Indiana Home Studio Build

Thanks Stan!!! I appreciate the kinds words! I am just up the road from you in the Indianapolis area. I look forward to reading your thread.

Here's an update on the progress... This past weekend, we got a good jump on the work on Saturday, and then took a break at about 5:00 PM so I could take my younger 14 YO son and his girlfriend to their Homecoming dinner and dance. We planned on picking up his date at about 6:00, taking them to a quick dinner, then off to the dance where we would drop them off until about 11:30 when we would have to pick them up. I figured that I would get in about 3-4 more hours of work while they were at the dance, and was hoping I could con my wife into picking them up while my son and I continued to work on the studio. My wife insisted that I take a quick shower since I had been working all day and was covered with drywall dust (I hate drywall!), Green Glue, caulk, etc. Well... like an idiot, I was hurrying, and when getting out of the shower stall, I tripped and stubbed my toe on the shower door, and just about sliced the top 1/3 of my toe clean off! OUCH! It was a bloody mess (literally). So instead of taking my son to the dance, I had my older son drive me to the emergency room while my wife dealt with Mini Romeo and his date Mini Juliet. I just sat in the emergency room soaking towels with blood until they were able to stitch my toe back together. At this point it looks like I won't lose the tip of my toe, but we won't know for sure for another week or so. It sliced right through my toe nail, and took off about half of the pad on the bottom of my middle toe. It was hanging by a thread... GROSS!!! Needless to say, this ended my studio building for the evening, and then of course ended all hopes of getting anything else done for a few days. I can't even wear a shoe for a week. This really sucks!!! So we made very little progress this week, and it will probably be another few days before I can really get down there to do anything real. Before the toe butchering debacle, I was able to: -Finish caulking the second layer of ceiling drywall that we finished last weekend. -Cut out the rough window opening in the drywall between the control room and the live room. I had been leaving that layer of drywall in tact up until now to help keep the dust out of the live room. -Start on the 2nd layer of drywall for the walls. We got a couple of pieces up in the control room, and one big piece up in the live room on the other side of the wall. Alas, not as much as I had hoped, but fate has a funny way of taking control of things. Here are a few pics of the small amount of progress we made: Here is a short series of four pictures showing the 2nd layer of ceiling drywall over the doorway to the iso room. The angle on these pictures makes it a *bit* hard to get the perspective, but I am basically standing under the doorway, looking straight up at the ceiling under where the door will be. There are 2 layers of ceiling drywall, but only a single layer on the wall. These pics show the application of the acoustic caulking between the layers. The next step here is to add the second layer of drywall to the walls, and then re-caulk.

Expired tubes of Green Glue! <sigh> This stuff is expensive! We have used just over 2 cases on the ceiling, and have about 4 cases left for the walls. I will probably need to order another case or two before it is all said and done.

Here are a couple of shots of the rough opening between the live room and the control room. These 2 shots are looking from the existing live room into the new control room. You can see how we added one sheet of drywall to the live room side (top right of pics)... that is when I hurt my foot and all progress came to a screeching halt. Notice the stupid couch? I am really beginning to hate that couch, and I am sure tired of moving it all around while we work around it!

This last pic is from the opposite perspective. This is from the control room looking out into the live room. Notice that we have the upper part of the second layer of drywall on the inside of the CR walls. Lots more work to do!

We actually got back to work on Sunday, for at least a partial day anyway. For the first time in a week, I was able to get a shoe on my foot. This was a big step towards recovery! Ya-hoo! It still hurts like crazy, but at least I was able to get down to the studio to get *something* done. At the end of last week, I got all the hardwood flooring in! It is sitting in huge piles in my garage, which is now officially void of any cars! The side where I normally park has been filled with saws, stacks of drywall and wood, sawhorses, etc. for a couple of months, and now the side where my wife normally parks her car has boxes and boxes of flooring! Oh goodie! Just in time for winter to arrive!!! ;) But the best news of all??? I was able to score the flooring for FREE!!! Yep, you heard me right, FREE!!! As it turns out, there is a local flooring guy that is moving out of state, and he had a TON of hardwood and laminate flooring that he was trying to get rid of. All we had to do was come pick it up! Talk about luck!!! It was a miracle!!! Anyway, back to the studio... We hung a few more sheets of drywall in the control room, and actually finished the CR-to-LR wall on the CR side! I spent most of the day on the live room side however, prepping the wall for the second layer of drywall. I had to cut back the old carpet all along the dividing wall (I am installing hardwood in the live room as well, so the carpet is garbage anyway), and then remove the carpet tack that had been nailed into the concrete. It was quite a job, and made a huge mess! Besides all of that, the floor board trim needed to be removed, there were several holes that needed to be patched, and all of the electrical and audio boxes needed to be caulked and sealed as well as the bottom of the old drywall. All-in-all, I spent several hours just doing the prepping work in the live room. Of course in the afternoon, I *HAD* to take a 3-hour break and watch the (American) football game because "my toe was killing me and I needed to rest it"!!! :) Considering how productive the last week has been, I feel like we at least made "some progress". Not much to show in the way of pics... it is "just drywall" after all! This first pic shows the wall that divides the CR from the LR. We had started on the second layer of drywall before I hurt my foot, but only got the top 2 sheets hung. You can see those at the top of the pic, as well as the faint blue chalk lines that I drew on the wall to mark the studs down below. You can see where I cut back the carpet (it is all going to garbage eventually anyway. You can also see the old glue on the floor that was holding down the spongy carpet pad. What a pain this was... removing the carpet tack (you can see the holes in the cement), ripping out the glued down carpet pad that came off in tiny pieces... Grrrr... You can also see some of the patchwork from old receptacles and switches that I had to patch, and all the new boxes had to be sealed and caulked. I still have a bit of sanding, and then removing some of the bits of black foam that are still stuck to the wall from the old Auralex, and we can finish the second layer on the live room side.

This second pic is looking in the other direction along that same wall. Same procedure as the other side. I am glad that this part is done, I have been dreading it for a while now! You can also see a piece of white PVC pipe that is sticking through the wall on this side. I am sure that this is not the most acoustically correct (soundproof?) device, but I wanted it anyway! Basically it is a straight pipe through the wall from the live room into the iso room. This is to accommodate any weird cables that might creep up from time-to-time. For example... Leslie cables. There are so many configurations for Leslie cables, and rather than try to route them through doors (which then could not be shut), I decided to create a portal for them. As you can see, it is sealed on each end with a small, removable cap, and I will also stuff it with foam when not in use.

Sorry that I haven't posted in a while, but my foot injury has kept me on the slow path for the last few weeks. We actually hit again hard this weekend, and are hopefully back on a faster track. Lots of progress, but nothing really new to show yet. I hope to be posting some pics later this week. I do have an important question however: In some of Rods window design drawings, he uses cloth-wrapped rigid fiberglass pieces between the window stops to prevent coupling between the walls. How are these pieces attached to the assembly? Small finishing nails? I am not sure that there will be any backing wood behind these pieces to nail them to in every case.

Doublehelix - I didn't have time to read all the text on these 6 pages, but really quick, what are you up to in costs so far and what is your budget (if you don't mind me asking)??

BradJacob wrote:

Doublehelix - I didn't have time to read all the text on these 6 pages, but really quick, what are you up to in costs so far and what is your budget (if you don't mind me asking)??

I am at about US$8,700, and still have to buy the glass, trim, paint and a few flooring materials (I already have the actual flooring, which I got for FREE!). This price does not include acoustic treatment or any rewiring that will have to take place when I get all the gear moved from the old room to the new room. Here is an approximate breakdown SO FAR: $1,200 audio wiring (Mogami/Neutirk) $1,200 framing contractors (including materials) $1000 for 3 doors $480 for drywall (so far, more to come!) $600 insulation $1,000 Green Glue $120 acoustic caulk $460 electrical wiring (including new circuits - I got the electrician for free) $650 for lighting fixtures (I still have 1 more to buy) $300 for the floor construction (including sand) $250 for tape/mud/drywall tools $100 neoprene $20 backer rod $150 window framing $235 screws/nails/hardware $250 Putty Pads $600 HVAC venting (some labor as well for the cold air returns) I also bought a few tools (!) that I had to have! (Just ask Lou! It is the LAW!!!) Air compressor, air nail gun, t-squares, on and on... I haven't added all the receipts, but I am close to $10,000 at this point, and that is with (mostly) free labor and free flooring. I am estimating about US$12,000 when it is all said and done. My budget started at $5,000, and then quickly went to $8,000 as I started serious planning and looking at the actual costs. I am WAY over budget as you can see. Sucks, doesn't it???

doublehelix wrote:

BradJacob wrote:

Doublehelix - I didn't have time to read all the text on these 6 pages, but really quick, what are you up to in costs so far and what is your budget (if you don't mind me asking)??

I am at about US$8,700, and still have to buy the glass, trim, paint and a few flooring materials (I already have the actual flooring, which I got for FREE!). This price does not include acoustic treatment or any rewiring that will have to take place when I get all the gear moved from the old room to the new room. Here is an approximate breakdown SO FAR: $1,200 audio wiring (Mogami/Neutirk) $1,200 framing contractors (including materials) $1000 for 3 doors $480 for drywall (so far, more to come!) $600 insulation $1,000 Green Glue $120 acoustic caulk $460 electrical wiring (including new circuits - I got the electrician for free) $650 for lighting fixtures (I still have 1 more to buy) $300 for the floor construction (including sand) $250 for tape/mud/drywall tools $100 neoprene $20 backer rod $150 window framing $235 screws/nails/hardware $250 Putty Pads $600 HVAC venting (some labor as well for the cold air returns) I also bought a few tools (!) that I had to have! (Just ask Lou! It is the LAW!!!) Air compressor, air nail gun, t-squares, on and on... I haven't added all the receipts, but I am close to $10,000 at this point, and that is with (mostly) free labor and free flooring. I am estimating about US$12,000 when it is all said and done. My budget started at $5,000, and then quickly went to $8,000 as I started serious planning and looking at the actual costs. I am WAY over budget as you can see. Sucks, doesn't it???

I'm on my way too my friend. What started off as an "I know I'm cutting corners" type of build, has quickly risen to doing it the right way. For me, I had some of my material already and am doing ALL the framing, rocking, etc, etc, (except the electric - which I have a close friend who gave me a great price) - which saves money. It's coming out really nice though. Just do some "extra" recording to re-coup the money.

DH You're NOT sat in your 'hole in the ground', you are making a great job of your project and you certainly don't deserve to be on page 2 of the forum! As for budget, welllllll, I know where you're coming from! For me it is difficult to calculate since my Chill-Out area and kitchen are an integral part of the overall build. All in all, whilst being slightly over, Im still very happy, with room to compromise later if I have to (but you know, of course, I won't!) :wink: Take care, buddy Kind regards Lou. 8)

Thanks Lou! I have been busy, but there is really nothing to show in the way of pictures that would show anything new. We are still putting in the last couple of sheets of drywall (can you believe that?), but I have been mainly involved in the building of my window and door frames. Lots of small pieces that have to be hand-sanded, stained, then polyurathaned, re-sanded, more polyurathane, etc. It takes FOREVER!!! I am almost done with the windows, and will post some pics here soon, I promise! Remember, I am "just a dad" and can really only work on weekends between my "fatherly duties" and on odd evenings when I am in town. I am doing this all alone, so it takes a lot longer. I should probably take a week off of work and just bust out a big chunk. More soon!

Well, even though I am not posting any pictures today, we are making some decent progress. The 2nd layer of drywall is *almost* done! We are down to the final couple of sheets that we just could not finish last night. I am going out of town for the week, but starting Friday night, I am taking a week off of work to get some serious work knocked out. Now when it is all said and done, I will have have hung 74 sheets of 5/8" drywall in my little place! Crazy! The windows frames are now complete, and I am just putting the last couple of touches on them. I will post the entire window build series at once rather than piecemeal. I will order the glass later today, and it will be in by the end of the week. By the end of my one-week vacation, I am hoping to finish the mud and tape work, paint the rooms, lay some flooring, and get the doors and windows hung. I know that is a pretty aggressive schedule, and I may not get *everything* done, but at least it gives me something to shoot for.

Woo-hoo!!! I ordered my glass!!! Bad news is that it won't be here until the last week of November (with the US holidays coming up next week, it delayed things a bit). I went ahead and bit the bullet and ordered 3/4" and 1/2" panes for the main control room window and 3/4" for the rear outside window. (OUCH!!! $$$) Oh well, it's only money! ;)

THE DRYWALL IS HUNG!!! It is a miracle! We actually finished hanging all the drywall last night, and all of the caulking around the perimeters!!! I can't believe it! Have I ever told you folks how much I hate doing drywall? I didn't think so!!! Today, we push on with the tape and mud. Pictures on Monday, I promise!

OK, here is the long-promised update. I am going to warn you, although we have been working our butts off, there is not much to show in the way of pictures since everything looks the same with this layer of drywall as the last. First, here are some pics of the window construction: From the live room looking into the control room. I started with the frame parts that will be supporting most of the weight. These are just pine boards that I stained and covered with several layers of polyurethane (and lots of sanding!). Between the boards, you can see the rubber sheets that were laid between the walls before the framework went it. Here is an old picture as a reminder showing the rubber around the inside between the 2 walls: Here is another shot looking into the CR: Here you can see a close up showing the framework with the semi-buried rubber: The next 3 pictures show the rigid fiberglass sheets that I cut to put between the window frames. This helps close off the hole between the walls, but does not allow for any flanking due to a solid connection between the walls: The rigid fiberglass I used comes from fiberglass ceiling tiles. This was a great suggestion that came from Rod Gervais as it was already the correct thickness for the job. My other option was going to be to slice my thicker fiberglass sheets in half length-wise to get them to the correct thickness. Not a job I wanted to tackle! These tiles are faced with a white, textured plastic coating that easily peeled off to give me a nice clean, thin sheet of fiberglass. Here you can see a couple of the angled stops that I made to get the correct slant to the glass. These are made from 1" poplar, and were cut to a 6 degree angle for the window glass splay. These panels (as well as the rest of the stops) were sanded, stained, and polyurethaned. I then installed them with the miracle sticky stuff, Gorilla Glue, along with counter-sunk wood screws that were filled with wood putty to cover up the holes. I love Gorilla Glue! These next 3 pictures show the angled stops on one side of the window as installed. Here you can see some of the stops drying in the sun: These next 3 shots show the stops in place on both sides of the wall: It took me a while, but I was finally able to find someone that would sell me a small quantity of silicone bead desiccant that will be placed between the windows to help absorb any moisture and to prevent fogging. I ended up having to get a bunch of little bags, but I can easily cut them open when the time comes. Now it is time to cover up the rigid fiberglass between the stops. I used MORE rigid fiberglass, but this time, I covered it with some black ponte cloth. Here is a closeup of the gap WITHOUT the cloth-covered piece: And here is a closeup of the gap WITH one of the cloth-covered pieces inserted between the stops: The glass is due to show up next week some time. I have ordered one 3/4" sheet, and one 1/2" sheet. I will post more pics when I get to the actual glass installation step. Next up, is what I call the "Ugly Window". This is an existing window that was in the back of the basement, and now resides at the back of my control room. I struggled a bit as to what to do with this beast! Apparently, the previous owner has a water leakage problem that he tried to solve by caulking the window edges. Not a good idea, when in reality, he needed to keep the outside window well from filling up with water instead! When we first moved in, and had the first big rain, the well on the outside of this window filled up with water, like an aquarium! That window was never meant to hold standing water, and trying to seal the gaps with caulk was never going to do anything. Instead, I went out the next day, and cleared the small drain at the bottom of the window well, and then built up the outside of the window well with about 3 feet of top soil to get the water to drain AWAY from the window rather than INTO the well. Problem solved. Anyway, here are a couple of pictures of the "ugly window" with the lovely caulking job still in tact: So I scraped, clawed, sanded and dynamited off all of the caulking, and painted the frame this "lovely" shade of brown. My wife about died when she saw that color. It looks a lot like instant pudding! Absolutely horrid! I am not sure what I was thinking! Here is the window with the new window frames in place: Well, I finally had enough of "instant pudding" and painted the window frame black instead: This "Ugly Window" will be getting a 3/4" glass pane installed in the new frame to act as a sound barrier. This is also on order, and will arrive sometime next week. I'll try to take some better pics of this window later. Finally, here are a couple of pictures of the control room as we finally begin the mud and tape work on the second layer of drywall! Amazing! I never thought I would see this day! The first coat of mud and tape is complete for the second layer. Tomorrow, I will begin with some light sanding, and then add the second layer and feather out the tape joints a bit more. 74 sheets of 5/8" drywall, 2.5 cases of acoustic caulk, and 6 cases of Green Glue later, and we are getting close to painting time! From this point on, all of the work that we do will actually SHOW some progress. It seems like the last few weeks we were working soooo hard, but there was nothing new to show. Next steps are: 1) Finish the drywall mud and tape 2) Paint the walls! 3) Install the doors 4) Install the windows 5) Install the flooring All of these steps will at least show some progress, so hopefully, I will be able to post more updates more often now! Thanks to everyone for the support and encouragement! It has been a long journey to this point!

Great detailed progress report. Keep up the good work.

DH, Excellent job on the windows! I know you've got to be relieved that the sheetrock is almost finished. I know that I will be once I get my final inspections cleared and insultion installed. Great job with the photos. It's very helpful to many of us on the forum who are wanting to do the same . The photos are very clear and concise. Thanks, Dan

Yesterday saw a boatload of sanding. Sand, sand, sand... My knuckles hurt this morning, and I am not sure if I can even grab a sanding block or a putty knife! What a mess!!! Tons of dust in the air, and trust me, it gets into *EVERY* nook and cranny! I got the control room finished, except for the ceiling, which I will finish this morning. Next, it is on to the airlock hallway, and then the iso room and then finally the dividing wall between the live room and the back rooms. Lots to do still!!! After sanding the live room, I applied the second coat of mud on the taped seams and screw holes. These will require a second LIGHT sanding, and possibly a third coat of mud in some selected areas or wherever I might have missed a spot. Hopefully, I can get some painting done before the weekend ends. These next 2 pics show the live room with the second layer of mud (except the ceiling). You can see that I sealed the openings with plastic sheets to contain some of the dust. Every few minutes, I would pull out my over-worked Shop Vac and try to pick up as much of the dust as I can. What a mess! You can see from the pictures that the ceiling looks pretty rough still. I will get that sanded, and then apply the second layer of mud first thing today.

fantastic! Great job on the windows.

The whole thing looks predictably awesome buddy - keep up the great work. :wink: :wink: Window - 'Schmindow' :wink: :wink: :wink: Kind regards, Lou. 8)

My understanding is the best TL for a double window system is when the panes are parallel. The sympathetic resonance that can occur with parallel panes is far less of an issue than the basic distance between panes. If the panes are like you have them, then the point at which they are closest is the best TL rating you will get from the window. The best setup is to have the panes as far apart from each other as possible at all points. If you want to angle them, put them both at the same angle (not opposing) to maintain the same distance between. Reflection control on both sides of the glass can still be achieved with a parallel setup. bassman

Bassman: Thanks for your post. Yes, I have heard about the advantages and disadvantages of sloped glass vs. parallel glass. Based on the information that I have at hand, I decided to go this route, although it would have been a heck of a lot easier to go parallel! I am mostly concerned with with visual reflections. You hint at ways to deal with that and yet still keep parallel panes. Can you expand on this? Lou: You are just jealous! You *wish* you had a window in your little studio! Your place looks like such an amateur job, I can't believe you can even bring yourself to visit these fora without hanging your head in shame!!! ;) "Window-Schmindow" indeed!!! :) Haha! jwl: Thanks! How's your live rig working out?

'Napoleon wrote:'

Lou: You are just jealous! You *wish* you had a window in your little studio! Your place looks like such an amateur job, I can't believe you can even bring yourself to visit these fora without hanging your head in shame!!! "Window-Schmindow" indeed!!! Haha!

:lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: You're a total star DH :wink: Awesome, and regards, Lou. 8) P.S. I will be doing parallel glass panes though - and, as far apart as I can get them! A bit like tightly packed jeans really!! Man - we all sound like porn barons!