John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

Hi All,

Well after a few attempts to find a spot to make some noise, we have finally found a small unit to build a starter studio. I say 'starter' as in it will not be a fully commercial venture. Evenings and weekends to begin with so it's important to keep costs reasonable.

I am attaching some photos and my rather clumsy sketchup attempts (I'll learn as I go). I have a reasonable notion about acoustics and studio builds as I have been a lurker here for years and I have even asked a few questions here and there but this will be my first studio build. But there is nothing like actually getting into a build to get your head spinning with questions and focus on detail !

Type of music to be recorded: Pop, Rock and anything band I can get in there, so I expect some kickass rock drumming to happen now and again.
Type of gear used: Will be putting an Audient 4816 in and using UAD Apollo/Antelope Orion 32+ for I/O. I have Adam A7X and will probably get the sub-woofer (I don't think my small control room will need anything bigger)


So the basic details of the unit are as follows (I am getting the keys next week so this info is just from photos and one visit)

1. It is an 8.5m x 5m structure with an industrial corrugated roof that slopes from 3.2 down to 2.9m approx. (452 sq feet)
2. The walls are well built and are 4 inch solid block, insulation and another 4 inch block.
3. There are only doors at the front. 2 large metal doors (which I intend to keep closed) and one standard size metal door.
4. From what I can see there are no ventilation outlets in the unit
5. Neighbouring units are garages not living spaces
6. The owner tells me there was a studio here before for about 4 years and they had not problems with neighbours complaining about the noise.
7. Floor is painted concrete, not connected with neighbours as they were built at separate times .. though I am not really sure of the isolation

The basic idea of the build is to make a 2-room studio, Control room (3.5m x ) and live room, using the room in a room technique - two totally independent boxes that neither touch the building walls or ceilings nor each other. Build materials will be wood frame with double plasterboard(drywall) and green glue.

Questions:
1. Putting the live room at the front of the building would get about an extra 30cm of height but overall layout might suffer. I am keen to have as high as possible a ceiling for drum sound. Would it be worth it?
2. To allow a bigger live room I am considering having a smaller control room. Is 3m wide enough? (as per mockup attached)
3. The front of the building has a large double metal door (specially made and very heavy). A previous tenant added a sliding glass door as per the photos. I am planning to build across it and perhaps stuff the space between the glass door and the metal door with rockwool. Would it be worth it? And will that section have the dreaded three-leaf problem? (The owner has offered to remove the glass door if we don't want it)
4. Would it be better to lay the ceiling on each box on top of the walls or try to hang it from those steel girders that are there, using ISO-clips? I would get the maximum ceiling height and I could save money by not having to buy cross beams to support the ceiling weight.


I have many more questions .. but until I get the keys and have proper measurements that's all for now. Many thanks,

Update. I have now signed the lease and have the keys !

So I took some more measurements and asked the owner a few questions.

Floor: The floor only touches the inside of the inner brick leaf of the cavity wall. This is good news, I believe.

Walls: All 4 sides are built with a 4 inch concrete block, a space with insulation, another 4 inch block. The walls are 34 cm wide (13.4 inches) in total which leads me to deduce that the gap between the brick leaves is just over 5 inches. The inside of all the walls are painted with 3 coats of white paint .. so I expect it is well sealed - though I will be adding acoustic calk to the top, bottom and corner edges just to be safe.

Roof: Those girders in the photos are not solid steel girders, they are rolled steel girders and as such would not be suitable for supporting the weight of a double plasterboard ceiling.



It seems that the roof is the weak point from an isolation point of view so I think the best place to start would be to add a double layer of plasterboard just inside of the roof - fixed to the walls with wood cross beams to support the weight. This would close the outer shell. I'll have to do the calculations about the expected TL of the walls and make sure my added ceiling gets the same or more TL.

Once the outer shell is complete I think it would be a good idea to measure the TL of the shell before starting my inner rooms of the room-in-a-room construct. That way I will know the requirements of the inner shells.

Question 1: How does one measure the TL of a roof? Do I need to get up there or use a boom and point a measurement mic down at the roof?
Question 2: Do the two brick layers in the existing walls constitute 2 separate leaves? If I now add my room inside will I be adding a third leaf?

Thanks,

Further Update (and bump )

An inspection of outside the walls has shown that the unit has an independent wall from the adjacent unit on one side with about 20 cm space and there is about 3 m garden space on the other side. The front wall is linked though to the front wall of units on either side .. so there is still an opportunity for flanking.


If I could only have the answer to one question right now, it would be whether the cavity wall (4 inch block, 5 inch space with insulation, 4 inch block) constitutes a double leaf and so my putting an inner room inside this (6"x 2" wood frame with double plasterboard and green glue) will make that a triple leaf.


Thanks,

If I could only have the answer to one question right now, it would be whether the cavity wall (4 inch block, 5 inch space with insulation, 4 inch block) constitutes a double leaf and so my putting an inner room inside this (6"x 2" wood frame with double plasterboard and green glue) will make that a triple leaf.

Theoretically, yes, it is a two-leaf wall, but in practice I wouldn't worry too much. With 4 inch concrete block on either side, there's a lot of mass in there already, and the resonant frequency is already very low, so adding a third leaf is not going to be a huge issue, as long as you put reasonable mass on that as well and seal it well.

- Stuart -

Resurrecting this thread as we have now started building.

The story so far:

After much soul searching and getting some advice around what constitutes a useable space we have decided to leave the studio as a one room thing, with a small area at the rear for the toilet and storage (and maybe a coffee machine) The unit has a typical industrial roof so we added an inner roof of wooden beams with rockwool and double layer of plasterboard with green glue between.

The unit also had two large heavey metal doors, to which someone had added a sliding glass door inside. We didn't want any of that and we saw it as a weak point from an isolation point of view so we covered it with 6 x 2 timber frame, filled with rockwool and double layer of plasterboard with green glue between them. We did not take this partition to the ceiling because we are going to have to cut ventilation holes in the wall to add some kind of extraction system. Sliding door covered Dimensions of the room are now as follows:
Length 6.35 m (20.8 ft)
Width 5.28 m (17.3 ft)
Height sloping from 2.69 m (8.8 ft) at the rear up to 3.04 m (10ft) at the front (we will put the drums at the front to get max height)

I have checked mode calculators here is a screenshot: The studio sounds very nice at the moment, a smooth decay, with no slapback and I think that is the sloped ceiling.


We will be adding a super door to the inside of the single entrance this weekend to close off the first phase of soundproofing. Then we will do some tests to measure the isolation that we have achieved so far. My expectation for the walls (double 4 inch block with a 5" space between them) is pretty high isolation values and I think the big metal doors with the inner partition we added and the single door with the super door are going to be the weak points.

Our initial idea was to make a room within a room but budget has taken a hit with the work done so far. Depending on the results of the isolation test we may decide to do some acoustic treatment and get in there to start doing some recording etc and do the inner room at a later date. If that means that we have to keep the noise levels down a bit, well, at least we will be able to start some work (we are both new to recording and we want to get our feet wet) The studio is in Dublin, Ireland and I have checked the noise level regulations and during daytime the limit is 55dB and at night 45dB. I will post back as to the isolation test results as soon as I do the tests (which will be pretty crude measuring noise levels inside the studio and outside with the iPhone app from Faber Acoustical)


Meanwhile, I need to get planning the acoustic treatment inside and I have a bit of a conundrum which I suppose any one room studio will have, I have to have the mix area and the live area in the same room. I am thinking that a LEDE set up could suit with the dead end being the mix area and the live end being the live area. Anyway, I have 2 specific questions.

1. Size of super chunks: If I make the sides 60cm (23.5") will I just get more energy trapped or will it also extend to lower frequencies?

2. Border of broadband panels: I want the aesthetics to be very good and the soft edges on the typical DIY broadband panel don't look too good (plus I don't trust myself to do corners right) Would it create any funny box resonances if I made the borders of the broadband panels from 6" x 1" wood and put a 4" rockwool with a 2" gap from the wall and that way I could staple the cloth cover to the wood and tidy it up. I am planning to put a grid of them as per the photo below and I wonder if all that border wood, against the wall would create any funny resonances... or would it help with diffusion?

Many thanks in advance for your help.

Bump

Buying the wood today ... no one have any idea on this?


EDIT: Wood bought. I will post back photos and REW in the Acoustics section ... what can go wrong?

Very excited to see the pictures that you have posted up when you can get them on the portal. In the meantime, it's great to see the rental for the unit settled and that the build has started already! I'm a little bit of a noob with this, so just curious what do you mean that it won't be a commercial venture? I am under the impression that most people here are building their own recording studios for fun!

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