I just inherited a 20 x 18 room to renivate...please help

Hey gang, First my background, Me (Paul V): I am a sound designer, recording engineer, and professional keyboardist and percussionist Location of planned room: Set back on 20 acres of land in Racine, WI USA Details: I just inherited a room on my father's property so the good news is I have no rent. The room as it sits (former work room) is 20' x 18' with a single door in the south/west corner of one of the long walls. The room is on a cement slab and is in a metal pole barn. Available ceiling height is 12' slanted sideways up to 18'. In my current and smaller single room I record everything from loud tube amps to drums and vocals. My goal in this space would be to have either a control room and a live room or a control room, drum booth / vocal & guitar booth. My budget is around 20k in the next year, but my father just finished home remodeling and has tons of extra materials (wood and drywall available), plus he is one of those folks who barters for everything and pays retail for nothing. My only other points are that: I do speaker reviews occasionally and would prefer to not use sofit mounted speakers as I need to switch out and line up monitors for test purposes, plus I am looking at barefoot micro mains which are side ported for bass. I have a large keyboard rig and percussion collection which needs to be housed in the control room (theoretically) as well as clients and my recording gear (which right now is just an 8 channel control surface). Any help and layout would be appreciated. I cannot figure out sketch up yet sorry. I may be able to knock down a wall and add 3 to 4 more feet to the 20" length, but that would be way more costly. Thanks, Paul V

Aloha and welcome to the forum! :D Congrats on your studio build! Before we get started, we need to do a little housekeeping. Any chance you could please:

Edit your profile to include your location. This is very important, because this is a worldwide resource, and as such, material costs and availability vary widely. For example, masonry is cheaper than gypsum in some parts of the globe, whereas it's the exact opposite in other regions.

You'll probably get more of a response by doing so and this will really come in handy two or three posts down the road. It's also part of the forum guidelines. Thanks! :wink: For more info, check out both of these links - http://www.johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=7572 http://www.johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=3231 Okay, now that that's done, does this fit skp file your description correctly? If so, it will give us a place to start. Pics work well too, by the way. :wink: Aloha 8)

Aloha, Perhaps something like this? (rough layout - live room & vocal booth treatments to be added) In Rod Gervais’ book “Build it Like the Pros,” http://www.johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=5670 he points out both L.W.Sepmeyer’s & M.M. Louden’s formulas most widely used in professional studios worldwide. He also notes that the orders listed are (top to bottom) the first to third best ratios in both cases. L.W. Sepmeyer Height Width Length 1.00 1.14 1.39 12’ x 13’7” x 16’7” 11’ x 12’5” x 15’3” 10’ x 11’4” x 13’9” 1.00 1.28 1.54 1.00 1.60 2.33 M.M. Louden Height Width Length 1.00 1.40 1.90 12’ x 16’8” x 22’8” 1.00 1.30 1.90 1.00 1.50 2.10 Eric Desart on Louden’s Ratios http://www.johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewt ... ght=#64490 1.00, 1.35, 1.85 12’ x 16’2” x 22’2” 11’ x 14’8” x 20’3” Using L.W. Sepmeyer's ratio @ 10 ceilings will give you room for a control room, vocal booth and live room. 10’ x 11’4” x 13’9” to start wth, but will that be enough room for your gear + clients? Aloha 8)

Updated the profile...thought I did that already, but my computer lost conection...anyway. Man you guys arw quick. Thanks for the sketches already. The front vocal booth is cool, I did not think about that...I figured I was looking at one long control room and two smaller rooms. With a booth that long I could safely track a guitarist or 3 piece vocal group. The one mistake I made in my description is that the door is actually on the other side (top part of the same wall, just slide it up)...but I think flipping the whole thing top to bottom is a good idea, as the bottom part is the outer wall, so having the tracking room on top (not on the outer wall may be a wise choice. Anyone here have experience sound proofing a tin roof? Also on a concriet slab, how necessary is it to float the floor? Can I get away with just floating the tracking room and vocal booth ? Any other thoughts would be great and this is already a big help. Construction if approved wont start till spring of next year, and I will provide pix when I start and I am sure I will have a ton of questions along the way. Paul

you might build an inner ceiling to get the isolation you need, and then a false ceiling over the rooms to put in hanging traps. this way the rooms feel proportional and have all the right angles, plus you get to use the overhead space for trapping and that may save some space on the floor. search around this site for numerous pros and cons of floating floors - you might only need it in an acoustic drum booth. it really depends on how much isolation you really need though... here's what i came up with - Kendale's design is more pragmatic and may be more effective.

Wow, I like it, but you are right I think, Kendale's design may be more practical and cost effective, but cool keep the ideas coming...and again thanks!!! Paul

Aloha, Thanks for updating your profile, Paul. :D Nice layout, Glenn! :wink: I would agree with you on

build an inner ceiling to get the isolation you need, and then a false ceiling over the rooms to put in hanging traps.

Here's the sticky on floating floors - http://www.johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=8173 and here are a couple of more views with wall treatments. Aloha 8)