Looking for feedback on Basement Studio Design Plan

Hi Everyone: I've been researching and formulating design ideas for a recording studio in my basement for a few months now; using Rod's book and this forum as my main sources. I have created a PDF document in order share the design with friends and family that can be found here: http://home.cogeco.ca/~sjager/studio.pdf You may wish to check that out for more pictures and additional details. Where I'm At in the Process: So far I've just been reasearching and playing around with different designs. I'm hoping to get some good advice from friends and you folks. From what I've read so far in this forum and Rod's book compared to other sources I've checked out, you are the best. I have yet to buy any materials or start construction. My Goals: Since the age of 14 I’ve been in and out of prog rock and indie bands as both a guitarist and a bassist. Now at 25 years of age, I’ve also taken a liking to the drums. I have a brand new set of Tama’s that drive my wife nuts. In my days as a high school/university student, I took part in many struggles to record a decent sounding demo track or two with my band. Although the demos have progressed in quality over the years, I have yet to record anything that sounds near professional. By building a home recording studio I hope construct a space to jam in a 3-4 piece band without disturbing my wife too much in the room above, and a place for myself and friends of mine to record quality tunes. Since I plan to record friends, I want to keep the Live Room and Control Room separate. I’m also not ruling out the possibility of small time commercial endeavors with independent artists or gigs for film soundtrack material. Room Objectives: Live Room

- I would like the room to act as a practice space for up to 4 musicians, 2 guitarists/vocalists, a bassist/vocalist and a drummer. Thus the room should be able to fit 4 people, at set of drums, 3 guitar/bass amplifiers, 3 guitars, 3 vocal stands, a power amp, power amp speakers approximately 200-300 watts per channel, mics and stands for recording live off the floor, and post-construction room treatments. - I don’t want to be able to hear any of the noises present in my basement (see chart below) in my recordings. - I would be happy if I could keep live room sound from exceeding 50 dBc across the audible spectrum in my living room (the room above the Live Room). See the "Noisy Musician chart below". - I would like to be able to have visual contact with folks in the Live Room while I’m in the Control Room. - I would like to utilize the existing HVAC system in both rooms without jeopardizing my sound isolation.

Control Room

- Maintain decent stereo imaging. - Keep the noises present in the basement as low as possible (<50 dBc peak) - Keep noise from the Live Room to a minimum (<60 dBc peak?) - Maintain some natural light and have access to fresh air in the room. - Have visual contact (through a window) with the band/individual I’m recording. - Isolate my recording gear from electrical transients; especially those caused by the fridge, washer/dryer, furnace and dishwasher if necessary.

Basement Noise Chart: Noise Occurrence Peak Sound Pressure Level Reading (dBc) Furnace and Fan Often 74 dBc Washer/Dryer Often 69 dBc Foot steps Above Often 83 dBc Voices/TV Upstairs Often 65 dBc Voices Downstairs Seldom 74dBc Outside Noise Seldom about 65 dBc (no measurements taken) Noisy Musician Chart: Location: Peak Sound Pressure Level Reading (dBc) 1st floor Front Left Sun Room 92.5 1st floor living room(rear right) Room Couch 86.5 Outside Rear Left Window 86.0 Outside Front Door 78.0 2nd floor Master Bedroom near vent 75.5 Front Left 2nd storey Guest Room 78.0 Mid Right 2nd storey Guest Room 78.5 1st Floor Rear Center Kitchen with meter in duct 108.0 1st Floor Rear Right Room with meter in duct 106.5 Existing Construction: I live in a year old home in a quiet subdivision of Oakville, Ontario, Canada. Most of my neighbors are young parents. My house (1650 sq ft) is situated on a corner lot and my nearest neighbor is only about 10’ away. Thankfully, I don’t have any windows on that side. Behind my house, the nearest neighbor is approximately 50’ away, and to the front (across our street) my neighbors are as little as 80’ away. I am proposing to build my studio in the basement, with the Live Room next to my neighbor (10’ away) and the rear concrete wall facing another neighbor (50’ away). The Control Room will follow the remaining rear concrete wall, that has 1 small above grade window, and the left concrete wall facing the street that also has an identical small above grade window. Approximately 6' of my 7' 4" foundation walls are underground. I have a combination A/C and heating system which is routed through my furnace. The furnace runs on natural gas. I hope to utilize this system in the studio. My electrical panel uses a 2-pole 100A/pole main breaker. There is lots of available space for adding additional circuits. The basement of my home, modeled in the sketch up picture below, contains: the electrical panel, the washer/dyer, the furnace, the natural gas piping, water/sewer pipes and the hot water heater. Both the hot water heater and the furnace are gas fired. A copper gas line snakes its way along the bottom of my floor joists to the rear right side where my fireplace is situated in my living room. I plan on rerouting the gas line so that it lies on top of the HVAC ducts that go from the furnace to the rear right corner. Furthermore, the plumbing that runs underneath the floor joists will be altered to pass through the joists. Sketch Up File: http://home.cogeco.ca/~sjager/BasementF ... nsions.skp The concrete floor is made from a single slab and the foundation to floor joist height is 7’ 4”. However, there are many areas in which it is lower. Take a look at photos above; there are 3 rusty red I-beams used in two locations that support the floor joists. I-beam runs can be identified in sketch up model as thin red rectangular blocks. The height from the bottom of those I-beams to the foundation is only 6’ 9”. Additionally, the main HVAC feeder and a branch feeder are run underneath the floor joists, identified as the wider white rectangle block and cylindrical white shape respectively in the model. The distance from the bottom of these duct paths to the foundation measures 6’ 9”. Both basement windows, shown in the photos above, penetrate the bottom of floor joists. They are sliding glass windows, and are the only sources of fresh air control in the basement. My furnace intake is located inside the basement about 3’ above the furnace’s control housing. I am proposing to build the Live Room and Control Room both in the rear end of the basement. The space at the front end of the basement is too small and contains an I-beam support pole that shouldn't be removed. The floor joists (or ceiling joists for the basement) supporting the rooms above are run in different directions depending on the area in the basement. They also vary in spacing. In the rear right area the joists are run 16” on center (from the center of one joist to the next). In the rear left, they are run 12” on center. Throughout the basement 2 x 8 No. 2 grade Spruce-Pine Fir joists are supporting 5/8“plywood decking for the floor above. Note where the ducting leaves the furnace the headspace is only 6’. The rectangles with ‘X’s through them at the end of cylindrical ducts represent vents presently located in the basement. Sketch Up File: http://home.cogeco.ca/~sjager/HVACandJoist.skp The sketchup file is not completely accurate for determining the horizontal span of my floor joists. What I've measured them at are as follows: 1. Span from rear right I-beam to rear right foundation(16"oc) = 10' 7" 2. Span from rear center-to-left I-beam to rear foundation(12"oc) = 12' 6" Each end of the joist has at least 1" of its length on both the I-beam and foundation wall. According the AWC maximum span calculator Span #1 is capable of supporting 20psf dead load and 50 psf live load (max span being 10' 8"). Span #2 is capable of supporting 20psf dead and 40psf live. Span #1 is currently supporting my living room (10' x 14') and span #2 is supporting my kitchen (12' x 17'). My Current Design: Here's what I have come up with so far. I have yet to look at Star-grounding the electrical in detail. That will probably be my next post. Have a look at the layout, walls, doors and HVAC. I'll walk you through my plans following the pictures. Sketchup File: http://home.cogeco.ca/~sjager/studio-dim-web.skp Sketchup File: http://home.cogeco.ca/~sjager/Studio-HVAC.skp In the photo of the doors, you may have noticed I moved the I-beam support pole (replacing it with 2 such poles) that was underneath the connection point of two adjoining I-beams in the rear-center of the basement (yellow arrow is pointing to corner). I've done this so there is space to walk carrying a laundry basket down the stairs and to avoid conflict with control room entry. The current design allows for a 115 sq. ft control room and a 145 sq. ft live room. Floor Design: Due to the lack of headspace (7’ 4” maximum) I have in the basement, chosen not to build a floating floor. I have decided to leave the concrete floor as is for now. Although all rooms in the basement share the same floor, the amount of sound transmission through the concrete will probably end up being less than what makes it through the walls/ceiling/HVAC. Single Frame Wall Design: - Single wall construction will be used on all the walls following the foundation walls. - 1” of space between the back of the 2x4 wall studs and the foundation to cut down on sound traveling through the studs to the concrete. - Isolation clips will be attached to the foundation at a rate of 2 per 8’ of wall to brace the 2x4 frames. - Owens Corning (Pink fluffy) insulation will fill the wall cavities. - 3 layers of 5/8” thick drywall will be fastened (via drywall screws) to the front of the wall studs. All of the wall material plus the 1” air gap make the wall stand out 6 3/8” from the foundation. - Acoustic caulk will be used to fill all drywall joints. Double Frame Wall Design: - All walls not following the foundation will be double walls. - 2 x 4 framing will be used for studs and plates with a 1” air gap in between. - Studs on opposite walls shall be offset as much as possible while still enabling a WIC isolation clip, at 2 every 8’, to stabilize the wall. - Three layers of 5/8” drywall will be fastened directly to each room side of the frames using drywall screws. - All drywall joints will be caulked with acoustic caulk. - All of the wall material plus the 1” air gap in between each leaf make the double wall 11 ¾” thick. Ceiling Design (This design can be found in Rod’s book from page 66 – 71.): - I plan on adopting a 2 leaf ceiling de-coupled by 2 legged resilient channel (RC-2) provided the RC-2 can support 3 layers of drywall. - The first leaf will consist of three layers of 5/8” drywall placed in between each pair of floor joists. - The drywall should be cut in strips, leaving ¼” of space between the edge of the drywall and the floor joist. - Fill 1/4" space with backer rod and acoustic caulk. - 2 x 2‘s will be fastened to the floor joists to support the drywall (see figure 26). - The double legged resilient channel will be attached to the bottom of the floor joists on one side and fastened to the 3 drywall layers on the other. - Insulation will be stuffed in between the two layers, if the gap is not used for the HVAC system. - Install cross bridging may be installed where appropriate. Door Design: For the Control room door I plan to use Rod's "super" door. However, sheet lead is illegal to use in homes and apparently extremely hard to find in Canada. So I may have to find a replacement material. The home depot has what they call a "Safe n' Sound" door; I was thinking of turning that into a "super" door. Another option is using what HD call fire-code doors. They are made of solid wood and weigh about 100 lbs. I plan on installing my live room door underneath the rear right I-beam (6' 9" headroom) in order to maximize my live room real-estate. The home depot safe n' sound doors would be a messy cut as they employ multiple layers of material. It would be much easier to use a fire-code door in this situation If I cannot find sheet lead, I will use Rod's double door design with the fire-code doors in the live room. Live Room to Control RoomWindow Design: - I would like the window to be between 2’ by 3’ to 2’ by 4’ in size. - Based on a couple quotes I've got for 7psf sheets of glass, two panes of 2 x 3 is about 100$ per expensive than its equivalent 2 x 4 panes. - The laminate quote was for 4 panes because they couldn't get 2 panes of laminate at 7psf each. - I didn't include frame weight when i added the wall weight to be 7psf, maybe I should be shooting for a figure closer to 9psf for the glass? - For the window frame, I will be following Rod’s instructions as depicted in figure 5.2 in his book. - I will splay the glass to avoid image reflection, but I’m not sure at this point on what angle to use. Control Room Outdoor Windows My neighborhood is normally a pretty quiet place. Occasionally aircraft fly overhead or cars with loud stereos drive by and these sounds can be heard moderately inside the house. As I stated in my objectives, I would like to keep natural light flowing into the Control Room while I’m working. I’d also like to be able to open the window to get some fresh air flow from time to time. Since these windows are above the level of the floor joists, I plan on angling the bottom leaf of the drywall up towards the top of the window starting from the far side of the joist opening in front of each window. For times where a noiseless environment is desired, I plan on building a miniature door or plug that will seal tight against the window to stop the sound coming in. Electrical: - In both the Control and Live Room, I will run separate circuits for lights and equipment. - Each room will have its own equipment and lights circuit. - I will try to avoid both dimmers and fluorescent lighting due to the electrical noise associated with them. - I may employ a 40W bulb/100 W bulb switch in order to provide to different lighting moods for the Live Room. - I plan on using wall surface mount electrical boxes and lights, and metal conduit to contain my wire in order to maintain the sound isolation of my walls. A single hole in the wall is better than many. - All low voltage wires will be run perpendicular to 115 V circuits where they come in close contact. - Low voltage wire will consist of an XLR/1/4” snake/patch bays capable of supporting at least 12 microphones, and LAN cable. HVAC Design: So far I haven't had time to buckle down and find a store that carries HVAC ducting components, but here's what I hope to do in order to isolate the rooms. 1. Preventing Sound from room to room travel - I do not want too much sound escaping the Live Room or coming into the Live Room. - Install Silencers (baffles) in between the ceiling joists (see orange sections in the recording studio model that shows the HVAC runs). - Line (at least portions of) the inside of the metal duct feeders with sound absorbing material OR replacing some of the metal feeders with fiberglass and adding a liner. - Due to the amount of space between my ceilings joists, the silencers will speed up air flow, resulting added air noise. To combat this, I will make sure the silencers are connected to much larger ducts at the room end. If I am installing my vents in the walls, my duct surface area in the direction of air flow is cut down slightly. This will increase air noise slightly. - Extending duct runs so that the vent drops down at the corner of the ceiling and wall or extending runs so that the vent is in the wall. 2.Mechanical sound and vibration traveling from the furnace into the rooms - I am planning on installing a vibration suppressing adapter between the furnace and main HVAC supply in and out ducts. To keep the band in the Live Room cool and less humid in the summer, I will install two drop down ceiling outlets and one high/low return (check out the Studio-HVAC.skp sketch up file). Heat will be an issue in the winter for 1 or 2 people in the room but not if 4 guys are rocking out hard. In the Control Room I plan using one out of the way drop-down outlet (so sound waves in the center of the room aren’t distorted) and one high/low wall return. Since I do not want have the ceilings any lower than they already are, I am proposing to make all my new duct runs in between the joists. I am then limited to ducts that fit what space is left over between the joists after the 2 leaf system is added. The maximum sizes for all my joist cavities are shown in the picture below. Note that I plan on continuing the low ceiling (because the I-beam and HVAC duct) in the Live Room all the way to the rear wall. This enables me to use a larger “silencer” and duct for outlet 2. Sketchup File: http://home.cogeco.ca/~sjager/MaxSizeHVAC.skp Budget: I'm hoping to get away with only spending about 5000$ on the construction since I plan on doing it all myself. However, my budget is not fixed. At this time, I have no idea how much the treating the HVAC system will cost. The last spreadsheet estimate I created showed a total cost of about $4500 not including HVAC, window frame parts and employing a star grounded electrical system. Questions and Comments: Note: For questions involving how much weight my ceiling can carry, more details can be found in the Appendix of the Studio design PDF file I have on my website the link is at the begining of this post. 1. (Attn Canadians) Where can I find WIC isolation clips to hold double walls together and inside walls to the foundation where necessary? 2. If I cannot carry 3 layer drywall leafs on my ceiling should I bother with 3 layer walls? 3. Do I gain any significant sound absorbtion by using Roxul Safe n' Sound insulation in the double wall cavities or the ceiling? Note that HVAC will be run in a few ceiling cavities, taking up all or a majority of the space. Furthermore, the double wall between the Control and Live room contains my window, which may be the weak point there. 4. If I were to use just 1 layer of drywall for the walls following the foundations can I tie them into 3 layers on the ceiling without compromising the isolation I get from the room above? (lack of construction experience has forced me into asking this question) 5. Should I be considering lowering the drywall load per leaf since the horizontal span for my load requirement is so close to its critical length (as in the Live Room calculation, see appendix A)? I’m assuming there is a safety net factor built into the Maximum Horizontal Span calculator. 6. How much cross bridging should I use after adding all this ceiling weight. 7. Will I get the isolation I require if I fasten two or even three panes of laminate together into a single sheet of glass in order to match the weight of the walls? 8. What is the ideal angle to splay my window glass at to keep down image reflection? 9. Solid wood Fire-Code doors sold at Home Depot seem to weigh about 100 lbs, are they as heavy as a 1 3/4 “ solid core door? (I didn’t get a chance to measure the thickness). 10. I need to come up with or find a good way of measuring a noisy 60 Hz 115 VAC household circuit. At this point I don’t plan to have purchased any high quality recording gear before I’m finished construction. 12. How much sound attenuation can I achieve with “silencers”? 13. Is extending the duct length and adding 1 more 90 degree turn going to make much difference after the silencer is employed? If I am not able to meet my HVAC objectives, I can always plug up the ventilation for short durations of time. Final Words: Thanks for taking the time to look all this information over. I hope it isn't too much! If it is, let me know and I'll post it in fragments. Cheers, Sam.

my main thought would be to flip the CR so you can look into the live room. since the bulk of the basement appears to be underground, you can probably get away with less drywall on the walls and bolster the ceiling, windows, and doors.

Gullfo: Thanks for the reply! I'm having trouble understanding the meaning of your 1st point.

Gullfo said: my main thought would be to flip the CR so you can look into the live room.

I think you are telling me to place the angled CR walls beside the wall shared with the Live room, instead of where they are now. What comes to mind is that in changing the shape of my CR, I am limited by the sewage drain pipes (see first sketchup pic in my previous post). I also wanted to maximize deskspace along the window wall shared with the live room, so I watch the action as I tweak the mix. However, I can see that IF I did place angled walls along the window wall shared with the live room, i would be receiving a better stereo image, while facing the window into the live room, depending on monitor placement, the angle of the walls and my distance from the window wall. But please clarify your comment. I'm probably way off. :P I hope something in my presentation didn't confuse you. Cheers, Sam.

I think Gulfo is presuming due to the geometry of the control room you will be facing the wall against the live room

i was assuming the angled areas in the CR were the location of your monitors (soffits or otherwise) which would be counter intuitive (for me) to have my back to the live room. if the angled sections of the CR are simply absorbers then you're good. with the design so far along, you might want to get your questions posted into the construction forum where other folks can add comments.

Thanks for clearing that up Gullfo. I will treat those corners to absorb sound. I'll update this post with new questions and info and throw it in the construction section. Cheers, Sam.

i can verify that your canadian by A:) the amount of hockey gear you own and B:) the amount of insulation in your basement! i'm sure by the amount of detail that you've been reading this forum for a while, and such is reflected in your post. great post. i must admit, i didn't read all the way through, however, i did happen to notice that you mentioned using RC on the double walls. I'm not 100% sure, but I think this has been advised against, as you are already isolating your two walls and gain little or no advantage (and costs u money). I fought with a number of things that you have ahead, except i had the luxury of an 9' ceiling height. I did end up moving two water supply lines, with the help of a local plumber (i still seemed to do quite a bit of that work, other than sauldering the joints!) and i must say it was a pain, however, i had to move copper, i noticed you have flexible tubing, so that may make it much easier to do. another thing to watch for is the isolation between the furnace room. I did not attempt maximum isolation, however, I have some low end bleed from the furnace when it is on. My cost-effective solution: don't run the furnace/ac when tracking... which if you really get to it, doesn't allways take that long in comparison to mixdown. plus, according to your design, the CR will be closer than the TR anyways, again, that would help. good luck with your build, stop by my thread if you want pix of something specific, i haven't posted nearly any of my actual build pix that showed how I built stuff! kevin

Sam - here's a suggestion. The booth area has a low ceiling to cover the HVAC Ducts. cheers john

Sandlefoot: Thanks for the reply. I'm not sure where you read that I was using RC on the double wall, please "highlight" where i said that or quote me. I never intended to use RC on the double wall. John: Thanks for taking the time to design an alternative approach for me. I haven't done much research into vocal booths and why I just can't record vocals in the live or mixing room, but if i needed one, I was going to build it in the far end of the basement using part of the space i had planned to leave unfinished. I'm also not a vocalist, so since this is starting out as a hobby studio, I don't think I'd use a vocal booth much. I manily write songs that remain instrumentals. Furthermore, I contemplated adopting more angled walls than necessary, but since I'm following rod gervais book (his examples are for boxed rooms and the acoustics of the room are easier to calculate and treat, I think) and I'm short on space, a boxed route seems the way to go. You may have missed the basement windows in control room (my design) . If i put the LIVE room where you have proposed I would have to plug up that window either temporarily or permanently in order to keep sound from escaping outside the house. By leaving the windows in, i get natural light and optional fresh air into the control room. I may build a optional mini-door to close over the window for times when a quiet control room is desired. Again, thank you very much for your time. Please respond if you think I'm missing something, I plan on begining the framing this weekend. Cheers, fs

by the way sandledfoot. .... Great posts on your tracking room construction! I will use your door and window frame pictures as a guide to framing mine. I've never framed an entire basement (just helped on a few walls in the past), but I've been studying and I figure I'm ready :) Thanks. -Sam

I posted this in the construction thread, but it has more to do with design so I'll post here too! Well, it's been awhile but both layers of drywall are in between all the joists within the area the studio encompasses; for the old design anyways. Both layers have been caulked and i've used 4" - 6" pieces of 2x2 to secure the drywall tight to the plywood above. Here's a pic of some of the handy work. These 3 runs were done by my brother-in-law, he was a little more generous with sealant than I was, I told him not to be short. He did a very good job. The drywall you see hanging down between the joists to the far left is part of the way I had first contemplated finishing where the wall meets the ceiling structure. This is not the way I'm going to do it anymore, instead i will make the joint as per the way Rod does them for the inside wall - ceiling connection. See pic below The connection between the drywall in between the joists against the deck and ones sealing the joist cavity will be staggered just like the others i've shown here. Here are the pictures of the new layout. The reasons why i chose to change it to what you see below: - Door into LIVE room is no longer underneath the I-beam. This avoids a small door and the outer frame can now be connected to the ceiling for added support. I've never framed a door before, so if you think the old way (directly underneath the beam) was easily possible let me know. - Door into LIVE room will now not interfere with musicians equipment set up. I've created a dead zone in the door opening for two reasons; the reason i just mentioned and to keep the live rooms length and width from sharing the same dimension as much as possible while still allowing someone to enter the room. That is what the single framed short walls are for. - Ducting done via soffit along the wall. I realized I do not have much diameter available for air flow down a duct if i want to add both a lining inside the duct and insulation outside. The duct with sufficient diameter for airflow will not fit between the joists as I had planned. With a soffit i will be able to keep my air velocity low, make a few 90 degree turns, and put a nice thick sound attenuating lining inside the ducts. - Control Room is bigger. - Control Room door is no longer blocked by a low hanging duct and i-beam. Please let me know what you think of the new layout. I will be starting to frame the outside walls adjacent to the foundation very soon. Questions: How do HVAC guys determine the maximum length and volume that your duct runs can be? How do they determine how many branches you can install? Should I had a soffit to the soffit-less wall in the control room to keep the room as close to symmetrical as I can? Anyone see anybody's build pics that show framing and drywall detail of how the duct go through the wall into the studio rooms? I will list some more questions soon as they come to me. Cheers, Sam.

i think there are several topics in the construction forum dealing with HVAC ducting, isolation, silencers, etc... the layout looks fine and if it meets your needs then its also good!