John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

Hi, in internet blogs I read about decouple wall and come across stagered studs or the double stud system but I haven´t read anything about what to do with the floor and ceiling.

My financial resources don´t allow me to go for a room inside room approach but can I use damping materials in order to decouple the stud from floor and ceiling?

If yes, then my second question is: Since I am somehow floating the stud from floor and ceiling this means also drywall shouldn´t touch floor and ceiling so they have to be hanged close to the floor and ceiling but without touching it, right? But this will leave a space through which sound can pass... How should I fill this space without losing the decoupling?

CRAZY IDEA: just was thinking about a material option and wondering if someone have any experience with. I was thinking about using used tire as a damping material. In méxico I can get this cheap. I´m thinking on puting old tire between the floor and the base stud and then put more between screws and base stud... So neither the wood is touching the floor directly nor the screw is touching floor and wood directly. Maybe screw will touch with the wood through the hole, I could make a hole a little bigger in order to prevent this. I would repeat this process with the ceiling.

Can anyone explain how we could decuople a wall with no room inside room concept and tell if any experience with tire or other materials you suggest?

This is another question that could have stayed inside your build thread. Literally, all of your questions should stay in your thread. I wish I had the ability to move this there.

Hi, in internet blogs I read about decouple wall and come across stagered studs or the double stud system but I haven´t read anything about what to do with the floor and ceiling.

I can assure you that internet blogs aren't going to give you all of your answers, but I'd bet that this forum has the answers to 99.9% of your questions. I urge you to not leave this site and use the search feature to find your answers.

There are countless threads covering your exact questions. I've read them, so I know they're on this site.

My financial resources don´t allow me to go for a room inside room approach but can I use damping materials in order to decouple the stud from floor and ceiling?

Damping materials do exactly as their name suggests. They dampen. They will not fully decouple anything. Now, you shouldn't be worried about decoupling your wall from the floor and ceiling. They are working together as your inner leaf. What you need to worry about is decoupling your walls and your ceiling from the existing walls and ceiling. The ONLY way to really do that is to build a room in a room.

Financially, can you afford to frame up 4 inner leaf walls? But you can't afford ceiling joists and materials for the ceiling? I'm not sure where your financial resources put you in terms of what is out of reach.

If yes, then my second question is:

Sadly, it is not.

I was thinking about using used tire as a damping material.

Tires would not work either. If you ever did want to use some sort of material to "float" your wall and ceiling system on, you'd need to spend serious money to buy special products that are designed for the exact weight of your walls, ceiling, and anything hung on them. When we soffit mount our speakers, it's a miniature scale of this concept. We will typically use Sorbothane and through measurements and calculations, we ensure that the right amount of the right Sorbothane is used to isolate down to a certain frequency and a certain amount of deflection is achieved on that material. Think of it this way: imagine you used a very hard rubber and a lot of it on your walls. Your walls were super light. This rubber wouldn't even squish at all. Now, any vibration experienced on the building or your walls would transfer 100% to one another. On the other hand, say you used only a little bit of a very soft rubber. Now, your walls might be VERY heavy. Your walls would just squish the rubber down completely. And again, you'd have the exact same outcome of vibration transfer at 100%. That's why floating entire rooms costs an absolute fortune. The special devices and engineering behind it are outrageous.

Can anyone explain how we could decuople a wall with no room inside room concept and tell if any experience with tire or other materials you suggest?

It's not great, but the only real option to achieve a little bit more isolation than a normal wall would be to use isolation clips and hat. Greg

This is another question that could have stayed inside your build thread. Literally, all of your questions should stay in your thread.

Greg is right: You keep on asking questions in new, disconnected threads, all over the forum, but it would be much better to ask ALL of your questions in your thread only. Like this, you won't be able to keep track of your questions and answers, and nobody else will be able to follow that either. It's much better to keep questions about YOUR build in your thread. all together, in one place.

- Stuart -

Sorry guys, I will make sure to no post everywhere. Will go back to my project thread =)

Sorry guys, I will make sure to no post everywhere. Will go back to my project thread =)

Thank you my dude!



Greg