sweetbeats
Reel deep thoughts...
Well I've been away from my usual torrent of posting everything you never really cared to know about [insert piece of equipment I own here]...been quite busy.
Since I haven't much to share gear-related, and since its "pretty quiet around here" I thought I'd share instead what's been occupying...just about everything here.
After years of analyzing, discussing, getting cold feet, agreeing, disagreeing, etc., my wife and I took the plunge and moved forward with a remodel and addition on our home of 6 years. My lady and I along with our 4 children were eager to stretch out a little beyond the 1300 sq. ft. 1.5 bath home that we had been in, take care of some structural issues, infrastucture updates and repairs/upkeep and create some new spaces. We had a tall order in light of fiscal strictures so there was a bit of "value engineering" and creativity that went into the plans to keep costs down, and a LOT of sweat equity...and its gotten worse because the market is so bad and we got chopped at the knees with the funding of the second half of the project. Oh well...I always wanted to learn, among other things, how to install and trim out windows and install siding right? We were able to use the original garage and a covered porch as subjects for conversion to living space...about 700 sq. ft. of space, and add a new unfinished garage out front...in this way the only new foortprint to the house is the new garage which was the most cost effective way to so it. We broke ground at the beginning of July.
The part of the project about which you all are probably the most interested is the sound room...about 10' x 11' and fully isolated dual-wall construction with a 1" air-gap, blow-in-blanket micro fiber insulation and QuietRock ES on all interior surfaces and all exterior surfaces adjoining living space...separate heating system...low-voltage chases for running audio interconnects through the walls and also outside the room...dedicated 20A service for audio and separate circuits for general power and lighting...blocking in the walls for mounting speakers and computer monitors.
Here is a view from the existing laundry room...through the first doorway is the "mud-room" off the garage and the sound room is the next doorway...you can see a 3-gang box low and to the right of that doorway...that's one of the low-voltage access points, the one outside the studio.
If we walk forward through the mud-room to the doorway of the sound room we see this...the mixer and monitors and other racks will be against the left wall from where I'm standing, and the MM-1000 will be straight ahead on that back wall with the high windows...you can see how thick the walls are around the windows, and the QuietRock is supposed to have the same damping properties as 8 layers of standard gypsum board:
Now if we backup just a little and turn right we are in the garage which is a mess...construction central...there's the back of "Matilda" in the background all wrapped up behind the skateboard halfpipe I'm building...
...oy.
Now if we keep walking forward and take a left we go out a man-door and then if we turn around and look back where we came from we see this...the door we just came out of, and one of the high windows of the sound room...the new garage is on the left:
And then if we turn to the right a little bit we see what used to be the South end of the original house which used to be the garage and is now the sound room and a new bedroom...two high windows for each of those spaces on that wall:
We also cut about 600ft of trenches for storm and sump drain runs as well as power and water out to the field...here's one such trench...you can see my burn pile made up mostly of demolition spoils in the background:
Let's take a closer look at that burn pile huh? I'm very proud of it...the wheelbarrow is there for scale. You can see our horsies in the far off background. We torched the pile today. It was...AWESOME...8 hours later and it is still flaming, and its been drizzling for 4 hours! Flames at least 20' up...hm...wonder if one of the kids got a picture of it on fire...
Okay. Thanks. I feel better.
Since I haven't much to share gear-related, and since its "pretty quiet around here" I thought I'd share instead what's been occupying...just about everything here.
After years of analyzing, discussing, getting cold feet, agreeing, disagreeing, etc., my wife and I took the plunge and moved forward with a remodel and addition on our home of 6 years. My lady and I along with our 4 children were eager to stretch out a little beyond the 1300 sq. ft. 1.5 bath home that we had been in, take care of some structural issues, infrastucture updates and repairs/upkeep and create some new spaces. We had a tall order in light of fiscal strictures so there was a bit of "value engineering" and creativity that went into the plans to keep costs down, and a LOT of sweat equity...and its gotten worse because the market is so bad and we got chopped at the knees with the funding of the second half of the project. Oh well...I always wanted to learn, among other things, how to install and trim out windows and install siding right? We were able to use the original garage and a covered porch as subjects for conversion to living space...about 700 sq. ft. of space, and add a new unfinished garage out front...in this way the only new foortprint to the house is the new garage which was the most cost effective way to so it. We broke ground at the beginning of July.
The part of the project about which you all are probably the most interested is the sound room...about 10' x 11' and fully isolated dual-wall construction with a 1" air-gap, blow-in-blanket micro fiber insulation and QuietRock ES on all interior surfaces and all exterior surfaces adjoining living space...separate heating system...low-voltage chases for running audio interconnects through the walls and also outside the room...dedicated 20A service for audio and separate circuits for general power and lighting...blocking in the walls for mounting speakers and computer monitors.
Here is a view from the existing laundry room...through the first doorway is the "mud-room" off the garage and the sound room is the next doorway...you can see a 3-gang box low and to the right of that doorway...that's one of the low-voltage access points, the one outside the studio.
If we walk forward through the mud-room to the doorway of the sound room we see this...the mixer and monitors and other racks will be against the left wall from where I'm standing, and the MM-1000 will be straight ahead on that back wall with the high windows...you can see how thick the walls are around the windows, and the QuietRock is supposed to have the same damping properties as 8 layers of standard gypsum board:
Now if we backup just a little and turn right we are in the garage which is a mess...construction central...there's the back of "Matilda" in the background all wrapped up behind the skateboard halfpipe I'm building...
...oy.
Now if we keep walking forward and take a left we go out a man-door and then if we turn around and look back where we came from we see this...the door we just came out of, and one of the high windows of the sound room...the new garage is on the left:
And then if we turn to the right a little bit we see what used to be the South end of the original house which used to be the garage and is now the sound room and a new bedroom...two high windows for each of those spaces on that wall:
We also cut about 600ft of trenches for storm and sump drain runs as well as power and water out to the field...here's one such trench...you can see my burn pile made up mostly of demolition spoils in the background:
Let's take a closer look at that burn pile huh? I'm very proud of it...the wheelbarrow is there for scale. You can see our horsies in the far off background. We torched the pile today. It was...AWESOME...8 hours later and it is still flaming, and its been drizzling for 4 hours! Flames at least 20' up...hm...wonder if one of the kids got a picture of it on fire...
Okay. Thanks. I feel better.
.......... 
