Can bass traps be free standing?

Rich_S

Member
I'm starting to work (in my brain, at least) on treating my "studio" (aka family room, aka home office). However, we're empty nesters now, and we may be moving to a smaller place in a year or two. So, I don't want to go drilling a lot of holes in the walls, just to have to patch them all if/when we move.

Can corner bass traps be free standing? I've seen sketches of them involving rigid fiberglass panels screwed to cleats on the walls. But I'm thinking about something like a 3-legged table with the fiberglass spanning the outside legs. Maybe with a triangular wood top to make it look more like furniture, and to give the cats something to sit on as they look down upon me, rather than a large open-topped cavity that needs to be explored and hidden in.

Of course, if there's a surface to be sat upon, they'll need to climb my fabric-covered panels to get there. Maybe I should just make them full ceiling height.

Anyway, back on-topic: do corner traps need to be fastened to the wall?
 
I have 2 narrow 300x2100mm floor to ceiling bass traps but are also fastened to wall in case they fell over onto someone :facepalm: and I have 2 larger 600x1200mm bass traps hanging from the ceiling midway between floor and ceiling.

Mine are 100mm thick RW3 with a timber outside frame then completely covered in fabric. They aren't particularly heavy but I wouldn't want one to fall over and hit me. So I would fasten to the wall or something.
 
I have seen wall hooks advertized that, they claim, can be removed with no damaged or mark to the wall.

Another idea, if the room is carpeted, use "industrial" Velcro to stick the base to the floor then you would need minimum support to prevent toppling.

If solid floors, Velcro on both surfaces and you can remove the residue from the floor with "Sticky Stuff Solution" or copius quantities of ISOPROPA. DON'T put Velcro on a wall! You will pull paper, even plaster off.

Dave.
 
Can bass traps be free standing?

Yes...though for optimal performance, if you can have them about a foot or so off the ground, it's a little better.
I built some large bass traps and made them free standing because I wanted them mobile...rather than mounted in on spot. There are also some ready-made products that are free-standing, especially for the corners, but you have to consider how they are made, how they work. They are not all just big boxes with as lot of insulation. IOW...in the corner, you want traps that let the sound in, but then, not back out, and instead they absorb the LF energy....so like , maybe some type of "solid" front, that will not block LF, and reflect the upper frequencies, but a porous back to help trap the LF...or there maybe a functional membrane that vibrates internally and then dissipates the energy into the absorptive material inside.
 
Thing is when you put bass traps in corners or have free standing things in rooms. My thoughts are that..........If sound is travelling at about 760mph. Those 'bass' noises have been around the room a quite few times before they get absorbed by your simple or complected but no doubt expensive bass traps.

So where is the best place for your bass trap?......Next to the recording device/listener? Did somebody say 'corners!' one day and everybody followed suit?

I would have thought that bass traps and other sound difusers would need to be placed around the room in different places to suit what ever is being generated at that particular time......But then you would probably go nuts thinking about it all.:yawn::yawn:
 
I keep our cats out of my music room for cat hair and fur balls and all the other joys that come along with their companionship, but we've not downsized yet, so I have a spare room to which I can keep the door closed.

But, first, when I hear "bass" traps I always think about the denser, thicker kind of treatment that goes to corners or wall-ceiling joins. (I think the reason, [MENTION=193092]Orson[/MENTION], is because that's where the lower frequency "collects" based on those room mode models - don't ask me how!).

Anyway, if you have something fairly massive, like framed panels that are 8" or more in depth, they're probably ok standing by themselves, though in my low-ceilinged (8') room, I was still a bit bothered by 8' of panel just free-standing even in the corners of the room, so I wedged a bit of foam between the top and ceiling so there's no chance a renegade cat or "ankle-biter" (recent crossword puzzle answer :)) is going to cause anything to tip over. The regular treatment/panels are fastened away from the wall with a couple of L-brackets but those are quick spackle and dab-of-paint fixups when it's time to move on.
 
Oh I understand Keith and my bass traps that I made are in the corners of my sound boothe as well. Do I need them? I have no idea but after endless Youtube videos and threads like this I just became paranoid and even felt inadequate if I didn't have them or put them in the corners. :wtf:

My point is though being serious. That any acoustic treatment if to work correctly needs to be positioned to suit the situation. The room can be treated as a norm. But trying to catch and treat certain frequencies which may only be produced by a certain instrument at a certain place in the room..........cannot really be done efficiently if we religiously just put the sound treatment in corners waiting for those frequencies to hit them.
 
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Yes. Mine are just leaned in the corner behind my desk. No chance of falling on unsuspecting musician or cats...

As far as corner treatment the simple way to think of it is to place your head in a corner without a bass trap of sort. It is obvious there is buildup there. Place a quality bass trap in there and the effect is way less.

And where else you doing to put them in a small home studio? Maybe ceiling to wall, but not many have that kind of headroom.

Room treatment for home studios that have not ability to optimize room size/dimensions are different than a professional built studio. Have to take care of the obvious issues first. Then treat as needed to make the room as good as physics will allow. Then it just about compromise and making the best of what you have in any particular environment.
 
Yes...though for optimal performance, if you can have them about a foot or so off the ground, it's a little better.

Really. I hadn’t noticed that before in my reading about DIY bass traps. Does the same apply to the top? Is a 6 foot trap centered between the floor and an 8 foot ceiling better than a full-height 8 foot trap?
 
Really. I hadn’t noticed that before in my reading about DIY bass traps. Does the same apply to the top? Is a 6 foot trap centered between the floor and an 8 foot ceiling better than a full-height 8 foot trap?

I don't know if there is optimal in-between position...but I recall when I spoke with GIK about their big bass traps and asked about having them on the floor, etc...they said it's best to pick them up off the floor a bit...there was nothing said about equidistant from the floor and ceiling, because you can have rooms with a lot of height, so the traps would not be raised too high. It was just something about the floor.

When I built my own larg bass traps...I did a lot of testing with the frequency measurement software, and there was an improvement with the traps about 16" off the floor vs on the floor. I just put them up on some milk crates, and that made it easy to keep them mobile and still have them off the floor.

GIK makes some freestanding traps, and they come with a stand that lifts them up off the floor.
 
Interesting. Yeah, my dimensions were just an example. Not looking for optimal difference-splitting, just wondering if the "off the floor" thing applies to the ceiling as well.

Let's change the topic slightly: My back wall has two bedroom doors through it, in opposite corners, about 6 inches off the side walls. Obviously, a 12 inch or larger triangular bass trap will not fit without blocking part of the door way. Is there another shape of trap that could be used to treat those corners. If I hung a flat trap (spaced off the wall a bit) on the side wall, say about a foot in from the corner, would that be "good enough"?

One of these days, I'll get around to doing a drawing of my room so this stuff is easier to explain.
 
That's why I built my "mobile" freestanding bass traps...because I too have a door in the corner. So this way I can move the traps into position when doing mixing...and move them out of the way when not.

All that will go away and change when I get my new studio done...and the 6 large bass traps will end up in the two back corners...3 in one, 3 in the other...two side-by-side with the third one on top of them. I will have a 10' high back wall...so it will be 8' of bass traps going up....and I won't have to move them. :)
 
Looked through my laptop tonight, and it turns out I already got around to drawing the family room/office/studio a long time ago. It just needed a quick update, so here it is.

wtCRzhB.jpg


The room is on the second floor, over the garage. It has an 8 ft. ceiling. The floor is vinyl plank, the red rectangles are area rugs. The windows in the front wall are 30" wide, with 16" in between. The stairway is open from the steps up to the 2nd floor ceiling.

The only corner where I could get away with a full 24" bass trap is the upper left, behind the arm chair. The bedroom doors make the back corners problematic.

This is just going to be a for-fun home studio, but whatever I can do to make worthwhile improvements in the sound utilizing DIY treatments, I would consider. Where would you start?
 
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An open door is a 'bass trap', so to speak - the sound waves go through, do not bounce back (except from within that room).
 
An open door is a 'bass trap', so to speak - the sound waves go through, do not bounce back (except from within that room).

Kind of on point, but does not seem quite accurate. I have done tests in my room with doors open and it does not make much of a difference. Especially if in center of room or not exactly in corner, I bet an open door is more of a minimal improvement if the room sucks to begin with, and isn't treated correctly.

I just would not wish to advise someone to not treat their room because 'hey, I have an open door'. It doesn't work. Especially when the door is closed....

And not to mention the fact that a closet could actually resonate and cause more issues. Just sayin.

I recently had a carpenter on a job that built 5 3' x 12" x 12" boxes to support 16' trim pieces while cutting them. It was so loud even I as a drummer took notice. Those little boxes did the same thing an acoustic guitar body does.

Just something to think about. I do not know the science of it all completely. Do tests and see what works best in your room.
 
Kind of on point, but does not seem quite accurate. I have done tests in my room with doors open and it does not make much of a difference.

I agree.

Logic would make you think the LF would just "go out the door", as MJB suggested...but it really doesn't.
My one corner that has a door, even when open, I can walk over to it, and as soon as I approach the corner, the LF starts to get real boomy.
At least the LF boom tends to stay in the corner...and as I walk away and back to my mix position, everything sounds normal...but that corner may be both adding and subtracting certain LF frequencies even if they appear to "stay" in the corner...so trapping will help no matter if there is or isn't a door in the corner.

I think it's just the "corner" thing that does it...and not so much a closed corner vs. one an open door corner.
 
If you think about it.......it is logical. If you make a box and sound enters then the sound will keep banging around inside the box.
 
I agree.

Logic would make you think the LF would just "go out the door", as MJB suggested...but it really doesn't.
My one corner that has a door, even when open, I can walk over to it, and as soon as I approach the corner, the LF starts to get real boomy.
At least the LF boom tends to stay in the corner...and as I walk away and back to my mix position, everything sounds normal...but that corner may be both adding and subtracting certain LF frequencies even if they appear to "stay" in the corner...so trapping will help no matter if there is or isn't a door in the corner.

I think it's just the "corner" thing that does it...and not so much a closed corner vs. one an open door corner.

Well of course, the 'corner' is still there unless the opening is flush to the perpendicular wall. But sound waves CANNOT bounce off empty space - they are bouncing off the other wall, or that still-there corner. I have a front corner with an opening, and have a trap on the perpendicular wall.
The opening is into a 11'x 16' foot room, I'm not too concerned about sounding bouncing back into my mixing room from it, as the delay would be enough that it would not matter - its the quick reflections that mess up the sound.
 
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