best material to make a sound baffle?

[James John]

What would be the best way to go about knocking up some sound baffles, for a reasonable price?
i'm thinking an mdf board, hinged in the middle with a timber frame. covered in some kind of insulating material such as fibreglass, then with some more material to cover over the fibreglass?
any thoughts on what people have done in the past?
james

[sweetbeats]

You may already know this, but there is lots of information in this website.

What are you wanting to baffle?

[James John]

i want to make some baffles for recording bands in an open space live room - just to take the edge off bleed through - it hasn't got to be perfect, just a bit better than it is now y'know... the main offenders are the drum-kit and leslie speaker by far. i reckon fibreglass would be good, don't you think? i'd have to cover it over with another material so it doesn't start cutting people!

[poopchute]

I know they maight be a little on the expensive side. But if you ever go to HomeDepot or Menards or Lowes go where they have those huge persian style rugs hung up and open 2 of them up so that they make a little 45 degree angle and just listen to the quietness. I think you could record in a subway with those. If you can find a couple of clean used ruggs like that you could construct a couple of simple 4X4 1/4" plywood or underlayment (its lighter that standard plywood for carrying around)

[Dani Pace]

Something you might want to think about is making one side reflective and the other side so it absorbs sound. This way one baffle/gobo can serve two purposes.

[famous beagle]

You want to use rigid fiberglass (or at least that's been proven to have great acoustic baffling properties) --- Owens Corning 703. It's not something that they have at Home Depot (or at least they don't at mine). I had to do a search on line and find a distributor.

It's pretty cheap and works great. I covered mine with either a breathable muslin sheet or burlap.

Also, mineral wool is much cheaper than 703, and it's got really great baffling properties too -- very close to 703 specs.

Both 703 or MW usually comes in 2x4ft sheets, in 1, 2, or 4" thicknesses.