First Design - Not trying to get it "perfect"

[5meohd]

Am I fine in starting with Eric Desart's Louden research for my "rectangular" room I want to build?

as posted here: http://www.bobgolds.com/EricDesart/newl ... 002xz7.jpg

Some things you might wonder about:

It will be build inside of a ~4200 sqFT room. It is a large open space in an old industrial district.

14 FT ceilings.

Lets start out assuming that I am not concerned with a "live room" or any "booths".

My partner and I have priorities:

Our experimental electronic music is FIRST. (synths, analog and DAW based)
A desire to help other local musicians create is SECOND.

We are going to eventually (probably) go with the Wilmslow Audio ATC clone kit. Probably the K100.

For now we have Equator 10".

I will edit this with a proper (opinionated) weighting scale, but here is a rough list of "needs".

1: Acoustic Response
2: Vibe
3: Space (floor space, seating, storage etc..)

But lets just assume we do NOT have nearly the budget it would take to get a "perfect" response!!

[JCBigler]

You don't have nearly enough information to provide any quality suggestions on how to approach this design.

Help us help you

and then read this post for an example of a thorough and qualitative first post Stuart's first post

It will be build inside of a ~4200 sqFT room. It is a large open space in an old industrial district.

14 FT ceilings.

Are you serious about that number? 4,200 square feet is a HUGE amount of space. Is that correct or is it a typo?

It would cost a small fortune just to wrap that space in a single layer of sheet rock, to say nothing of multiple layers.

Also, why go through all the trouble of building a studio if it's not going to be perfect? Buy once, cry once. Do it right the first time.

[5meohd]

To clarify.

I mean, literally, I will be building my room INSIDE of the larger space. So I can decide on a length and width proportional to the (fixed) 14 FT cieling.

I didn't word that properly before! Sorry.

I'm really only trying to find the answer to my first question.

Are Loudens ratios good to use as a starting point for drafting?

[JCBigler]

Not the answer you want to hear, but you might want to start by reading these two books:

Home Recording Studio: Build it like the Pros

and Master Handbook of Acoustics

[Soundman2020]

There is an announcement at the top of the forum about what to do to assure getting as many responses as possible.
The announcement leads to this post (click here). Actually, several people, who are experts on this forum, will most likely not reply if you don't do what is written in that post. Many others who are very helpful, will most likely not reply out of respect for the moderators' wishes.

- Stuart -

[5meohd]

Location filled out. (Sorry, I signed up months ago, read that, and swore I filled it out)

Unfortunately I do not have a lot of the other details asked for in that sticky.

I believe two of my walls (one corner) will end up being exposed brick on one, and big loft/warehouse paned windows with brick above and below on the other. I would then build out the other two walls. Ideally I'm leaving the exposed brick and windows for vibe. I can hang/float/cart any type of treatment that I "need".

The entire floor will be split into four basic sections:

1: Residential (a couple bachelor friends with little cause for concern noise wise)

2: Lutherie shop/studio (those two guys)

3: My control room/sound design studio

4: A middle section that could have a triple use.. a "by appointment" retail shop for the guitars/repairs, an intimate venue where we can set up my PA (custom Bill FitzMaurice rig 4x T60's), AND a Live room. This does make sense to us because none of us want those things to be a full time gig, yet desire to have access to "something along those lines".. so lumping them together should be a pretty cool concept.

Roughly we are looking at 1,000 sqft each for the Work Shop, Residential, and Control Room.. Leaving the "middle section" to be whatever is left over.

Which is why I'm simply asking if Louden's ratios are a good starting point. According to his ratios, the interior dimension of my control room with 14 ft cielings would be LESS than 1000. I'm trying to grasp if that means I can then build a second set of walls outside of that to help with bleed a little.

So...

What do you think of Philip Newell's book Recording Studio Design? I was recommended that before the two above.

What do you guys think about Louden's ratios? To the extent of simply telling my "roomates" that I will indeed be able to get by with 1000 sqft.

[Soundman2020]

I mean, literally, I will be building my room INSIDE of the larger space. So I can decide on a length and width proportional to the (fixed) 14 FT cieling.

I'm not sure I understand why the inner-leaf ceiling has to be fixed at 14 feet. Is that a legal requirement? If not, then why would you not be able to set your inner-leaf at whatever height is suitable for the ratio you want? You say you are building this as a "room within a room", which is indeed the best way of getting good isolation at the lowest cost, so if that's the case, then surely you should be able to build your ceiling at any height that makes sense? If you are free to decide on length and width for your inner-leaf, then what is preventing you from also deciding on height?

Are Loudens ratios good to use as a starting point

Louden's ratios are as good as any as a starting point. Sepmeyer, Bolt, Volkman, Boner... they are all good starting points. As long as you stay well away from the "bad" ratios and get reasonably close to one of those "good" ones, then you should be fine. There's a lot more to studio design than just the room ratio! There's no need to get hung up on that too much.

But lets just assume we do NOT have nearly the budget it would take to get a "perfect" response!!

Budget is usually more related to isolation than to treatment. In order to get high levels of isolation you usually do need a large budget, but treatment is a bit different, and can be accomplished on a more reasonable budget... assuming, of course, that the room has reasonable acoustics to start with! Curved walls, asymmetric geometry, cube shape, low ceilings, very small or volume or very large volume, windows/doors in the wrong place, lousy construction materials, poor floor, and similar things can all trash your acoustics, and also trash your ability to treat the room well. Assuming all of those are in order, and that isolation is taken care of, then treatment can be relatively inexpensive.

The entire floor will be split into four basic sections:

So if I'm understanding that right, then your two bachelor buddies will be taking care of their pad and workshop all at their own expense, you'll be taking care of your control room at your own expense, and between the three of you, you'll be doing the shared central room, which will be a love room sometimes, a rehearsal room sometimes, and also a guitar repair shop sometimes? Is that correct? If so, I'd suggest you re-think that: there's no problem at all with a room doing double-duty as a live room and also a rehearsal space, but I sure wouldn't want my live room to also be an instrument repair shop! Sawdust, cleaning materials, chemicals, scraps, tools, etc... not good things to have in a live room, where sensitive microphones and instruments also need to live... If you have 4,500 square feet, then there should be no problem at all finding enough space to put that repair shop elsewhere. I also don't see the need for it at all, since you already mentioned a lutherie shop as part of the design, so why can't the lutherie shop also be a repair shop? That's pretty much the exact same thing....

According to his ratios, the interior dimension of my control room with 14 ft cielings would be LESS than 1000.

Which specific Louden ratio where you talking about? He came up with several... Also, a thousand squere feet for a control room is HUGE. Specs from places such as the AES, EBU, ITU etc. recommend smaller areas for control rooms. For example, ITU recommends a minimum of 20 m2 and a maximum of 60m2 for a 2-channel (2.0, 2.1, etc.) room, and 30 m2 min. to 70 m2 max. for a multi-channel room (5.1, 7.1, etc). Your room would be over 90 m2, so it would be out of spec for world-class control room. You'd also need a ginormous live room to work well with such a large control room, something on the order of 5000 square feet or so. I'd really suggest that you should re-think your room volume down a bit, to something more usable. You did imply that you don't have much budget for this, and the larger the room is the more money you'd need to treat it....

I'm trying to grasp if that means I can then build a second set of walls outside of that to help with bleed a little.

I think you need to read those books that JC mentioned, in order to understand the principles of room isolation! If you were to build another shell around your inner-leaf, when it is already located within an enclosing outer-leaf, then that would create a 3-leaf system, so your isolation would be WORSE, not better, all other things being equal. Fully-decoupled two-leaf MSM isolation is the most effective, least expensive method for getting good isolation. If you go to three-leaf, then you will need a lot more mass to compensate for the lost isolation, which adds a lot more cost, and takes up a lot more room.

What do you think of Philip Newell's book Recording Studio Design? I was recommended that before the two above.

Personally, I'm not a big fan of some of Newell's methods. He does have some good stuff in his books, and he does seem to have built quite a few good studios, but his basic "bass-leaky inner-leaf and massive asymmetrical outer-leaf" approach just doesn't make a lot of sense for me. I prefer the more tried-and-tested Tom Hidley / John Sayers / Rod Gervais / Eric Desart style of isolation, and the RFZ design concept (with its variations).

What do you guys think about Louden's ratios? To the extent of simply telling my "roomates" that I will indeed be able to get by with 1000 sqft.

Once again, "getting by" with 1,000 square feet for just a single control room is way overkill. I'm not aware of any professional studios with such enormous control rooms. Personally, I have designed entire three-room and even four-room studios in less space than that! With a thousand square feet of floor area, you have enough space for a good-sized control room, a nice live room, and an isolation booth at least, and you could likely fit in a vocal booth too, with careful design.

Here's a control room I designed that was recently completed:

Control-Room-Final-690x400.png

It is pretty big, as you can see: But still only about HALF the size of what you are proposing. This one is a little over 500 square feet. I'm really not sure what you'd do with a control room twice as big as this one. Treating it would be a nightmare, too...

So my suggestion would be to scale down your control room to something more typical and more useful, then use the extra space for additional rooms.

- Stuart -

[5meohd]

Beautiful work Stuart. Thanks you.

This is more along the lines of what we want/estimate we can afford:

edit: photos WAY too big. Link for reference: http://reviews.headphonecommute.com/201 ... r-deupree/

This is because we need "vibe". So yea we may come down from 1000, or possible take advantage of your help and create a booth or something. I just wanted to be clear that an open "techno jam" room is the priority. And considering our workflow is "dub" style using the console and FX racks in the creative process.. We don't want to split up the console from the synths and couches.

The reason for not adjusting the ceiling is 80% financial and 20% aesthetic. We are very excited about the look and feel of the old timber warehouse space. In fact the landlord doesn't want too much of it covered, but getting a help here, helps with explaining certain needs like that, as they arise.

And NO! No "Wood shop" in the live room! Just a few custom display cases, and some available amps/cabs for their customers to check out, by appointment only.

[Soundman2020]

I just wanted to be clear that an open "techno jam" room is the priority. And considering our workflow is "dub" style using the console and FX racks in the creative process.. We don't want to split up the console from the synths and couches.

Then you most definitely do NOT want a huge room, where you'd have to space things faaaaar apart and also have lousy acoustics! Much better to have a smaller room where everything is within reach, and the acoustics are also good.

This is more along the lines of what we want/estimate we can afford:

Please check the forum rules about posting photos: Those are about 5 times bigger than the rules allow...

That room looks to be maybe 300 to 400 square feet, roughly, from what can be seen in the photos. You are talking about having a room about three times bigger. You'd also need very large (and very expensive) speakers to be able to handle such a room with good accuracy.

The room in the photo also has poor acoustics, since it is not laid out well, and the acoustic treatment is insufficient for a control room. But the size is about right for what you need. You could go a bit bigger than that if you want to, but certainly not three times larger.

The reason for not adjusting the ceiling is 80% financial and 20% aesthetic. We are very excited about the look and feel of the old timber warehouse space.

Unfortunately, you cannot have good isolation ("soundproofing") if you also want to keep the look exactly as it is. The laws of physics absolutely prevent that. You can duplicate the "warehouse look" inside your rooms, for sure, but you cannot have the current walls and ceiling as the inner-leaf and also have good isolation. You are asking for something that is physically impossible.

In order to have good isolation for your control room, you need to build a "room within a room", which implies building four walls on top of the existing concrete slab floor, then building a new ceiling on top of those new walls. All of that cannot touch the existing walls or ceiling anywhere. There can be no mechanical connections at all between the two. So your new walls and ceiling are an independent self-contained unit that just happens to sit on the same original concrete floor. That's what a "room within a room" is, and that's how you get good isolation. The "room ratio" that you were asking about applies only to the walls of that inner-room: not to the walls of the existing outer-room. So you would design your inner-leaf room using one of those ratios, then you can adjust the length, width and height as much as you want to get a good ratio, with the only limitation being that you need to leave enough empty air gap between the new walls/ceiling and the existing walls/ceiling in order to get the amount of isolation that you need.

Isolation and treatment are two entirely different and separate aspects of your room. First you isolate to the level needed, and you do that by selecting the correct building materials, the correct thickness of the materials, the correct size of the air gap between the leaves, and the correct type of insulation to go in inside the gap. There are equations for calculating all of that.

Once you have the isolation correct, then you do the acoustic treatment inside the room to get the right acoustic response for the room. That is also calculated using equations according to the purpose of the room, and according to the specifications for control rooms, as published by organizations such as the ITU, EBU, AES, and many others.

Once you have all of those technical aspects worked out, then and ONLY then can you worry about the "vibe": how will the place look. That's all about decoration, not about acoustics. The vibe can be taken into account when designing the isolation, and it can also be taken into account when designing the treatment, but not the other way around: you can't start with a required "vibe" then try to force the acoustics to work for that! That would be like a chef first deciding what a meal should look like, without caring about how it tastes. Chefs don't do that: they want their meals to taste good, so they choose the ingredients and methods to make that happen first, then they figure out how to present it attractively on the plate, so that it looks good too. But you'll never see a chef compromising on taste just to make his meal look better! The first and most important function of his meal is to taste great, then based on that, he comes up with creative ways of presenting and decorating his creation.

That's how studios are built too: first comes the acoustics, then comes the look.

There's a principle in studio design called "form follows function", which basically means that you shape and treat the room according to its purpose: this is going to be a STUDIO, so it should be designed as a studio that sounds good, then the looks can be adjusted to match whatever aesthetic style you happen to like. If you want a rustic warehouse look, then you can get that, but only after the structure has been designed firstly to isolate to the level you want, then to sound great acoustically. The look is just the "icing on the cake". The look of a recording studio is not the basic function: how it sounds is the basic function. The look is just an add-on.

If you design your room first for look, then tyro to worry about making it sound good later, you are doomed to failure at the worst, and just mediocre sound at best, because you will be forced to try to adapt the acoustics to the look, which does not work.

In fact the landlord doesn't want too much of it covered,

So hoe exactly were you planning to build the room??? You did say "I will be building my room INSIDE of the larger space", which clearly implies that you will be building a room! And "building a room" sort of implies that you 'll be covering up what is already there...

but getting a help here, helps with explaining certain needs like that, as they arise.

You seem to be going about this whole things backwards! Studio design is not about rushing ahead and trying to fix things each time you hit a snag: Studio design is all about thinking through every single possibility in advance, taking it all into account, and carefully designing and planning every aspect, before you every buy a single nail or stud.

Sorry to be harsh like that, but it's the truth. One thing this forum is known for, is "no sugar coating". We just tell it like it is, and sometimes that can come across as hurtful. That's not the intention at all: we are here to help, and all of the above is just that: even though everyone here so far is telling you that you are doing it totally wrong, that's not because we are trying to insult you, or make you feel bad, but rather because we want to help you!

Plain and simple: if you carry on with your current method of thinking about this studio, it will not work out well. Acoustics is a huge subject, and it takes time to learn about it. Studio design is also a huge subject, and also takes a long time to learn. Ditto for construction. There are aspects you haven't even thought about yet, such as the HVAC and electrical systems, or how to isolate doors and windows, or how to deal with the signal cables and patch panels, or how to set up the room geometry correctly, ... all of that has to be put into place in the initial design.

So my advice would be for you guys to take a step back, buy and read the books that JC mentioned (they are the best), then spend a few months learning the basics of acoustics, and the basics of studio design, then spend a few more months actually designing the studio, working through the equations to make sure that it will work as intended (both for isolation and also for acoustic response), and only then, when you have all of that complete, only then should you start buying materials and building your place.

Once again, sorry to just lay it out like that bluntly, but that's the hard truth here: you don't yet have the knowledge that you need to build the place, and based on that lack of knowledge you are making decisions that will force it to end up as a lousy studio. It might look wonderful, but it won't be much use acoustically. And it can be both at onece, if you do it right...


- Stuart -

[5meohd]

No hurt feelings Stuart.

But I should note.. While I admit to being a total "noob" with studio design and acoustics, I did conplete an associates in audio engineering.

So a lot of the concepts you're warning me about.. Im aware.

Which is why the thread title says "NOT perfect".

We are allowed to divide the space into sections and do as we wish with those interior walls. But he does not want the cieling or brick walls messed with too much. Of course, Im trying to say, that with proper tools to argument the NEED to do so, I can likely get it done.

BUT. This isnt a permanent spot for me. I do not want to spend the money or the time to get it to levels of a proper control room. I simply can't. That would be a BAD decision based on the fact that I am planning to build my own home and proper studio in the next five years.

This space is simply a bonus. The guys doing the Lutherie and loft apartment are good friends. They want access to my recording technology. I want a larger space than the tiny 150sqft room I have that is also a storage room for my father in-law. Lol.

What you say about "form then function" is 100% true for a control room aimed at making $$$, especially when designed for working with/recording "other" people.

When talking about a personal creative space I would argue that the form starts to take a heavier weight.. I simply do not want to be boxed into a room with no character and no sunlight. I will take an acoustic compromise over that feeling anyday.

So maybe this is the wrong place to be asking?

Is impossible to get help in creating something that doesn't go the whole nine?

When I build in the backyard in the future, i can design form and function together. For this spot (the next year or two) I can't.

Surely their are some things to do to improve upon "building walls at totally uneducated dimensions and loading in gear".

I have thought about HVAC of course!! In fact new AC has to be installed.. Im quite concerned about that being a transmission line for the audio going strait to a friends bedroom.

[Soundman2020]

Is impossible to get help in creating something that doesn't go the whole nine?

Not at all! It's just a matter of choosing which is more important. You can have good isolation, good acoustics, and good looks. That's not a problem, and that's what studio design is all about: making sure all three aspects are taken care of. But the "good looks" part comes at the end, once the isolation and treatment needs have been decided. If you look around the forum, you'll see many different styles of decoration, from rustic to modern, some with lots of visible wood, others with no visible wood, some dark colored, some light colored, some with contrasting colors. some have lots of glass, some have no glass at all. Some have very spartan looks, with just basic simple lines, others have "busy" looks, with lots of visible details. Some have bright lighting, some have subdued, soft lighting. It all depends on the personal tastes of the owner. There's a hug range of things that can be done in terms of decoration, look, style, aesthetics. But once again, all of that is done around the underlying necessity of making sure the room sounds good. Just like a chef that would never think of putting some pretty decoration in the plate that would taste disgusting, or poison the eater, so too an acoustician would never use a decorative object or style in the room if it would make it sound bad or "poison" the acoustics.

That's the message I'm trying to get across. Rooms can and should and do look great: just not at the expense of the acoustics. I have been in many wonderful looking architectural masterpieces... that sound like crap! Because the architect gave first priority to aesthetics, and non to acoustics. I have also been in equally wonderful looking architectural masterpieces that sounded fantastic, where the architect had designed the aesthetics and acoustics together. And of course, I've also been in some rooms that sounds spectacular, but looked like the inside of a dog's breakfast... where no architecture was involved at all! So that's what I'm trying to say here: good studio design is about both: first getting the room to sound good, then working with that to get it looking good to.

For example, a large room, such as you are talking about, will need a lot of diffusion. Perhaps large Schroeder diffusers, or poly-cylindrical diffusers, or maybe simple geometric diffusers... They could be made visible to the room, and built from raw unfinished wood recovered from a demolition site if you wanted a very rustic look, or they could be carefully sanded and varnished to warm tones that complement the wall, ceiling and floor colors if you wanted that type of look... or they could be totally hidden behind fabric fronts, so they are not visible at all in the room. In all three cases, they would perform just as well, from the acoustic point of view, but would fit three totally different aesthetic styles. That's what I mean by "form follows function". First you figure out what type of treatment is needed, and the location in the room where it has to go in order to do its job acoustically, then you take a look at the various ways each device can be built, the various options that could be used in terms of materials, colors, finishes, etc. and figure out which combination best fits the aesthetic you want for the room.

That, as opposed to the incorrect path some people take, where they happen to see something they like and decide to put it into the room anyway, without thinking about what effect it will have on the acoustics. For example, a couple of years ago I designed a home studio for a guy in Canada, and after it was finished he went out and bought a very nice looking, very large, thick fluffy throw-rug, to completely cover the floor between the chair and the sofa... and it trashed his high frequency response! All of a sudden he lost all the clarity in the highs, and lost the spatial clues in the stereo imaging... we figured it out pretty quick, of course, and he took his rug back to the store, and swapped it for an equally nice looking but much more acoustically suitable rug, that was smaller, thinner, less fluffy, and properly located in the room. And he got his high-end back again.

That's what I'm trying to get across here: he decided on a decorative item that destroyed his carefully balanced room acoustics, rather than first thinking about the acoustics of the room, then going to look for a decorative item that would complement that, and also look good. He could, indeed, have used that nice thick rug if he wanted to, but then we would have had to modify the acoustic treatment in the rest of the room to compensate for the lost highs. He decided not to go that path: his room still looks just as good, just with a different rug.

Studio design is all about trade-offs: You an indeed have a room that looks wonderful, isolates beautifully, and sounds perfectly accurate, precise and acoustically clean... but it will cost a lot of money to do that. So if "low cost" is the number one priority for you, they you have to decide which of the other aspects you will "trade-off" in order to get the costs down: Will you settle for a room that is not well isolated? Or a room that does not have good acoustics? Or a room that does not have the look you wanted? Those are your choices. Something has to give, so it's up to you to decide which one. Or maybe it will be "some of all three": Maybe you'll decide to sacrifice some looks, some isolation, and some acoustics. Or maybe you'll decide that all three are very important, so you'll go looking for more money.

Or you could decide to sacrifice size, in order to keep good acoustics, good isolation, and also good looks. Just
down-size the room: if it is smaller, it will be much cheaper to build (less materials, less labor, faster). If it is smaller, it needs less diffusive treatment (which is expensive) and more abortive treatment (which is less expensive). So it could be good acoustically, good for isolation, good looks, not so expensive, just smaller.

OK, so you say that this is not going to be a permanent studio, and does not need to be perfect. Fair enough: if you are prepared to live with an acoustically inaccurate studio that does not isolate very well, and doesn't look very good, then you can save a lot of money! Just throw together something basic, knowing that your mixes won't translate so well, your neighbors might complain about the noise when you play loud, and doesn't look as wonderful as you would have liked either. If that's the way you want to build it, then that's entirely your choice! Nobody can say that that's a bad choice for you! If that's what meets your needs, then certainly we can help you build it like that. Not a problem.

But there's another option that you might not have considered: you could build it in a modular fashion, so that all of it can be taken apart and re.used when you leave, instead of just tearing it all down and throwing the bits in the trash. It is possible to build the walls as modules, the ceiling as modules, the HVAC system as modules, and the acoustic treatment as modules. That would be more expensive again, of course, but then when you do move out, you can take it all with you and either re-assemble the entire studio just as it was but in another location, or re-use the modules to build an entirely different studio.

That might be the best of all worlds, as you would not have to compromise so much on anything (except money!). If your biggest concern is losing all of your investment when you move out, then a modular room makes perfect sense, as you just take it apart and load the modules on a truck, and take it all with you.

It's an option worth considering....

Surely their are some things to do to improve upon "building walls at totally uneducated dimensions and loading in gear".

Yes, that too is possible! If all you want to do is to throw up a couple of walls to close off your area from the other areas, but without much isolation, then add some treatment to make it sound better, without making it sound world-class, then yes, absolutely, that can be done!

In that case, you wouldn't need to be very concerned at all about room ratios. Choosing a good ratio is only important for high quality rooms, where good smooth clean modal response is needed. If that's not the case, then don't worry too much about it. Modes are only a big issue where high acoustic precision is needed, but if you don't need precision in this room, then just choose dimensions that are reasonable: not direct multiples of each other, and not within 10% of being direct multiples, and you are done. (Also don't make it very long, very wide, or very high: the longest dimension should never be more than about 2.5 times the shortest dimensions). You don't need to fiddle around beyond that, if modal response and precision mixing are not necessary.

Same for isolation: if you can live with annoying your neighbors when you turn up the volume, then you don't need to go the full "room in a room" route. That's only needed where good isolation is important. As a point of reference, a typical house wall (wood studs with drywall on each side) gives you about 30 dB of isolation. If that's all you need, then that's easy to do. If you are prepared to keep the volume turned way down inside the studio, or if you can get away with turning it up and not having the neighbors want to kill you, or calling the cops on you, then simple coupled walls or single-leaf walls will work just fine. You only need to go to two-leaf walls and ceiling if you want higher levels of isolation, around 50 dB or more.

There are some "in between" options too, that will get you slightly better isolation for just a bit more money, such as using resilient channel, or RSIC clips plus hat channel, on the walls and ceiling, or adding an extra layer of drywall on each side. Those don't make an astounding difference, but they do increase isolation usefully.

I have thought about HVAC of course!! In fact new AC has to be installed.. Im quite concerned about that being a transmission line for the audio going strait to a friends bedroom.

Correct! They way to deal with that is to put "silencer boxes" (sometimes also called "baffle boxes") on the ducts, at the point where they pass through the walls. There are many examples on the forum of how to do that. And there are also several other aspects of HVAC that you'll see discussed in those threads.

So to summarize: maybe a modular build might be your best bet, or otherwise just down-sizing it to something you can afford. As well, if you don't need high isolation or good acoustics inside the room, then you could save money by just doing typical house wall construction and very basic acoustic treatment.

So you do have options, and it's only a matter of choosing how much quality, how much isolation, or how much aesthetics you are willing to sacrifice to fit your budget.


- Stuart -

[5meohd]

Thank you Stuart.

I will leave the forum for a few days until I can return with photos and a rough sketch of how we may divide the space (or two!).

I think isolation is the area where we will need to make a trade-off.. in that.. we can't afford to isolate. I just can't lose the windows that area already in the building.. they are huge source of inspiration to me, and my partner in crime.

So after I come back with pictures (also ordering the Gervais book!) we can discuss some of the intermediate tricks to "helping" with isolation, without doing a double leaf system.

For instance.. If I end up in a corner where the existing right angle is brick.. and I now need to frame out the opposing right angle.. what kind of tools/techniques can I use to secure the new stud walls to the existing brick? Maybe their are some quantifiable ways of getting some extra isolation by using a "gasket" or something?

And then.. If that is the path.. maybe you can help show that a new ceiling would help too.

fyi.. this is the second (top) floor. 100 year old hardwood floors. So far a (major!!!) assumption is being made that the downstairs neighbor isn't concerned about noise isolation. (I know it isn't residential, but obviously I'm concerned. It seems to be a speak easy of some sort.)

^^^^^ that is a huge concern. But understand I'm coming from a place with (seemingly) ZERO other opportunities.

thanks again Stuart!

-Ben

[5meohd]

edit: I've deleted this post because my picture URLs were broken. AND. I have new accurate measurements.

New post coming soon.. Just have to find an image host.

[Soundman2020]

You were right.. 1000 is WAY TOO big!

Yep! Glad Rod convinced you about that!

For some reason, your images are not showing up at all! Maybe you could check that, and try to fix your post? I'd really like to see what we are talking about!

- Stuart -

[5meohd]