John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

Starting with the premise that I just like the looks of wood and have worked in a lot of great rooms that are 100% wood, in building a new room is there any good reason not to just skip wallboard and use wood or should I put wood over wallboard. (this assumes RC, bass traps, angled walls etc).

Are there any major trade offs I need to be aware of, other than cost?

JS,

everything begins with the basic room........ that means iso-wall assemblies - which means drywall.

Wood comes afterwards................ and there are a variety of reasons for this - not the least of which is stopping the passage of air through the wall cavity......... for which wood is not a good material to use.

Wood can add some warmth to the sound of a room if it's done correctly - although i personally would not reccomend that any wall be 100% covered with wood........

Below is an example of what i mean........... this is the main room in a world class studio i constructed - note the #2 pine used for the final room finishes........... this is installed over double wall assemblies - 2 layers of 5/8" gyp each side - all walls to adjoining rooms are 2x8 construction @ 16" centers and 2x4 construction with a 2" air space at exterior walls (which were 12" sand filled masonry block)........... R30 insulation in each wall cavity....... 2" air space between walls......... 3/4" furring over the inner most layer of drywall - with 1" 703 between furring - covered with fire retardant burlap - and then the pine boards - with spacing between the boards varying from 2" to 3/4" depending on the actual location in the studio.

This construction was utilized in the main room - rhythm room (for drums and bass) and string room.........the same wall construction was used in ISO booths (2) and control room - although the ceiling construction in those rooms did not use wood.

Bruce flooring was used throughout - with the exception of the rhythm room - which was 3/4" T&G plywood (so the drummers can nail or screw down their kit if they so desired..............

The trade off of doing just wood over the studs would be a tremendoous loos in Isolation value for the wall assembly.

Rod

Nice work rod, so when you flying to detroit to build mine?

Bryan

giles117 wrote:Nice work rod, so when you flying to detroit to build mine?

Bryan

LOL......... maybe in July of 2005 when i am finished this little thing i'm working on now............

Rod

Thanks for the reply. What you say makes sense, I was just hoping to skip a step.