I'm torn between mounting my electrical boxes in the wall and on the wall. In the wall means I have to punch a hole in an otherwise perfectly good triple-layer sandwich of 3/4" Medium Density Fibreboard, 1/8" vinyl barrier, and 5/8" sheetrock. Sure, I can caulk the hell out of it, but I'm still suspicious that I'm creating a very weak point in the wall. On the other hand I'm considering mounting the box to the surface of the final layer. While this means the box will protrude from the wall over 2", at least it doesn't cause a potential weak spot in the wall.
Am I just worrying too much? Is it really ok to make a hole in an otherwise perfectly good wall for the electrical box?
Lee
Electrical boxes - better to mount ON wall rather than IN?
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knightfly
- Senior Member
- Posts: 6976
- Joined: Sun Mar 16, 2003 11:11 am
- Location: West Coast, USA
Not if you can help it. Best effort would probably lose at least 6 dB, maybe as much as 12 within a radius of 4-6 feet of each box. (That is what's known as a "SWAG", or Scientific Wild Ass Guess) - the SWAG is based on the fact that you would be trading 3 thicknesses of undisturbed mass for a 16 gauge metal box with holes in it, and a plastic cover. Gee, I wonder which one blocks more sound? :=)
You didn't mention what country you're in, but in the US at least, you can buy electrical fixtures that are made for surface mounting - including power strips that are set up with an outlet every 4-6 inches, up to one every 12 inches. The outlet boxes for use with this system are shallower by a little than typical inside-wall mount boxes. I've seen some of the components for this system at Home Depot, although at the time I wasn't doing any heavy duty research so didn't check to see what all they carried...
One possible way to camouflage the surface mounted electrical a bit, would be to run it just below where you intend any absorption panels/traps, etc, to be mounted - keeping in mind that any audio lines should be run at least 12" away from power if they run parallel, and even further away from any "wall warts" or "line lumps" for gear power supplies - most of these abominations spew out incredible amounts of hummmmm.
If necessary, I'd break the wall in only one place, and only if necessary to get power into the room(s). When doing this, it helps if you can offset the holes to opposite sides of a stud cavity, caulking like crazy on both sides and stuffing extra insulation in that cavity to help offset the sound loss.
Another possible trick is to run power thru whatever HVAC ducting you have - there are already going to be steps taken to minimise leakage there, such as fiberglas lining, separate feeds to each room, multiple angles, etc - I'm not sure if anybody's done this, and I've not checked the NEC to see if it would be legal (just thought of it) but if so I KNOW it would require Plenum rated cable at least, in order to meet code... Steve
You didn't mention what country you're in, but in the US at least, you can buy electrical fixtures that are made for surface mounting - including power strips that are set up with an outlet every 4-6 inches, up to one every 12 inches. The outlet boxes for use with this system are shallower by a little than typical inside-wall mount boxes. I've seen some of the components for this system at Home Depot, although at the time I wasn't doing any heavy duty research so didn't check to see what all they carried...
One possible way to camouflage the surface mounted electrical a bit, would be to run it just below where you intend any absorption panels/traps, etc, to be mounted - keeping in mind that any audio lines should be run at least 12" away from power if they run parallel, and even further away from any "wall warts" or "line lumps" for gear power supplies - most of these abominations spew out incredible amounts of hummmmm.
If necessary, I'd break the wall in only one place, and only if necessary to get power into the room(s). When doing this, it helps if you can offset the holes to opposite sides of a stud cavity, caulking like crazy on both sides and stuffing extra insulation in that cavity to help offset the sound loss.
Another possible trick is to run power thru whatever HVAC ducting you have - there are already going to be steps taken to minimise leakage there, such as fiberglas lining, separate feeds to each room, multiple angles, etc - I'm not sure if anybody's done this, and I've not checked the NEC to see if it would be legal (just thought of it) but if so I KNOW it would require Plenum rated cable at least, in order to meet code... Steve
Soooo, when a Musician dies, do they hear the white noise at the end of the tunnel??!? Hmmmm...