Crawlspace Control Room

[himey77]

I am constructing a studio in the basement of my newly !!RENTED!! house. The control will be located in a crawlspace which is divided from the live room by a concrete wall. Dimensions of the room are L= 22ft 5in x W= 12ft x H= 6ft. I obviously do not want to spend a lot of money on permanent construction because this is a temporary living situation. I am not concerned with isolation what so ever. I just want the best mixing environment for the room.

Floor: The floor currently consists of rocks dispersed on top of a plastic tarp just like most crawlspaces I have been in. I plan on using ½ sheetrock laid right on top of the rocks for the flooring. In my research I feel that this idea yields the highest cost/effectiveness ratio. Any better cost effective ideas are welcome…

Walls: The walls are tricky. The front wall, one sidewall, and back wall are pure concrete. The other sidewall is half concrete on bottom, and open insulation and 2x4’s on the top half. I really can’t afford to sheetrock the whole room, so I was thinking about using fabric on the solid concrete walls and boarding up the top half of the sidewall?? I will be using 2” foam in the appropriate places on the front and side walls and I will also be building several bass traps for the corners. The very back of the room will be used as a ‘storage’ area. It will house boxes, unused furniture, and Christmas decorations. I figure this will add some form of diffusion and absorption.

The ceiling: The ceiling is open insulation (cough, cough) and 2x4’s. I definitely want to cover this are because it is ugly and hazardous to my health. However, while searching the big hardware chains and fabric stores, I have yet to see a very cheap solution. Even basic broadcloth cotton fabric can be quite expensive.

I am not going to cloth or board up the entire room. I figure the storage area does not need flooring or wall and ceiling coverage because I will not be present in that area. What should I use for the walls and ceiling? I have been looking online for bolts of fabric and that seems to be my best bet so far. Anyone have a good source for approx. 460 sq ft of fabric?? I could also get cheap carpet for the walls and ceiling, but I think that would be too much absorption in the mid/high frequencies. What kind of fabric or wood/particle board would be best?? Do I want transparent or absorptive? My budget, which is still expensive for a temporary solution, is $200-$250 for the walls and ceiling. I have already have a separate budget for the sheetrock flooring. Any help is greatly appreciated. I have been waiting a LONG time for a studio solution, even if it is temporary. Thank you guys in advance. I have learned a lot from this forum, but I feel that my situation is unique enough to post.

[knightfly]

Unique is right - sheet rock will last maybe 3-6 months in contact with the ground, with or without a vapor barrier - add uneven ground, and you'll have a gawd-awful mess underfoot in short order.

The solid concrete walls are OK, especially for your lack of concern about isolation - storing anything you actually want to KEEP in a dirt-floored room is about as useful as tossing the stuff into a dumpster - it will grow mold and fungus, etc, rust, all kinds of things that cause problems.

Modally, 6 x 12 x 22 is almost a perfect 1:2:4 ratio, which will give you LOTS of peaks and dips in the room - finding good locations for speakers and your head will be difficult if not impossible. One thing that will help some, is if your overhead joists are still open - since you don't care about isolation, you could fill these with insulation (the heavier the better, up to about 4 PCF - standard house insulation is about .8 to 1 PCF, BTW.)

Foam, especially foam on a budget, is not a good idea. If you can find a local source of rigid fiberglass insulation (see the building materials forum for possible help on that) you will get better results for less, and have fire proof stuff on walls instead of deadly gas and fumes in the event of a fire.

Hope this helps; you have quite a challenge there, but if you read the first 3-4 links in the REFERENCE section, you should get some better ideas of what most people use, and why... Steve

[himey77]

Thanks for your reply knightfly. I don't want a disaster on my hands so I have a couple of ideas for a new plan. Sheetrock = flooring does not mix... got it. I am assuming I will have to bite the bullet and lay plywood down for the flooring?? I will most likely use 2x4's as framing for the floor so that it will not be on uneven ground. I could use the 8 sheets of 4'x8' sheetrock I bought to insert a back wall somewhere in the room. Where should I build this wall in relevance to the room dimensions?? I am definitely going to be buying some OC 703 and using that for bass traps. Should I use that on the side and front walls as opposed to Auralex for reflections?? The ceiling is already filled with thick, fluffy insulation. I just need to cover it up. As for the storage: everything is in plastic Tupperware bins and there is not as much stuff as I thought. Maybe 4 bins total.

Can you guys give me good suggestions to make my room better? Knightfly has already pointed out my problems; let's hear some solutions. You can ignore budget because I know $200 to $250 isn't going to cut it. I can take a hit on some material if I use it for permanent construction (they are ripping down the house, so I don't have to worry about tearing it down myself , but I figure I will be reusing most of this stuff wherever I move so I can invest a little more. I realize that monitoring is one of the most, if not the most, important aspects of home recording. I will be buying Dynaudio's pretty soon, but I won't lay down the cash unless my mixing environment drastically improves. I'm spending my money on the room first. Please help.

[knightfly]

First, I'd NOT cover your ceiling insulation with anything but cloth; that low ceiling needs to "disappear" acoustically as much as possible, and a cloth cover will maintain absorption better. If the insulation has paper backing showing, this will reflect probably more highs than you might want; the cloth will help there a little.

Depending on how long you think you'll be there, you may want to rethink your floor yet again; putting un-treated wood against soil is STILL far from permanent - you might get one season out of plywood against the ground before it starts to get soft, although the plastic should slow that down a bit - your headroom limitation doesn't leave many options, but some type of thin "pavers" (flat masonry blocks) under the ply might help longevity. Either way, this will create a "drum", which would need to be stuffed with insulation to keep from ringing. If you're gonna be there less than a year, I'd just put down plywood over 2x4's laid flat, shimmed with scrap wood where necessary to level, put R19 insulation between the flat 2x4's so it presses up against the plywood, and call it marginal

Back wall - 20' length will improve it quite a bit, but unless you're able to build splayed walls that start about halfway back and taper to 10' wide at the front, your ceiling being half your width keeps things from getting much better. Probably the best you can hope for is to shorten the length to 20 and use 4" rockwool at the side reflection points, behind your speakers, and diagonally across all the corners. Alternately, you could build this at the FRONT side if it makes any difference.

Have you seen the page on portable acoustic DIY stuff here?

http://www.johnlsayers.com/HR/index1.htm

Probably the reason no one else has chimed in here, is that everyone else is either SANE, or lucky enough not to be stuck with your set of circumstances - so how long do you think you'll be there?

Outa time for now, hope this helps... Steve

[cadesignr]

Probably the reason no one else has chimed in here, is that everyone else is either SANE, or lucky enough not to be stuck with your set of circumstances

Hey himey77, I wish you luck. I deeply understand the desire to have a room to do this stuff and the will to try anything just to get to do it. Been there, done that in so many wierd and uncompromising situations I can't even remember em all. Just do the best you can and chalk it up to payin dues later. Thats about all you can do. Tell you what though. I admire you for your will. As far as the floors etc, Steve hit it on the nailhead as usual.
And to show you that your STILL lucky you have what you have.....at least you don't have to deal with this.....

[knightfly]

Rick, now I understand what you meant when you said you were just "hangin' out"...

So, ya plannin' on a 4" thick floated concrete floor in there??!?

Personally, I think a good push with a small dozer makes a lot of sense, unless your local fire department needs a practice building - if they PAY you to let them burn stuff down, you might come out ahead... Steve

[cadesignr]

Rick, now I understand what you meant when you said you were just "hangin' out"...

Hahahahaha! Like my little "iso" room? Took me two days just to brace it up when I moved into the house. Actually, I am doing something with it. Got some steel "I" beams and picked up some sonotube for the piers this week. Slowly but surely. Here is an Elevation of the side in the pic. There is a nice creek 75' below. My wife wants this for her "ebay" crafts room. We'll see about that. Its really pretty out there in the summer. Like a rain forest.
fitZ

[knightfly]

Damn, and I thought I was ambitious...

[himey77]

Thanks for the replies guys. I know what you mean about the hesitant replies from other folks. If I read this about someone else I'd think, "Damn, this guys screwed!!" I just want to make the space as good as possible without breaking the bank or going insane. I will heed Knightfly's suggestions, and ultimately decide how much the room is worth to have temporarily. I know that I will be there less than a year. At least, I know a little more about acoustics now. My previous monitoring setup consisted of crappy Technics home stereo speakers mounted FLUSH in the CORNERS of my tiny, untreated room. Can you say bass build-up?? Dealing with such an inferior mixing environment will make it more of a 'challenge'. Yeah... that's exactly what I want when it comes to recording, CHALLENGES!! Ha ha ha.... Thanks again.