John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

Removed.

THere's a lot of information here on the subject.

In single stud construction with no RC, steel stud walls outperform wood stud walls because there's a certain amount of decouplingness (I make up words all the time -- get used to it! ) associated with the steel, as long as the gauge is thin enough. Steel studs are shaped like the letter "C," so the flexibility of the sheet metal is key to that.

However, once you do staggered stud or (ideally) double framed walls, there is no real difference.

It becomes a question of cost (they're pretty close nowadays), availability, comfort and/or experience with construction, and (this is a biggie) moisture tolerance -- although termites don't eat steel studs, steel studs can tolerate much less moisture than wood studs. Wood studs can absorb a certain amount of moisture with no problems, yet moisture would condense on the steel studs and then be prone to rusting.

That's a summary of what's I know Steve has reported here in a number of threads... I'm too lazy to go looking for them right now.

Hope that helps...

--Keith

I used steel studs in half my room, the other half is wood (the wood half was pre finished so i had no choice). That may have been beneficial, i have no clue. One thing is steel studs are a bitch to work with! I have lots of trouble with it. If the steel studs reach the floor nailing nails into the trim is nearly impossible, wiring is pretty difficult trying to cut through all the metal and putting in outlet boxes is a pain. On the upside i think its easier to actually assemble the wall, just some tin snips and you dont need to mess with the weight of the wall and the mess of saw dust. Not to mention steel studs are much cheaper. OVerall i guess it weighs out pretty evenly, if ya just want acoustic value i think it would be worth it.

Fill