vocal/guitar booth plans

oldboy · Post by **oldboy** » Wed Apr 21, 2004 7:51 am

Hi all,
This site is really great, thanks for providing a great resource. I am building a small vocal/guitar booth, and I have a couple design questions. So far I have inside dimensions of 5x6x7, with frame of 2x4 wood studs and walls/floor/ceiling of 5/8’’sheetrock, fiberglass, 5/8’’sheetrock , 1/2’’sheetrock, 5/8’’sheetrock going from inside out, then entire booth resting on neoprene strips. This booth will be my “small room” within a room (the outer room is 5/8’’,1/2’’,5/8’’, fiberglass, outer wood wall) to keep out the outside noise. I live near an airport =(. My questions are:

1) How do I connect my mic cables, monitor/keyboard/mouse cables from the outside to the inside of the vocal booth? I read somewhere that you put them through PVC piping and then stuff it with insulation. So I just drill a cylindrical path through my wall when I’m done and then put the PVC in there – is this effective? Are there any other methods that work well, e.g. using wall plates, or are there boxes that can be purchased for this purpose?

2) Are the dimensions of 5x6x7 okay in terms of modes? Instead of a 5x6 rectangular base, should I angle the walls or consider any modifications?

3) With these dimensions what type of acoustic treatment should I do? I will be recording vocals and acoustic guitar, so will auralex foam along the ceiling and walls and vinyl on the floor do the trick?

4) Any suggestions for lighting that won’t cause too much noise? I will already have the flat-screen monitor noise inside the booth, which hopefully won’t be too bad, but I’m not sure how noisy lighting fixtures are in that space.

I will upload a drawing of my booth plans later tonight. Thank you kindly for your input.

- oldboy

dymaxian · Post by **dymaxian** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 12:28 am

Greetings! Sounds like you have a pretty solid plan to keep that room quiet. Being next to an airport, you've got a lot to worry about, but that plan is about the most you can do. Spend some time around the door (I'm sure you will) and you should have all the isolation you can hope for...

1) How do I connect my mic cables, monitor/keyboard/mouse cables from the outside to the inside of the vocal booth? I read somewhere that you put them through PVC piping and then stuff it with insulation. So I just drill a cylindrical path through my wall when I’m done and then put the PVC in there – is this effective? Are there any other methods that work well, e.g. using wall plates, or are there boxes that can be purchased for this purpose?

You're going to put the computer peripherals in here? If you have a control room outside, I don't see the purpose of this. Especially being that small- your computer desk will take up half the room. Even without putting monitor speakers in here, there won't be much left. Is it just for control of the recording system while you're tracking your own performance? If you had a really small desk, I suppose it'd work...

Anyway, your question- Yeah, having PVC penetrations will work if you don't let the pipes couple your wall system together. If it'll be penetrating 2 wall 'leaves' then use 2 shorter sections of pipe that are almost touching or are caulked end-to-end. And if you can, try to put a bend in it as it goes out into the next room, so low freq sound can't just drill straight thru. Make it turn at least one corner.

Essentially, try to treat it like an HVAC penetration.

2) Are the dimensions of 5x6x7 okay in terms of modes? Instead of a 5x6 rectangular base, should I angle the walls or consider any modifications?

Those dimensions should be fine. You could angle 2 of the walls so there aren't any parallels, but with a vocal booth this size I don't know that you'll be having modal problems from just voice or guitar. If you're planning to put a Marshall stack in there at full volume, that'd be different...

3) With these dimensions what type of acoustic treatment should I do? I will be recording vocals and acoustic guitar, so will auralex foam along the ceiling and walls and vinyl on the floor do the trick?

Auralex will work. You'd get more bang-for-buck out of rigid fiberglass panels wrapped in fabric. If you get a few boxes of 2" fiberglass and can space it out from the walls 2", you'll get all the absorption you need. Again, if you'll be recording any loud, bass-heavy instruments this would be different, but voice and acoustic guitar won't be piling up room modes on you very much.

I'm presuming here that you'd want it to be as dead as possible. With that size of room, that'd be my choice...

4) Any suggestions for lighting that won’t cause too much noise? I will already have the flat-screen monitor noise inside the booth, which hopefully won’t be too bad, but I’m not sure how noisy lighting fixtures are in that space.

Compact fluorescent bulbs use a different ballast than the big tube fluorescents, and make less noise. They interact with electric guitar pickups a lot less, but that's not a concern unless you're recording an electric-acoustic. Otherwise incandescent bulbs should be quiet- they'll generate a lot more heat, tho.

I wouldn't think the monitor would make too much noise unless there's something wrong with it. Maybe I just never hear my monitor over the noise from the computer fans... but even when I close off my computer's box, the monitor never bothers me. That's a regular, non-flat-screen CRT tho- are the flat screens noisier? How about the LCDs?

I've spent so much thought on controlling the fan noise from the box that I haven't worried about the monitor.

Hope this helps!

Kase
www.minemusic.net

Post by **Aaronw** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 5:20 am

Hello,

1) How do I connect my mic cables, monitor/keyboard/mouse cables from the outside to the inside of the vocal booth? I read somewhere that you put them through PVC piping and then stuff it with insulation. So I just drill a cylindrical path through my wall when I’m done and then put the PVC in there – is this effective? Are there any other methods that work well, e.g. using wall plates, or are there boxes that can be purchased for this purpose?

Kase's right on this. Be sure to use acoustical sealant around the outside of the pvc piping where it pentrates through the wall. Then you can also just stuff insulation in the pipe. You can also do the same, but put a connection plate on the wall for the connecting everything to, but often times, the fewer connections, the better.

Any suggestions for lighting that won’t cause too much noise? I will already have the flat-screen monitor noise inside the booth, which hopefully won’t be too bad, but I’m not sure how noisy lighting fixtures are in that space.

For this small of a space, if you want "mood" lighting, you can just string up some christmas lights (clear/white) or something like that. As far as a monitor, for as cheap as they are now, go pick up an LCD screen. It'll save you space, and won't be noisy.

Aaron

knightfly · Post by **knightfly** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 7:14 am

besides all the good info you're picking up, I've been trying to find time to design/build/publish a plan set for a free-standing booth, but the finished deal will continue to elude me til I get some things out of my hair around here - one thing I was able to (barely) start on was ventilation - bought one of those "duct booster" fans, just the small 4" one that fits inline for distant heat vents - the thing is fairly quiet, relatively cheap ($20) and fits fairly snugly into 4" ABS sewer pipe (the black plastic kind) - have an idea for an "omega" shaped duct with the fan at the outside, that may work pretty well for booth vent.

As much time/effort as this project will take, I'm most likely going to figure out a paid download (probably in the range of $10 for package including pix, plans, BOM, and end results. (I can only afford so much "freebie" contribution, and have already exceeded that)

The good news is, if/when I finish it will be WELL worth the $ - the bad news is, it could take several months before I get to that point.

Meantime, I see no glaring problems with what you're doing, your modes are as good as possible, and no one has steered you wrong in any way I can see... Steve

oldboy · Post by **oldboy** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 6:31 pm

Wow, thanks everyone for the great replies. Kase, I’m planning on controlling my computer from the vocal booth, so that I can start/stop recording myself – the monitors and pc tower will be outside (along with their set of screen/keyboard/mouse). Since I’m doing just vocals and acoustic guitar I think I’ll go with the Auralex foam. Aaron – I like the idea of Christmas mood lights, that’s pretty cool. I’m piping from inside the vocal booth to an open room (18x20), so coupling walls won’t be an issue. I see that whisperbooth and vocalbooth use roughly 3’’ cable tubes. That diameter seems a bit large, I may go with 2’’ pipes – anyone have suggestions? I’m thinking of the following mapping: PVC1: flatscreen, keyboard, mouse, headphones, extension cord (for light fixture), and PVC2: 3 mic cables. Are there any crosstalk issues with putting multiple cables through a single PVC pipe? It seems that minimizing the number of pipes is better for soundproofing (Aaron, I take it you were saying that plates would increase the number of pipes since each plate needs a dedicated pipe). As for acoustic sealant where the piping meets the wall, is caulk sufficient, or is there some recommended product? Also, I don’t have much carpentry experience – for drilling the hole for the PVC through the wall, do I just use a power drill, gradually increase the diameter of the hole, and pray I drill straight? Is there some method to facilitate making the hole through the booth wall?

Steve, thanks for the booth venting suggestion – I think I may incorporate that at some later date. I’d be willing to pay for the plans, but unfortunately I need to start this booth relatively soon. I have an idea for HVAC on the 18x20 room that is cheap and seems reasonably effective. The plan is install a window A/C unit directly into the wall (i.e. cut a rectangular hole in the wall, caulk around the A/C unit), and then build a soundproof enclosure (sheetrock, insulation) around the part of the A/C unit that extends into the room. This enclosure will have a soundproof door that can be opened when cooling the room, and closed when recording (after turning the A/C is off). A soundproofed ventilation path could be built on the outside for further isolation, but even without that I think this would provide a decent amount of isolation. It seems like a reasonable solution for those of us on a budget. Any thoughts?

Thanks again everyone for the feedback. Sorry about asking so many basic questions – I’m learning a lot, thankfully, from the replies and the forum in general.

- oldboy

cadesignr · Post by **cadesignr** » Thu Apr 22, 2004 11:40 pm

Hello guys, well, I thought I would toss this in just for illustration purposes. I have the other sections but no time to post right now.
Maybe this will help and maybe not.

fitZ

dymaxian · Post by **dymaxian** » Fri Apr 23, 2004 12:42 am

Are there any crosstalk issues with putting multiple cables through a single PVC pipe?

I wouldn't think so. XLR mic cables are, by their nature, balanced, so any noise introduced thru the cable run will be cancelled out when it gets to the other end.

Kase
www.minemusic.net

sap · Post by **sap** » Wed May 19, 2004 5:01 pm

I have a 12'X17' building that I would like to turn into a home studio. I play guitar and I have a 2X12 amp (carvin legacy). The amp is real loud. I would like to get a good recording with the amp cranked. My question is should I build an isolation box for the amp or a guitar/vocal room? I like the room idea better because I'm afraid my amp will overheat in the box. If I build the room I will use the idea oldboy has. Any suggestions will be appriciated. thanks.

knightfly · Post by **knightfly** » Thu May 20, 2004 1:32 am

Sap, even Carvin's vintage 16 in the 5 watt position is too loud to crank without some kind of booth, I wish someone would offer something like this in a half or one watt configuration - You're on the right track with the booth, and those dimensions are good ones. If you only use absorption on the upper half of the room, you can use a stand to raise/lower the amp depending on how "live" you want the sound... Steve