Drop Ceiling Soundproofing

S

stephenmodel

New member
I tried searching and could quite find the answer. I am looking to soundproof on some ,evel the drop ceiling in my basement studio. I wanting to stuff the drop ceiling with Roxul Safe'n'Sound Unfaced. It is the only think at my big boc store that is available and rated for soundproofing. Basically the room is about 30 x 12 feet.

Basically i wanted to stuff that in the ceiling and build ceiling bass traps with it as well. Would this be a worthwhile investment? Would the soundproof foam in the drop ceiling act as a bass trap if it placed aboce the ceiling tile? I am not looking for complete isolation but just something a more than doing nothing.

steve
 
That will act as a giant absorption panel, but that's just treating acoustics. That's what I did in my last house and it worked great! But it is NOT soundproofing. It offers pretty much NO additional isolation. "Soundproofing" and "sound absorption" are 2 VERY different things, roxul is made for absorption. Absorption is very very good, but it wont stop your family or neighbors from hearing anything. Soundproofing is accomplished by adding lots and lots of mass. Multiple layers of drywall, concrete cinder blocks filled with sand, that kinda thing. Sound waves simply cant muscle thru lots of mass.

That said, soundproofing and sound absorption kind of battle against each other, because if you soundproof, you are not letting sound out. It has to go somewhere, all that mass makes it bounce back into your room (reflections), instead of just continuing outward away from you. This makes for an acoustically bad recording environment. Sound absorption catches reflections, but if you have thin walls / not a lot of mass, then there's less sound reflecting back into your room in the first place. You wouldn't need a single bass trap if you were recording in the middle of an open field.
 
Yeah i was hoping it would lower the volume at least a little bit. I also want to start treating my room and thought that this might be a good start. Along with 4 2x4 bass traps. I am rearranging all my equipment and mixing locations this weekend and I am going to try to get this going.

You think that doing that to the drop ceiling would be a beneficial Move?

steve
 
suprstar said:
That said, soundproofing and sound absorption kind of battle against each other, because if you soundproof, you are not letting sound out. It has to go somewhere, all that mass makes it bounce back into your room (reflections), instead of just continuing outward away from you.
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I've never really thought about it that way but that really makes sense. More mass = more treatment needed for reflections. Less mass = maybe less treatment needed, but more sound escaping.
 
airbagtester said:
I've never really thought about it that way but that really makes sense. More mass = more treatment needed for reflections. Less mass = maybe less treatment needed, but more sound escaping.
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Yep! There are a few things that help with soundproofing that do not affect acoustics in a negative impact, and even some that help room acoustics (like constrained layer dampening) - but the actual statement "more mass = more need for treatment" is certainly true.
 
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