Building Studio on Second Floor of Old New England House

[geohewitt]

Hey guys!! First time posting after reading up as much as I can on other’s posts. Hopefully I’m giving enough information here and I apologize for the huge write-up

Location: Groveland, MA, USA. Quiet neighborhood with neighbors have houses on two sides, each roughly 40ft away

What I want: Have a live room to record drums and guitar/bass cabs and have a control room to mix in.

Budget: Prefer to keep under $2000, since budget is really tight

Structure notes:

- All walls and ceilings are lathe & plaster with zero insulation
- Exterior walls are going to be insulated with cellulose foam on October 17th and 18th since there is no insulation whatsoever. They need two existing walls with which to blow the cellulose foam into
- The house was built with 8ft ceilings for all rooms, attic is 9’7” at highest point
- Electrical will have one circuit for lights and one circuit for all audio gear
- Neighbor to the east, house is ~40ft away, one neighbor to the south also ~40ft away
- Only main external sounds are occasional leaf blowers outside
- I unfortunately have to make everything as non-permanent as possible, in the event that maybe 5 years down the line I end up moving and want to make the house re-sellable and maybe take some of the structures I build along with me!

How loud will I be: I don’t plan on tracking a full band all at once, but they might play together in the room to get scratch tracks or a demo before we do the actual recording. So Live Room will get probably to around 110dB, Control Room will be under 80dB since it’ll only be used for mixing.

What and where:

I just bought a house to try and build my first studio on the second floor. First floor is two bedrooms, a kitchen, bathroom, and main entrance room. Second floor was three bedrooms, I tore down one wall for the live room

!Floorplan - 2nd Floor.png

The plan is to have Room E be the control room, but I am concerned with how close to being a cube it is and getting a lot of modal issues.
I went ahead and knocked the wall down separating Room D & Room C so that they are joined to be the live room.

Stairs Room 01.jpg

Stairs Room 02.jpg

Control Room 01.jpg

Live Room 01.jpg

Live Room 02.jpg

The 15”x15” brick chimney unfortunately cannot be moved, but perhaps the wall I end up building to separating the control room from the live room could encase the chimney with a window to the right of it?
Everything here is up in the air so I definitely could use some advice on what you guys would do here.

Control Room 03.jpg

Chimney 01.jpg

Chimney 02.jpg

Ceiling Height: Lastly, after insulation has been done in the attic, I will be removing all the lathe & plaster ceilings over the Control Room and Live Room. Then I will be removing the attic ceiling boards out so that only the attic floor joists are left in order to have ceilings that have around an 18ft pitch.

Control Room 02.jpg

Attic 01.jpg

Main Questions/Concerns:

- How should I go about building the wall separating the control and live room if I’m going to have that tall of a ceiling. Will I have to build a room within a room for both LR and CR?

- Will the cellulose packed into the external walls be enough to isolate the 110dB created from drums in the live room or will I need to have double leaf construction for both rooms in order to be isolated? Really trying to be as economical as possible

- Should I also have a double leaf structure in both the live room and the control room? My thought process is that the control room should take priority with it since I want to be monitoring things with as much isolation as possible, but if the blown-in cellulose alone isn’t enough to isolate the drums, should the live room take priority? Or both?

- If I do indeed need to have two-leaf construction in both rooms, would I build the dividing wall(s) on top of a floating floor first in order for it to be isolated from the existing structure?

- What do I need to have as much isolation in the control room from the live room and external sounds?

What would you guys do in my place!? I need all the help and advice I can get, thanks so so much in advance!!

Geo

[Soundman2020]

Hi there Geo, and Welcome!

Prefer to keep under $2000

Ummmm.... I really hate it when I have to say this, but I think you are missing a zero off that figure. And the initial digit is probably half what it should be as well...

There's over 400 square feet of floor area that you plan to turn into a studio that must isolate 110 dB down to legal levels outside, and is also on the second floor. So you are saying that you plan to spend just five dollars per square foot. That's not even enough to buy and install the drywall for your ceilings, without even considering the walls... or the framing ... or the insulation ... or the HVAC ... or the acoustic treatment.

Exterior walls are going to be insulated with cellulose foam on October 17th and 18th since there is no insulation whatsoever. They need two existing walls with which to blow the cellulose foam into

Blown cellulose is not a good choice for studio isolation. Far better is either mineral wool or fiberglass.

Only main external sounds are occasional leaf blowers outside

It doesn't rain in Massachusetts? No wind? No hail? No thunder? No aircraft flying over? No traffic? No people talking inside the house? No footsteps, radio, TV, vacuum cleaner, phone ringing, washer, dryer, doors opening/closing, toilets flushing, water running, etc, etc, etc?

- I unfortunately have to make everything as non-permanent as possible, in the event that maybe 5 years down the line I end up moving and want to make the house re-sellable and maybe take some of the structures I build along with me!

To be very honest, that's a pipe dream. Many, many people want that when they build their studios, but in real life it usually is not practical. The cost of building something that can be disassembled later and trucked away, without destroying it in the process, is usually much higher than studio builders are prepared to take on. Drywall, for example, won't ever be re-usable, since it is brittle and non-structural, so you cannot use drywall if you plan to disassemble: you'd have to go with plywood or OSB, which can take a beating, but they are both less dense that drywall, so you need to make them thicker to get the same isolation. And they are more expensive anyway...

I'm not trying to rain on your parade: just pointing out reality.

So Live Room will get probably to around 110dB, Control Room will be under 80dB since it’ll only be used for mixing

Those are reasonable values, but you didn't say how quite you have to be, so we don't know how much isolation you need, and that's the key to everything.

build my first studio on the second floor.

That's about the worst possible place to build a studio, for two reasons: 1) It's much harder (and more expensive) to isolate an upstairs room, then it is a ground floor room, and: 2) You will need to beef up the structure so it can support the very large extra mass that you will need.

I am concerned with how close to being a cube it is and getting a lot of modal issues.

Did you check it with a room mode calculator? What ratio did you get?

I went ahead and knocked the wall down separating Room D & Room C

Are you totally certain that that was not a structural (load-bearing) wall? Did you get a structural engineer to confirm that it was safe to remove that wall, before you took it out? Walls like that, in the center of buildings, often carry sheer loads and/or serve other structural purposes...

- How should I go about building the wall separating the control and live room if I’m going to have that tall of a ceiling. Will I have to build a room within a room for both LR and CR?

Yes, assuming you want medium to high isolation. Fully-decoupled two-leaf MSM isolation is the only way to go. It's the most effective and lease expensive.

- Will the cellulose packed into the external walls be enough to isolate the 110dB created from drums in the live room

No, definitely not. No way. Never. It's a common misconception that insulation stops sound. It does not. NO form of insulation stops sound. The only way to stop sound is with mass and hermetic seals. Insulation is not mass, and not sealed: it is light, fluffy, porous, and does prevent sound from getting through. If you use it as part of a tuned system, then yes, it is very effective, but only because it is acting as a damping material within the system: by itself, it does nothing.

or will I need to have double leaf construction for both rooms in order to be isolated?

Yes, absolutely, always. But you seem to be not understanding how this works. This is how it is done:

MSM-two-leaf-WallChunk-conventional--inside-out--three-rooms--S04.png

That shows three rooms isolated as a studio, with a non-isolated passage on one side. As you cans see, each room is built as a SINGLE leaf structure, and therefore there are TWO leaves between any two rooms. There is also a SINGLE leaf shell around all three rooms, and therefore there are TWO leaves between any room and the outside world.

The same principle applies to the ceiling.

Really trying to be as economical as possible

Then "room-in-a-room" construction is what you need, because it has the lowest cost of all possible isolation systems. It is much cheaper than going with just a single leaf, and also cheaper than doing a three-leaf or four-leaf system.

- Should I also have a double leaf structure in both the live room and the control room?

See above. Imagine that one of those rooms in the image I posted above is the control room, and another is the live room. Ignore the third room, since you will only have two rooms.

My thought process is that the control room should take priority with it since I want to be monitoring things with as much isolation as possible,

Then you have it backwards! Isolate at the source. The loudest thing you will have in there, by far, is the drums. Based on your own estimates, the drums are putting out one hundred times more acoustic power that the speakers in your control room, so that's the level of isolation you need. But because you can't isolate a single leaf effectively at low cost, you actually need to build the entire studio so that it isolates the drums. That's the goal. If you then want LESS isolation between the live room and control room, that can be done, but isolation of both towards the outside world is what matters first.

but if the blown-in cellulose alone isn’t enough to isolate the drums,

As mentioned above, it will do basically zilch. Insulation is not isolation. Insulation by itself does not isolate. And cellulose is a poor choice in any case, for a studio.

should the live room take priority? Or both?

Yes: both, but based on the LR.

- If I do indeed need to have two-leaf construction in both rooms,

See above. You do NOT build each room as a two-leaf structure. Rather, you build each room as a SINGLE leaf structure (eg, framing with drywall on only ONE side), such that you automatically end up with a two-leaf isolation system.

would I build the dividing wall

There is no dividing wall: there are only single-leaf walls around that form each room.

on top of a floating floor

Never, ever try to build a floating floor, unless you are absolutely, certainly, totally certain that you need one, as described here: http://www.johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewt ... f=2&t=8173

Also, you do not have anywhere near enough budget to float a floor. It is very hard to get right, and very expensive. The isolation mounts and the concrete pour are expensive, and in your case you'd also need to reinforce the existing stricture with steel beams to handle the weight of that. It simply is not an option, and you don't need it anyway.

in order for it to be isolated from the existing structure?

Contrary to popular belief, there is no need to isolate the walls from the floor, unless you need very high isolation. In your case, you don' have the structure or the budget to do it anyway.

- What do I need to have as much isolation in the control room from the live room and external sounds?

Firstly, I'd suggest that you start with two books: "Master Handbook of Acoustics" by F. Alton Everest (that's sort of the Bible for acoustics), and "Home Recording Studio: Build it Like the Pros", by Rod Gervais. Those two will give you the basics you need to understand in order to start designing your studio.

Then, you need to define how much isolation you actually need. You have come up with reasonable estimates of how loud you will be in each room, so now you need to know how quiet you must be outside, legally and in order to keep your neighbors happy. For example, if your local noise regulations specify that you cannot exceed 50 dB, then you will need 60 dB of isolation, but if they regulations specify a limit of 40 dB, then you need 70 dB of isolation.

What would you guys do in my place!? I need all the help and advice I can get, thanks so so much in advance!!

To be totally honest (once again), i would not even try to do this on US$ 2k. US$ 20k would be iffy. US$ 30k to 40k would be more reasonable and realistic. Just the cost of your HVAC system alone is going to exceed your entire budget. The cost of framing alone is going to exceed your entire budget. The cost of drywall alone is going to exceed your entire budget. The cost of insulation alone is going to exceed your entire budget. The cost of flooring alone is going to exceed your entire budget. The cost of treatment alone is going to exceed your entire budget. The cost of the electrical work alone is going to exceed your entire budget. Etc.

So if at were my place, I'd look to multiply the budget by a factor of ten to twenty times. Then I would carefully measure, estimate and calculate how much isolation I need. Then I'd start designing a proper fully-decoupled two-leaf isolation system based on that. Then I'd hire a structural engineer to come take a look at the existing structure, and what needs to be done to beef it up enough. And I would probably end up deciding that the studio needs to go on the ground floor, and the living area upstairs, in order to reduce costs to something affordable, and to increase the effectiveness of the isolation.

- Stuart -

[geohewitt]

Hi there Geo, and Welcome!

Prefer to keep under $2000

Ummmm.... I really hate it when I have to say this, but I think you are missing a zero off that figure. And the initial digit is probably half what it should be as well...

There's over 400 square feet of floor area that you plan to turn into a studio that must isolate 110 dB down to legal levels outside, and is also on the second floor. So you are saying that you plan to spend just five dollars per square foot. That's not even enough to buy and install the drywall for your ceilings, without even considering the walls... or the framing ... or the insulation ... or the HVAC ... or the acoustic treatment.

Exterior walls are going to be insulated with cellulose foam on October 17th and 18th since there is no insulation whatsoever. They need two existing walls with which to blow the cellulose foam into

Blown cellulose is not a good choice for studio isolation. Far better is either mineral wool or fiberglass.

Only main external sounds are occasional leaf blowers outside

It doesn't rain in Massachusetts? No wind? No hail? No thunder? No aircraft flying over? No traffic? No people talking inside the house? No footsteps, radio, TV, vacuum cleaner, phone ringing, washer, dryer, doors opening/closing, toilets flushing, water running, etc, etc, etc?

- I unfortunately have to make everything as non-permanent as possible, in the event that maybe 5 years down the line I end up moving and want to make the house re-sellable and maybe take some of the structures I build along with me!

To be very honest, that's a pipe dream. Many, many people want that when they build their studios, but in real life it usually is not practical. The cost of building something that can be disassembled later and trucked away, without destroying it in the process, is usually much higher than studio builders are prepared to take on. Drywall, for example, won't ever be re-usable, since it is brittle and non-structural, so you cannot use drywall if you plan to disassemble: you'd have to go with plywood or OSB, which can take a beating, but they are both less dense that drywall, so you need to make them thicker to get the same isolation. And they are more expensive anyway...

I'm not trying to rain on your parade: just pointing out reality.

So Live Room will get probably to around 110dB, Control Room will be under 80dB since it’ll only be used for mixing

Those are reasonable values, but you didn't say how quite you have to be, so we don't know how much isolation you need, and that's the key to everything.

build my first studio on the second floor.

That's about the worst possible place to build a studio, for two reasons: 1) It's much harder (and more expensive) to isolate an upstairs room, then it is a ground floor room, and: 2) You will need to beef up the structure so it can support the very large extra mass that you will need.

I am concerned with how close to being a cube it is and getting a lot of modal issues.

Did you check it with a room mode calculator? What ratio did you get?

I went ahead and knocked the wall down separating Room D & Room C

Are you totally certain that that was not a structural (load-bearing) wall? Did you get a structural engineer to confirm that it was safe to remove that wall, before you took it out? Walls like that, in the center of buildings, often carry sheer loads and/or serve other structural purposes...

- How should I go about building the wall separating the control and live room if I’m going to have that tall of a ceiling. Will I have to build a room within a room for both LR and CR?

Yes, assuming you want medium to high isolation. Fully-decoupled two-leaf MSM isolation is the only way to go. It's the most effective and lease expensive.

- Will the cellulose packed into the external walls be enough to isolate the 110dB created from drums in the live room

No, definitely not. No way. Never. It's a common misconception that insulation stops sound. It does not. NO form of insulation stops sound. The only way to stop sound is with mass and hermetic seals. Insulation is not mass, and not sealed: it is light, fluffy, porous, and does prevent sound from getting through. If you use it as part of a tuned system, then yes, it is very effective, but only because it is acting as a damping material within the system: by itself, it does nothing.

or will I need to have double leaf construction for both rooms in order to be isolated?

Yes, absolutely, always. But you seem to be not understanding how this works. This is how it is done:

MSM-two-leaf-WallChunk-conventional--inside-out--three-rooms--S04.png

That shows three rooms isolated as a studio, with a non-isolated passage on one side. As you cans see, each room is built as a SINGLE leaf structure, and therefore there are TWO leaves between any two rooms. There is also a SINGLE leaf shell around all three rooms, and therefore there are TWO leaves between any room and the outside world.

The same principle applies to the ceiling.

Really trying to be as economical as possible

Then "room-in-a-room" construction is what you need, because it has the lowest cost of all possible isolation systems. It is much cheaper than going with just a single leaf, and also cheaper than doing a three-leaf or four-leaf system.

- Should I also have a double leaf structure in both the live room and the control room?

See above. Imagine that one of those rooms in the image I posted above is the control room, and another is the live room. Ignore the third room, since you will only have two rooms.

My thought process is that the control room should take priority with it since I want to be monitoring things with as much isolation as possible,

Then you have it backwards! Isolate at the source. The loudest thing you will have in there, by far, is the drums. Based on your own estimates, the drums are putting out one hundred times more acoustic power that the speakers in your control room, so that's the level of isolation you need. But because you can't isolate a single leaf effectively at low cost, you actually need to build the entire studio so that it isolates the drums. That's the goal. If you then want LESS isolation between the live room and control room, that can be done, but isolation of both towards the outside world is what matters first.

but if the blown-in cellulose alone isn’t enough to isolate the drums,

As mentioned above, it will do basically zilch. Insulation is not isolation. Insulation by itself does not isolate. And cellulose is a poor choice in any case, for a studio.

should the live room take priority? Or both?

Yes: both, but based on the LR.

- If I do indeed need to have two-leaf construction in both rooms,

See above. You do NOT build each room as a two-leaf structure. Rather, you build each room as a SINGLE leaf structure (eg, framing with drywall on only ONE side), such that you automatically end up with a two-leaf isolation system.

would I build the dividing wall

There is no dividing wall: there are only single-leaf walls around that form each room.

on top of a floating floor

Never, ever try to build a floating floor, unless you are absolutely, certainly, totally certain that you need one, as described here: http://www.johnlsayers.com/phpBB2/viewt ... f=2&t=8173

Also, you do not have anywhere near enough budget to float a floor. It is very hard to get right, and very expensive. The isolation mounts and the concrete pour are expensive, and in your case you'd also need to reinforce the existing stricture with steel beams to handle the weight of that. It simply is not an option, and you don't need it anyway.

in order for it to be isolated from the existing structure?

Contrary to popular belief, there is no need to isolate the walls from the floor, unless you need very high isolation. In your case, you don' have the structure or the budget to do it anyway.

- What do I need to have as much isolation in the control room from the live room and external sounds?

Firstly, I'd suggest that you start with two books: "Master Handbook of Acoustics" by F. Alton Everest (that's sort of the Bible for acoustics), and "Home Recording Studio: Build it Like the Pros", by Rod Gervais. Those two will give you the basics you need to understand in order to start designing your studio.

Then, you need to define how much isolation you actually need. You have come up with reasonable estimates of how loud you will be in each room, so now you need to know how quiet you must be outside, legally and in order to keep your neighbors happy. For example, if your local noise regulations specify that you cannot exceed 50 dB, then you will need 60 dB of isolation, but if they regulations specify a limit of 40 dB, then you need 70 dB of isolation.

What would you guys do in my place!? I need all the help and advice I can get, thanks so so much in advance!!

To be totally honest (once again), i would not even try to do this on US$ 2k. US$ 20k would be iffy. US$ 30k to 40k would be more reasonable and realistic. Just the cost of your HVAC system alone is going to exceed your entire budget. The cost of framing alone is going to exceed your entire budget. The cost of drywall alone is going to exceed your entire budget. The cost of insulation alone is going to exceed your entire budget. The cost of flooring alone is going to exceed your entire budget. The cost of treatment alone is going to exceed your entire budget. The cost of the electrical work alone is going to exceed your entire budget. Etc.

So if at were my place, I'd look to multiply the budget by a factor of ten to twenty times. Then I would carefully measure, estimate and calculate how much isolation I need. Then I'd start designing a proper fully-decoupled two-leaf isolation system based on that. Then I'd hire a structural engineer to come take a look at the existing structure, and what needs to be done to beef it up enough. And I would probably end up deciding that the studio needs to go on the ground floor, and the living area upstairs, in order to reduce costs to something affordable, and to increase the effectiveness of the isolation.

- Stuart -

Hi Stuart!

First off, thanks so much for your reply, it's taken me so long to respond cause I've been really reading up on everything you suggested (and yes I did mean 20k, I was typing too quickly)! I've decided against trying to build the studio on the second floor, and am thinking of build a new structure in the property (depending on how far I can build from the property line etc) in order to build from scratch on top of a concrete slab instead of trying to fit everything on the second floor of such an old home. Going to be reading Rod Gervais's book at least a couple more times before I begin designing again and I'll come back here and check in with you guys on my plans later on!

Thanks again!!

- Geo