WOOD!

W

Wallycleaver

New member
Ok, here goes a stupid question. In some studios there are hardwood floors in the control room and the studio itself. Isn't that bad news. An additional reflective surface, and wouldn't it act similar to an acoustics top if it vibrates? Just a though
 
Studio floors are usually isolated from vibration by laying rubber, vinyl or fiberglass padding below the subfloor. I don't think any hardwood floor could resonate like a guitar, there's too much mass in it (even if it's not the ground floor). As for acoustics ... if the room is well designed, overall ... then some reflective surfaces can actually be a good thing.
 
Wallycleaver said:
Ok, here goes a stupid question. In some studios there are hardwood floors in the control room and the studio itself. Isn't that bad news. An additional reflective surface, and wouldn't it act similar to an acoustics top if it vibrates? Just a though
Click to expand...

You have to keep in mind that some reflective surfaces are good. Why not use carpet? Because it absorbs the wrong frequencies, pretty much all the high ones, and it leaves your room a bit boomy. Hardwood floors reflects the sound and leaves the absorbing up to the quality studio foam you put on your walls, that are specially designed for these things. Since you can't put studio foam on your floors (you couldn't walk around), you just want to make them as reflective as possible.
 
Well, Is concrete a good thing? I was thinking that at some point I would put some kind of flooring over the concrete in my control room- it just gets all dirty and sweeping dosen't always help much- damn I'd hate to buy a mop! :)

-jhe
 
James HE said:
Well, Is concrete a good thing? I was thinking that at some point I would put some kind of flooring over the concrete in my control room- it just gets all dirty and sweeping dosen't always help much- damn I'd hate to buy a mop! :)

-jhe
Click to expand...

Well actually we're keeping our floors concrete until we can afford hardwood floors. We're just going to paint it a nicer looking color than the gray it is now.

Speaking of mopping... I just spent a couple hours last night scrubing the floors, soaking with soapy water, and sucking it up with the shop-vac. We couldn't breath anymore it was so dusty. After doing all the drywall the floor had white dust caked onto it, and just sweeping wasn't doing a thing for it. Sure, where the 2 ton stack of drywall sat for a month the floor was plenty clean, but once the drwall was gone we could really see how dirty the floor was. Cleaning isn't THAT bad :) I actually like it. Everytime we give the studio a good clean it takes us one step closer to seeing the final result, which is still in reality about 5 months away.
I'm jelous of John, it sounds like building that studio is all you guys are doing. I have a full time job, and I start school on monday. I'll be going to school at the time I would normally be working on the studio, except friday. It's a big bummer for me.

Later,
-Brian
 
I had originally counted on having concrete floors cos I thought it would fit our budget but Amirel loves the place so much now that he wants to put in timber hardwood floors ... shit ... everything goes up 50mm!!

There's a coffe shop in town that has a concrete floor but they've put some coating on it and it looks really nice - sort of brown wax look - I'll try to find out what it is guys and get back to you with it

cheers
John :)
 
Yeah, hard wood floors raise the floor up, which sucks when you're already working with low ceilings, like I am.

If you could find out what the covering on the floors was at that shop you were talking about that would be great. Maybe I won't need to put hardwood floors down after all.

Later,
-Brian
 
I see why it would be ok in the control room but the main room I still have questions. Won't there be signals bouncing around like mad causing somethings to go out of phase? Unless, of corse you close mic everything, which makes the studios possibility of clients smaller? Am I crazy?
 
Wally, you've got a very good question. And I had the same question when I started looking into building my own studio. But everything, I mean absolutely everything, I've read suggests using a hard surface for the floors. If you've got 75% coverage of your walls with 2" studio foam you're going to be just fine. And foam on the ceiling, that's the part that helps the hard floor.
 
Concrete Floors

Well I went to the coffe shop and the owner told me he did the floor himself - good start - he then told me it was a two pack polyeurothane (spelling??) that he used and had to wear a mask and good ventilation etc. He cleaned the cement with an acid cleaner and then made sure it was perfectly clean. He the put on one coat with a fresh roller and in about 4 hours it was ready for a second. He sanded the first and then put on a second and finally a third. It looks like you poured honey all over the floor and is a lovely finish. I don't know what the US equivalent is but I'm sure your local Hardware store would know.

BTW this studio I'm building is growing out of all proportion - the owner has now approved my japanese style timber slot resonators to be built by the local joinery company using local hardwood timbers!!

Slots1.jpg


Cheers
John :D
 
Re: Concrete Floors

Thanks for the info on the concrete floor, I think I'm probably going to end up doing that.

What is that picture of? What is a slot resonator? You definately know more about this stuff than I do :)

Later,
-Brian
 
A slot resonator is a low frequency absorber (sort of). It shouldn't be too hard to calculate and build one if you know the frequency you want to get rid of.
A slot resonator is very useful if you've got problems with room modes and standing waves in the room.

I think I have an slot resonator calculator as an excel-file. If I find it I can mail it to you.


fimpen

megotart
 
Ok... and a slot resonator is different than a bass trap, such as Auralex LENRD, or Venus? If I've already cut the corners in my rooms so they're 45 degrees instead of 90, and the only 90 degree corners left are the wall to ceiling, would doing something like that really be needed for me? If I put LENRD bass traps in those corners that should get rid of the mode?
 
Brian and all - a slot resonator is like a coke bottle - if you blow on the mouth of a bottle it will produce a note, it's resonate frequency - if you then put some cotton wool in the bottle the note is gone but it is still there but has been absorbed. In a slot resonator the gaps between the timber is like the coke bottle and the gap from the wall determines how big the bottle is.

In the design above the gap varies so it becomes a broad band absorber. The width of the slats, the thickness of the slats and depth from the wall are all variables. The drawing above is for an absorber from around 180Hz - 800hz which are th frequencies at the tail end of the insulation (foam) absorption. Added together you get an even absorption from 180Hz - 20Khz.

The depth from the wall is the thickness of my wall frame 3". I'll go into it more in update 3 - due soon. I have the excel programme on the front page of my site and you can work it out for yourself

http://www.lis.net.au/~johnsay/Acoustics

Cheers
John :)
 
Re: Concrete Floors

John Sayers said:
Well I went to the coffe shop and the owner told me he did the floor himself - good start - he then told me it was a two pack polyeurothane (spelling??) that he used and had to wear a mask and good ventilation etc. He cleaned the cement with an acid cleaner and then made sure it was perfectly clean. He the put on one coat with a fresh roller and in about 4 hours it was ready for a second. He sanded the first and then put on a second and finally a third. It looks like you poured honey all over the floor and is a lovely finish. I don't know what the US equivalent is but I'm sure your local Hardware store would know.

Slots1.jpg


Cheers
John :D
Click to expand...

I wonder if it's Polane?

If it is-it's not something you want to do yourself.
Polane is what EAW and Turbosound have on the outside of their speakers boxes-the stuff is hard as nails, but it's toxic. It's a two part Poly. Nasty stuff man.

Tim
 
Yes Tim - It is nasty stuff - The coffee shop could use it cos they had an open shop front and the air could circulate but I wouldn't contemplate using it in a closed environment like a studio.

Cheers
John
 
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