John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

That's a pretty good improvement! Much better.

There's still some modal ringing going on at around 51 Hz, which might be difficult to treat further as you don't have much space left in the room for that! But it's nowhere near as bad as it was originally.

What do you have on the side walls right now? I'm pretty sure that mode is related to the roof width, so if you could get some 703 on the side walls, that might help. I know you don't have a lot of space there, but anything is better than nothing!

There's also a slight issue with the decay times in the high mids, so you might want to consider doing something about that. I can't believe I'm going to say this, since I practically NEVER recommend it, but in this case it is what your room needs: carpet. Ordinary commercial thick-pile carpet should do what you need there. So you could try a throw rug on the floor, and see if that helps. Normally carpet is not used in studios, but in your case, I think it will do the trick.

But the room is way, way better than the first time! Major improvement.


- Stuart -

Hi Stuart,
thank you for your comment , I hope you had a good start into 2015

I´m happy to be on the right track with my treatment


Actually I have some space left at the sidewalls. I hoped to keep some free space there for video equipment / instruments. But if some more treatment will help with the modal issues I will do it.

I also think there is still a small flutter echo between the sidewalls, especially because I have not treated the window/radiator and door yet(which are opposite to each other). I was thinking about maybe using thick curtain to adress that?
Or maybe the flutter echo is from floor to roof (the roof isn´t treated at all yet), in this case the carpet would do the trick. Or maybe some kind of thin ceiling panels on the roof?
Originally I planed to build a cloud, wouldn´t this also help with the modal ringing if it´s hard backed?
Maybe I could also build a tuned panel absorber for 51hz mode.
The room is not THAT small, I still have enough space left. Maybe a panel trap could even be built on the ceiling?

Actually I have some space left at the sidewalls. I hoped to keep some free space there for video equipment / instruments. But if some more treatment will help with the modal issues I will do it.

You could test it out without actually building anything: Just put a couple of panels of 703 up against those walls, and do another REW test to see if the effect is worthwhile.

I also think there is still a small flutter echo between the sidewalls, especially because I have not treated the window/radiator and door yet(which are opposite to each other). I was thinking about maybe using thick curtain to adress that?

You could attach acoustic absorption to the back of the door, probably. If that's not enough, then a really thick, heavy, lined curtain on the window would probably fix it.

Originally I planed to build a cloud, wouldn´t this also help with the modal ringing if it´s hard backed?

Yes, it probably would help a lot.
Not a good idea. It's MUCH harder to tune such a trap than the text books tell you about. Yes, in theory you could do that, and you'd probably get a reasonable effect, but hitting exactly 51 Hz with a panel trap isn't as easy as it sounds: The depth would need to be pretty big, so it would take up a lot of space, plus you'd have to place it in the middle of one of the two surfaces that is causing the mode. Having a very large, deep box sticking out into your room might not be very pretty!

I'd just go with more bass trapping.

The room is not THAT small,

It is acoustically! The wavelength of a 20 Hz tone is about 17 meters, so in order for your room to not be small acoustically, the shortest dimension (height) would have to be at least that big, and the other dimensions (length and width) would need to be proportionally bigger. Only things like concert halls and aircraft hangers are not acoustically small....

Maybe a panel trap could even be built on the ceiling?

Only if the 51Hz mode is related to room height... If it is related to the width or length axis, then placing the trap on the ceiling would not be very effective. It needs to be at the point where the pressure node is located for that mode. I didn't check back, but I don't recall which axis your 51Hz mode is related to. Is it a vertical mode?


- Stuart -