John Sayers' Recording Studio Design Forum Archive

Hello,
Thanks for the great resource. I've been reading through the forums for a few days now, and the info here is priceless. Well done!

I'm totally blind, so bare with me if I ask some seemingly rediculous questions here. I'll try to explain as much as I can about my project, but please don't hesitate to tell me to explain more if necessary.

What I want to do:
Convert a small out building in to a pre-production space for me to do the bulk of my radio and tv jingles in before going to a larger studio. I'll be using mostly keyboards and modules, but want to record live guitars, vocals, and occationly live drums. Well I say live drums. It is a set of Roland V Drums.

What I have:
I hope to post a pic of the actual building soon. Right now it is crammed full of boxes from where we just moved, but I'll get the wife to take a pic in the next few days. In the meantime I'll try to describe it as best as I can. The inside has not been finished out yet, and is just bare studs. The inside dementions are 19' 9' long by 13' 5" wide, and 8' 1" from fllor to ceiling rafters. There is a standard 32" wide storm window in each end on the short walls, and the existing door is located center of the front long wall and is 4' wide. The wall studs are, of course 2"x4", and built on 16' centers, and the ceiling rafters are 2"x6" on 24". The floor is a concrete pad. The door is pretty heavy. It was built from a 2"x4" frame, and has 3/4" OSB with wood siding on the outside, and 3/4" OSB covering the inside frame of the door. The outside walls are constructed of 3/4" OSB as well with wood siding covering it.

I have many questions, and don't mind splitting them in to different post if need be.
1. Is there enough space here for a small CR and a separate tracking/vocal room, or would I be better off to leave it one room, and use absorbsion panels when recording vocals?

2. What about the windows? Should I leave them and use some plugs like I've seen describe here in other post? Cover them up completly? Or maybe even replace them with glass block?

3. Should I lay down some laminat flooring, or just leave the concrete and carpet it?

4. If there is enough space to split the room in two, how important is a window between the CR and tracking room? Again I'm blind, so it wouldn't benefit me, but maybe others tracking in the studio?

Thank you, in advance, so much for your help. My nephew does construction and electrical, so I'll have help, and I've already sent the link to him, so he can download sketchup in case we need it.

Chipster wrote: 1. Is there enough space here for a small CR and a separate tracking/vocal room, or would I be better off to leave it one room, and use absorbsion panels when recording vocals?

2. What about the windows? Should I leave them and use some plugs like I've seen describe here in other post? Cover them up completly? Or maybe even replace them with glass block?

3. Should I lay down some laminat flooring, or just leave the concrete and carpet it?

4. If there is enough space to split the room in two, how important is a window between the CR and tracking room? Again I'm blind, so it wouldn't benefit me, but maybe others tracking in the studio?

1. i would opt for leaving the space open since it will have better acoustics and will be easier to move around. you could use some gobos to make an area for the vocals or build a dedicated vocal booth. if you do need more isolation, you could split the room. i've attached a sketch of one idea.

2. if other people will be using your space, then i'd leave the windows. you can build an interior wall for isolation purposes and add a second window on that so you get the full window and most of the isolation.

3. i'd polish and stain the concrete and only use small carpets as needed. if you find you don't like the sound of it, you can always put wood laminate flooring over it later.

4. if you do decide to split, i'd add the windows for the benefit of other people.

Hi Glenn,
Thanks for the reply. I'll get the wife to describe the sketches, you've attached, to me later, and thanks for those as well.

I really like the idea of leaving the space open. I was afraid that it might get a little crampped in there if we split it up, and was also afraid that it would make it harder to properly treat. Using Gobos while recording vocals doesn't bother me in the least.

The mrs. will be doing a lot of work in there as well, so she's glad that she gets to keep her windows. We were just given several boxes of brand new laminate, so I guess we'll use it as well.

Moving on to the interior walls. I know I've probably read it somewhere here, but have read so much in the past few days that my head is swimming. Should I build the interior walls by attaching new studs to the existing ones, or build a separate wall system? And should I use 2x4s or 2x6. Over the windows, should I install storm windows or use a solid sheet of thick glass?

The Rock Wool plant is less than 30 miles from my house, and I can go direct and buy it there, so that makes it my obvious choice over the more exspensive OC700 series, but what I'd like to know is, should I use it in my walls instead of standard house insullation as well?

Lastly for now, the HVAC guys are coming out next week to install the heatpump. What factors should I consider when running the duct work? Do I avoid placing registers above or near where my desk will be? Go ahead and plan where vocals and drums will be recorded and also avoid those areas as well?

if your isolation requirements aren't high, i'd just add insulation to the existing studs and joist (if the rock wool is cheap enough you can use it there as well as in treatments) and put on resilient channel and 2 layers of drywall (verify with a structural engineer you can do this). good quality exterior grade windows may be enough, or you could a storm window.

onec you have the room reasonable isolated, the next step is to measure it and determine what treatments are needed. There are some nice tools like ETF software or Room EQ wizard which can be used to do this.

i'd map out spots for your desk and acoustic instruments and vox and avoid putting registers directly overhead but generally you should seek to keep the air velocity low enough that the noise is low. this implies larger sized ducts, possibly duct lining, in-duct damping instead of controlling it at the register, and proper velocity control on the equipment. ensure fresh air exchange is provided. Rod is the expert here.

gullfo wrote:if your isolation requirements aren't high, i'd just add insulation to the existing studs and joist (if the rock wool is cheap enough you can use it there as well as in treatments) and put on resilient channel and 2 layers of drywall (verify with a structural engineer you can do this). good quality exterior grade windows may be enough, or you could a storm window.

onec you have the room reasonable isolated, the next step is to measure it and determine what treatments are needed. There are some nice tools like ETF software or Room EQ wizard which can be used to do this.

i'd map out spots for your desk and acoustic instruments and vox and avoid putting registers directly overhead but generally you should seek to keep the air velocity low enough that the noise is low. this implies larger sized ducts, possibly duct lining, in-duct damping instead of controlling it at the register, and proper velocity control on the equipment. ensure fresh air exchange is provided. Rod is the expert here.

Well, I'm afraid that I probably need more isolation than what just 4 inch walls will provide. The house next door is built farther off the road than ours, and their back bedroom wall is about 30 feet from my buildings side wall. I'm afraid on the ocation that I use real drums instead of the V drums that it may not be enough. I had planned to place the drums on the far end of the building away from their house, but still didn't think 4" walls would work. However, I'm justa newbe at this stuff, so I may not, in fact I know I don't, even know what I'm talking about.

I've had the building inspected, and a quick phone call to the inspector tells me that there would be no problem in removing the existing storm windows and installing commercial ones. He went on to say that if I need the thicker walls, he sees no problems with that either. Just check my plans with him before doing any construction.

I'll be talking with the HVAC guy this evening. I'll be sure and tell him about the larger duct size and other points you raised, and make sure we're on the same page before he starts.

Thanks