going to work tomorrow damn upper respitory infection..

No rush. Take care of yourself. I had the same infection at christmas time. It was misdiagnosed at first and I ended up with for almost 2 months. That was not fun.

DreaminDrumBeats wrote:

I see the top of the stairs jut out into the live room unlike they did in your original drawing. Umm how wide are they?

The stairs stick out into the room by 22" they are 3' wide

DreaminDrumBeats wrote:

The 2 circles in the drawing against the wall with 2 windows are drainage pipes? if so will you need access to them?

They are drainage pipes and I don't think I will need to access them.

DreaminDrumBeats wrote:

The dimension to the edge of the window (on the left side of drawing) is that to the center of I beam or to the edge of I beam

It is to the edge of the I beam

DreaminDrumBeats wrote:

Oh and your forgot to include where your breakerbox is located also just remembered that

The breakerbox is located between the lowered ceiling portion of where the vocal booth is and the window on the right side.

DreaminDrumBeats wrote:

Can you post some more pics from different angle then what you have on here.

ask and you shall receive. here is more pics From the stairs looking out to the live room From the furnace looking across the LR into the CR from the stairs looking into the CR from the south west corner of the LR looking towards the furnace from the south west corner of the LR looking across the LR towards th CR and vocal booth from the south wall between the CR and LR looking towards the stairs from the CR looking across the LR from the south east corner of the CR looking across the LR towards the stairs from the LR into the CR -- Notice the electric panel

I Annoy, I have a couple of concerns with the plastic over your insulation. I'm not an expert so take this for what you think it's worth. First, the plastic will I believe act as a third leaf. At least at some frequencies. I've heard that plastic is acoustically transparent to lows, but not to highs. So maybe the third leaf effect only applies to the higher frequencies. I'm not exactly sure. but I know Knightfly always warns against having kraft-faced paper with the kraft paper in the middle of a wall, and that's pretty thin too. I'm pretty sure he would warn about this plastic. I'm sure he'll correct me if i'm wrong though. :) to avoid this you would put the plastic, if it is needed, directly against the inner leaf, on the inside of the wall of course. The second thing is, I know you're in a northern climate so maybe it is appropriate to have a vapor barrier on the inner leaf of your wall. But this is not on the inner leaf, it is in the middle. So you may have a situation where moisture is traveling into your wall until it hits the barrier, and then it can't escape. it may be that plastic over insulation is normal and correct construction for your area. but this is for single stud walls. since you are doing a double stud wall this changes things. from what i have read you would never put a moisture barrier between two airspaces in a wall, it has to be against one leaf (outer in warm climate, inner in cold, no barrier in mixed climate). the moisture will try to travel from warm inside to cold outside. a vapor barrier will prevent this IF it is right up against your inner leaf. but that is not where the plastic is going to end up as you have it. it will be halfway in the middle of your wall. so you may create moisture problems, perhaps mold or even rot inside your wall. again, i'm no expert and i've just done very little reading on this for my own project. but i wanted to give you a heads up in case you hadn't already been over this. my best guess is you should take off the plastic, hold it in place with wire instead. and perhaps put plastic on the inside of your inner stud wall before the gypsum if that's appropriate for your climate. dan :)

Vince ok now that I know they are drainage pipes make sure you don't need access to them cause it would be wrong to close them in if you did need access to them if the need showed its ugly face. Thanks for the pics man helps out alot. Can you take a measurement to the left and right edges of the breakerbox from the wall. (vocal booth side) And the drainage pipe right next to where you want the vocal booth looks like it has a clean out at the bottom. Yet again need a measurment from wall to left side of pipe to right side of clean out to know where to put access door. How wide and tall are the I beams? They look like they are 6" wide x 8" tall. Correct me if I'm wrong Believe me I'm trying to get better. It sucks major Donkey D*** when barely workin and getting worn out in the first hour of being on the job.

Thanks Dan. I just responded to the same concern from Steve over in my construction topic. It looks like I need to remove the vapour barrier from the outside wall and put it on the inside leaf before the drywall goes up. You guys saved me a lot of truoble in the long run. Thanks so much Hey Doni, I'll get you those measuremnts as soon as I get home tonight. Being sick does suck. I know that feeling. The simplest little tasks seemed to completly wipe me out. I wanted to sleeep all day. Thanks again

DreaminDrumBeats wrote:

Can you take a measurement to the left and right edges of the breakerbox from the wall. (vocal booth side)

From the wall to the left edge is 6'9" From the wall to thr right edge is 8' I would probably need to access almost 3 ft from the drainage pipe.

DreaminDrumBeats wrote:

And the drainage pipe right next to where you want the vocal booth looks like it has a clean out at the bottom. Yet again need a measurment from wall to left side of pipe to right side of clean out to know where to put access door.

From the wall to the left edge is 5'5" From the wall to thr right edge is 5'10" It sticks out 14" from the wall

DreaminDrumBeats wrote:

How wide and tall are the I beams? They look like they are 6" wide x 8" tall. Correct me if I'm wrong

The IBeams are 5.5" wide x 8" tall Let me know if you need anything else.

Can you check the 2 drainage pipes on wall with 2 windows to make sure whether they have cleanouts at the bottom or not. I know the one by the breaker box and furnace do have them. I have most of it drawn but just want to know whether I have to make an access opening to those 2 pipes or not. Got you covered on the 3 ft access to breaker box

Does the 3 ft access space your needing for breaker box include the drainage pipe?

no it's from the drainage pipe. I want t o be able to have some room to run wires to the panel down the road if I have to.

Well here you go Vince. I turned the control room 90 degrees because of your breaker box position otherwise the room would have been square. I made the 3 ft access to breaker box include the drainage pipe no sense in closing it in if it doesn't need to be. Gave you a small Soundlock entry (thanks for the suggestion Bryon) Tell me what you and your wife think of this one.

Last 2 3D rendering Oh in the rendering youll notice the breaker box is not where its spose to be forgot to properly place it

Looks nice :)

I wonder if John has had the chance to stop in and look.

Doni, I got to tell you. I really like it. I was all excited last night when I went over it with my wife. However, we seem to be in disagreement. I thought this had all been figured out but I guess I was wrong, again :oops: After some discussion and lengthy walk around the basement. We have come to an agreement. She really wants me to contain the control room and vox booth to the right side of the basement. See the diagram below. The left side of the basement will be wide open. I can work on turning it into a live/tracking room later on. Here is a drawing showing where I am limited too. I guess I can see her point. I may not agree with it but I can see it :) Sorry about any confusion. I feel like I have made you do all that work for nothing. :( Beacuse of the space what about this layout from another thread? I could position the control room facing the vox booth.