Ventilation...

Bob Amser

New member
Hi,

After some advice, ideally with someone with experience of doing this. The construction of my studio is nearly done. It's a small loft space in an extension to my house and I've done all I can to isolate sound coming in / going out. I'm hopeful it'll be air tight.

With that in mind, I'm conscious that I, and the musicians I'll be recording with, will need to breathe. It's a relatively small space (I can only just stand up in the middle) so there will be a maximum of three people in there at any one time.

I have a couple of books on building a home recording studio. These both assume that for ventilation there will be an air conditioning unit. I think this is because the books are written in the US where, I gather, it's pretty hot at times. I live in the UK and it's hardly ever really hot here, so air con doesn't really happen in houses here, just cars!

Has anyone done ventilation with fans? My idea is two 'baffle boxes' (one for air in, one for air out) and having an in-line extractor fan in the air-out side. This can can be in the 'old' loft so as to reduce noise from the fan coming in.

Does this sound like a decent plan? Does anyone (even better) have a recommendation for a good in-line fan that will pull through the baffles effectively but is relatively quiet?

Gratitude, in advance, for any advice.
 
Bob,
I have a baffle system and fan in my booth. However, I usually only run it long enough to get it bearable enough to stay in there to record, and later just ventilate it by opening the door for a bit. I kill the fan, to stop the air flow while the mic is on.

As you have probably already researched, you will want a laminar flow of air, from your baffle system, to quieten and also exchange all of the air.

Here are some fans that run very quietly, that other VO talents use: http://www.ecomfort.com/fan/fantech-inline-duct-fans.html?utm_source=gemini&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=brand+fantech+categories&var1=ecomfortusa&var2=geminisearch&var3=fantech or TD-Silent Series Multi-Purpose Inline Mixed Flow Duct Fan 4" (143 CFM) :: Industrial Fans Direct

Maybe these will give you some ideas.
Dale
 
My last studio had a reverse cycle air con system with baffle boxes, ducts etc, this took a lot of building. The new studio has split system air con. Split system does not replace the air from outside but I find that we just open up the doors when we have a break and the fresh air come in. However I understand your problem have a really small space, however whenever you are bringing in air you are bringing in noise, I would just open the door when every you are not recording as it's much easier.

If you do want a design there are a 1001 designs on google, could you build a small baffle box on the actual studio door, this way you are not dealing with outside noise only noise from the house? You could use a large computer silent fan to move some air and power it from an old computer power supply?

Alan.
 
The new studio has split system air con.

A little off-topic, but I want to say Alan mentioned the split a/c unit a couple of years ago or more and the idea stuck. Because of him, I have had one for about a year or so and it has made all the difference. Before that, I had a window unit I permanently mounted in the wall when I built my studio. It was loud and distracting and in the middle of summer (Texas) it couldn't keep the room cool. The split a/c is ultra quiet and maintains temps. Thanks Alan.

Oh, plus it has heat. That might be useful in the UK. Give it a consideration.
 
When I had the central A/C installed...the guys were like..."You don't really need it downstairs because it's a split-level house and it's cool naturally" (which it is)...but I had them run a duct to the studio. :)
So...with the studio doors open, A/C return will pull the air out of the studio...so I do get a nice circular flow with the cool air coming in and the return pulling it out.
Actually...my studio ends up having the coolest temps in the summer. I can maintain 68-70 even if all my gear is powered on, and with my 2" tape deck and console, the gear does generate some heat. I mean, in the winter, I can keep the studio pretty warm without running a lot of extra heat.

You need ventilation and some cooling in the summer, even if your climate is not super hot...'cuz with the gear and if you have a few bodies in the studio...it can get warm/clammy without it.
 
Thanks folks. Good ideas all. I like the sound of split a/c. Maybe I can add in the future when more money becomes available.

The idea of using the door is genius - I have a panel above the door which is a 'weak point' isolation-wise and I've been building a baffle box to fit the odd-shaped space. Thanks!
 
When I rebuilt a house to use for my studio. I removed all of the rigid duct piping in the rooms used for studio purposes and replaced them with flexible duct piping. Virtually the same level of air flow is present yet no downfall of fan noise resonating the once rigid piping. Also ended up branching off of the hvac system itself and ran an additional 4" flexible duct into the vocal booth itself, with an switchable in duct van boosted wired to a rotary switch in the booth if the artist needs a boost of air between takes. Even if left on high, the audible sound from the pipe is less than that of a cpu fan.
 
Combining a few of those ideas, including that flexible ducting, which makes sense to me. I suppose the b side to that is that flexible ducting gives more resistance so may need a more powerful fan and may result in more noise created by the fan itself.

I once rehearsed in a rehearsal 'pod' that was, in essence, an acoustically treated industrial fridge. It was a Saturday morning so there had been some drinking the night before and the ventilation was bust. For us, the 'open the door' solution was not very helpful - that small amount of air from one direction did nothing to shift those farts.
 
Combining a few of those ideas, including that flexible ducting, which makes sense to me. I suppose the b side to that is that flexible ducting gives more resistance so may need a more powerful fan and may result in more noise created by the fan itself.

The trick is to use the largest ducting you can fit in, this way the resistance is reduced lowering the fan noise, and the air flow speed is slower also reducing the noise of the air movement.

Alan.
 
While ventilation is the Achilles heel of my home studio, the one thing I did right was to choose flexible ducting. I'm a good 25-30 feet away from the furnace blower, with a few walls in between. I get no mechanical noise or air baffling noise, that duct is dead silent. Unfortunately I didn't put a return in the room, so there is zero circulation when the door is shut and the room gets stuffy in a hurry. Add a couple of warm bodies and a bunch of halogen track lights, plus a few hot tube amps and it gets downright uncomfortable at times.
 
Unfortunately I didn't put a return in the room, so there is zero circulation when the door is shut and the room gets stuffy in a hurry.

You could build a small vent baffle box on the door like I suggested earlier. The return air will then flow through the baffle and out the door.

Alan.
 
Glad to have read this page. I intend to use radiant heat/cooling, but will need some system of air flow in the new studio (should it ever get past the ground level). Was planning to use low noise reversible fans (one row up toward the ceiling and one row down near the floor) to facilitate (blow cold air up for cool and vice-versa for heat).
 
That will help, but I would worry that if your room is well soundproofed, it will also be pretty air tight. The human body kicks out a fair bit of heat and the lack of oxygen, and over-supply of fart gas, is I suspect going to be a problem unless you only plan to close doors when actually recording. Usually, though, you want to be able to spend longer between getting up and down to open the door, plus you need the door(s) open for long periods to exchange the air. I speak from experience of using a sealed space before.

That said, you can have a less sealed space and just accept it gets noisy outside the room. Ventilation will be less of a problem, as will acoustics, as the sound and fart gas will be able to escape.

Bizarrely, I was clearing out my Mum's garage and came across an air conditioning unit she has no use for! Unbelievable! I never knew she had one in the house. I've already built the door baffle and now just need an adapter to connect the two. I'll let you know how it works.
 
Def look into radiant. Very efficient and no noise except low noise fans. Warm water for heating the room, cool water for cooling the room runs through pipes. If you have no air bubbles, you have no noise. You still need to ventilate, and the system is more efficient with fans...but I'm trying to design a radiant system that runs in baffles in the wall and allows the cold to enter at the top of the room and the hot to enter at the bottom so the system itself becomes the ventilation via convection and the outside sound is still killed by the baffle system. It's in my brain, just got to get it on paper and do some testing...
 
Wow. Sounds impressive! Heating is nearly always done by radiator in the UK and a well maintained system should be quiet. The only problems we get are problems with sound travelling along the pipes as traditional systems have metal pipes throughout. Use PVC rather than copper and, if poss, de-couple from any other part of the house. Oh, and don't eat beans the night before!
 
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