Details...details, the devil's in 'em

D

DrFrankencopter

New member
***** Stupid Question(s) Alert ****

I've read Alton Everest's books, some other more advanced acoustic books, and seeked out plenty of information on the 'net...and think I've finally hammered out the details of my one room studio, and it's getting close to 'hammer' time. But I still have some nagging questions....questions that the books just don't seem to cover.

Such as:

(1) How do you actually go about building your walls?

-do you build your walls lying down on the floor, and then pop them up vertically? Or do you build them in-place...does the technique depend on the wall construction (would you build a metal stud wall in-place and a wood framed wall on the floor)? What about angled walls (in the vertical plane)?

(2) Do you start with the wall framing, then do electrical rough ins, then put the drywall up? What about double walls?

(3) Do you do the ceiling last? I'm planning on doing an isolated ceiling on resilient hangars (Kinetics model ICW spring isolators), and I'm not sure how to tackle this beast!

I have a few books on home improvement, but they are really quite general, and I wonder if building studio walls will require substantially different techniques (e.g. tighter tolerances, acoustic caulk)....I know that the wall construction itself is different, but I am curious about the techniques used to actually put the things together.

Thanks in advance!

Cheers,

Kris
 
With studio walls, you can use different materials and stagger the studs to make a more acoustically dead wall, thus not allowing sound in, or out, of the room. But the concept is the same.

Studs, then electrical, then wall surface.

Most of the studios I participated in building, we used hanging tile, and of course did it last.

In my studio, it has tongue and groove cedar panels on all surfaces but the floor (including the ceiling), so I tore it down and sheetrocked, then put a layer of rubber sheet, then put the cedar back up (trimming in minimally because with the additional layers the room is slightly smaller).

Smells nice actually, for 60 y/o paneling. :)

Which ceiling hangers are you using? I'm not familiar with the ones you mentioned, unless I know of them by a different name.

We've done z-channel on the ceiling and screwed MDF or fiberglass to the ceiling, we've done acoustical tile, we've even just used deck screws to layer two layers of MDF and painted over that. Depends on the acoustical problems and of course, the budget.
 
Planning, Planning, and more

Hi, just a few suggestions. Do you have a real plan? Thats what I would suggest. Detail it on paper first. Imagine, You are building a precision box, on the inside of an existing box. Draw a section throught the whole room, in scale, both directions.Those are vertical sections. This will show you connections. Your plan is actually a plan section. Look at all floor, wall. ceiling connections. Plan your HVAC, electrical. door details, and connections between the existing structure and your structure that is supposed to float. That is if I interpret your intention correctly. The ceiling connections you described sound like you are suspending a complete ceiling structure unto itself. Whats it hanging from? Have you calculated a load on the existing structure. Don't want all that work caving in on your client. If you are double sheithing it, this will be HEAVY. And it has no perimeter support from the walls. It floats between the walls with 1/4" to 1/2" clearance. Then you caulk it. Any connection between ceiling and walls will short circuit all the other prep youv'e done.Same with the wall/floor connections. What kind of framing for it. Wood, steel, unistrut? Any permits? There are a thousand details that have to be addressed, and unless you are going to fly by the seat of your pants, I would take some time to visit your local Building Inspection Dept. At least this way your "floating" cieling" meets code. Same with the floor. Is your existing floor going to be the studio floor? Is it a slab, wood, or are you floating a floor? If its a slab, decouple it at the perimeter by cutting a 1/4" gap throught the concrete. Don't cut into pipes! Lot of work. Whats your noise floor? Do you really know how much sound control in db you need. In both directions. Any existing structural noise? These are just a few examples of things that should be planned. Better safe than sorry. Remember, a closed up studio is cut off from the outside world. Soundproof means airproof, And thats dangerous. But don't take my word for it. Talk to an inspector when your halfway done and you get a visit from one without a permit. No fun. This is what "floating" a structure means to me. I hope this helps. And I'm sure other people here have lots of experience with the details. Info is king.
fitz
 
Re: Planning, Planning, and more

RICK FITZPATRICK said:
Remember, a closed up studio is cut off from the outside world. Soundproof means airproof, And thats dangerous.
Click to expand...

Hey Rick. Can you elaborate on this a bit? Seems like not just studios, but even houses in the US are getting more airproof these days with super insulating practices. What specific problems does this pose to us air breathing creatures? Does every home studio need an HVAC system?
 
Thanks for the replies...

Ya, I've got a plan...though I'm never sure how much planning is enough. So far my plan has considered details such as wall construction for optimal isolation particularly at low frequencies.

My basement studio is in a townhouse end-unit, so my primary reason for isolation is to keep my neighbours happy. There's a concrete common wall (at least in the basement), and I will be building a 'room within a room' type construction. The slab is concrete, and I should probably cut it to decouple., because I don't have the height to spare to properly float the floor. The problem is, that the outside walls already have been framed by the home builder (and half drywalled)...I would have to pull them down in order to cut the slab. Is it tough to pull walls down and put them back up?? Is it worth it (I'm guessing yes)? What do you seal the cut back up with (acoustic sealant?). What do you do to make sure that the cut doesn't become a water entry point?

My HVAC plans are pretty simple (one room right), I plan on removing all ties into my house's HVAC system in my room, and using a single room air conditioner/heater that'll be ducted directly to the outside through a set of turned lined duct pipes and a small plenum chamber.

I don't have a solid electrical plan yet, but I will definitely be going with seperate circuits for my lights and my outlets. Lights will be a combination of incandescent track lights and DC adjustable lights.

The ceiling design is suspended from the joists...just like a regular ceiling, but uses springs and a frame for better performance for a given loss of height than resilient channel. Check out www.kineticsnoise.com for more details.

For wall construction, I am planning a double wall, with one wall double faced steel stud, and the other being single faced wood stud. I figure this should cut down on resonance between the two walls. I figure that if I can get 25 dB of isolation at 60Hz, then I'm in reasonable shape. I'm not sure if it's do-able though....

Pipes...I have one that I need to move, a water pipe, small diameter copper, and I figure that won't be a real big deal.

Thanks,

Kris
 
BID RULES

Hi, just a little input for the moment. Any info I suggest here, is to HELP, not degrade your dreams and ideas. I think building a home studio is more fUN than anything I can think of. (This is why I post.) But because it involves things goverened by building inspection department laws, at least in most countrys I believe, I am adament about obtaining permits. First reason, is saftey. Not just your own, but your neightbors, family, clients and future tenents of the building. How many things in your house have you found that were mickeymoused to the point where it required complete replacement of the work done? Not so, had it been overseen by the codes.(maybe!)
The point is this. We are adults here, and as adults we take responsibility for many things in life we don't necessisarily agree with(you stop at stop signs don't you?) How would you like to be in a building that caught fire, and you are 200 ft. into it, and the lights go out, and you die, cause some lazy a__hole of a builder, failed to put up a lighted exit sign, just because he didn't think the law applied to him? Get the picture?
Buildings are not inherently dangerous. Anymore. And why? Because of the codes. They are there to keep me and you safe(with in reason). The county I live in just passed a law that requires EVERY buyilding to have at least 2 smoke alarms. And they are infringing on peoples civil rights to inspect homes to insure that you comply. And thats the key word-comply. Look, this is a home studio forum, and I will offer my expertize if anyone is interested. I am not a know it all, far from it. But I do have professional experience dealing with BID. Your studio is your business, especially in your home. However, when it comes to responsibility for the saftey of others, this is where fact from fiction leave each other. Fact- anything you do to alter an existing structure, wheather it is one electrical outlet added to a circuit, or building a patio roof
has the potential to hurt someone, if done incorrectly. I'll post more shortly, this one is long enough for now. Sorry for the rambling. But remember this, anything worth doing, is worth doing correctly, and BID helps by making you comply with proven safety issues.
fitz
 
How much planning is enough?

Howdy again, hey thats an easy one. As far as responsibility to comply with the law, think about it. When you submit a set of plans to the building inspection department, they are the ones to decide whether or not you have planned enough, by way of the plan approval process. They will look at your plans, inspect them to see if you show them you are complying with the codes, and they will note on the plans, everything they think you are not! You keep repeating this procedure, untill you comply. Simple as that. If you comply in your plans, you get a permit, not the otherway around. They MAKE you comply. By stating or drawing you are telling them you will meet the codes, and agreeing to build as drawn. Thats the point of the PLANS. When the inspector comes for your inspection, he will look at the plans, and look to see if in fact you did build what you agreed to build, its already a done deal. He knows if you built as you said, its already been approved in the planning stage, so he doesn't have to think about it. Now, theres an old saying in the inspection trade. "We don't inspect ugly". What that means is feel free to be creative. Look around, if they did inspect ugly, every building would look the same. What they are there for is to see if you have complied with the LAW. Get a building code book for your local. Read a little of it. Then you will see. Here in California, we have whats known as Title 24. That has to do with complying with the handicap codes. You think home building is code tough? Try a commercial building. LOL Last time I submitted plans for a little 1500 sf. commercial building alteration, it took four months to get through the planning stage, and get a permit to put up 3 simple metal stud and sheetrock walls, 2 doors, and a window. Ha!
fitz
 
Cut concrete legally?

Hi John, your question is one that would depend on the application. Yea its legal to cut concrete. They do it all the time. . You don't need a permit(for most applications))to cut the concrete. You need a permit to build on it. Let me expand on that thought. If you have a slab, and the perimeter of the slab is your foundation for a building, the foundation(usually about a foot thicker thasn the slab) is what supports the roof load, not the slab. Its tied to it because it was poured at the same time.(it might add to the overall load bearing capability of the foundation) If you cut the slab loose from the foundation along the perimeter, the foundation still supports the load. Now I'm no expert, and I'll check with BID on this, however it would seem to me that if there is no load on the slab, then you have changed nothing. Some buildings may have interior load bearing walls, or columns, but they have their own foundations, although they were poured with the slab. I've seen one story homes altered to two story, where they had to cut the slab to dig deeper to add a column foundation to interior spans and to support added loads above. This is not to say that you should just bring in a diamond saw and start cutting. Yea, I beleive you can do it with out a permit. However, whats the point, if your going to build floating walls and floor on the slab, you are adding a load to it, and if your getting a permit for construction, I'm sure that the first thing they will ask you is to show that the existing slab meets the required load bearing capability(by way of calculation and robably not, at least here, but I'll check)Your perimeter studio floating walls are still a load. Especially if you have multiple layers of gyp. bd. or mdf. Let me get back to you on this after I check with BID. I'm no authority, but I aim to give valid info. One more thing, to truly decouple the studio floor from the floating walls, there would have to be 2 seperations. One between the exterior shell foundation and the new studio floating walls,(i.e. 2 foundations) and between the floating walls and your floating floor. (and then again between your control room/studio partition walls) Probably complete overkill, but I would think this is what you would have to do if your studio was adjacent to a railroad track or freeway! I don't believe home studio construction would require this, but how much noise control do you need? If that much, I would suggest starting a commercial studio and build from the ground up with all the above planned in. Probably a lot cheaper.
fitz
 
Thanks for that reply Rick - I figured that the slab will sit on the foundation which is usually around 1' - 1'6" wide so you would have to cut maybe 6" - 1' away from the wall to clear it. So... I thought it wouldn't be worth it.

cheers
john
 
I would think that under normal design, the slab and footings (outer foundations) are meant to be a single continuous structure. Any substantial cut that separated the slab from the footings would only compromise the structural integrity of the "whole" and should not be advocated.

:cool:
 
BID tells you

Hi ausrouck, I tried to make myself clear, I am not an engineer or authority, and any indication that I am advocating anything WITHOUT at permit is wrong. But you are probably correct about compromising the "structural integrity" And I did mention in my reply regarding this. Thats why you submit your plans to the BID! If they approve it, then they take responsibility for the "structural intigrity". If they do not, they will tell you to demonstrate by calculation and or code precedence, how you will comply with whatever code they are enforcing(prior to issuing a permit). Otherwise, if your not sure, consult or hire a buiilding engineer or architect, and he will interface between you and BID. Since they are licenced professionals, they have to submit a detailed plan and calculation sheet. BID then inspects thier submittal and responds approprietly. All your doing this way, is insuring that the job gets done right, legal, and saving a whole lot of time and frustration. But it costs for thier services. Like I said, in regards to cutting a gap through the concrete, I will contact the local BID, and let you know what I find out. This will only apply to this county(even though most codes have been adopted nationwide by local ordinances.) But let me add this. If I were going to cut a slab loose, in order for the blade to fully cut past the intersection tangent point of the cut perpendicular to it(to cut all the way through at the corners), the distance between the existing wall and your cut, would at least have to equal the radius of the blade, which is about 6 to 8"(that is if a reciprocating concrete saw is not available?) which leaves that distance of slab on the interior side of the foundation to further reinforce it. And that is how I would detail my plans for submittal to BID, and let THEM tell me why or why not they will issue a permit. Although this distance between the existing wall and the planned floating wall is probably more than the average homestudio owner can afford to loose. This was just a suggestion. Without seeing a detailed plan of someones studio, you KNOW how difficult it is to offer REAL solutions in this regard. As soon as I recieve my autocad reader, I will start posting details which may(or may not?) help more(or maybe I should keep my mouth shut!)Thanks for reading my input.
fitz:)
 
Yes Rick and Ausrock - I agree with you totally regarding adhearing to the building codes.

Rick - have you got a copy of Paintshop Pro ?? You can open .dxf files into paintshop and then save them as jpg, gif or whatever.

Also you can import DXF and DWG files into Smartdraw and export them as images OR PDF files for acrobat reader

cheers
john
 
noise vs. fresh air

Hi guys! Thanks so much for info. Didn't mean for this to go on this long. I bet Kris is wondering what happened to his question. I just asked one on the tascam forum about "tails out" and there was so many replys they had to start a new thread. Cool. Have a great day, and I'll get this drawing thing down soon. One more thing. For Dan Merril.
Dan, again I'm no expert. But the thing about airtight studios. Maybe not like a shuttle,
but look at it this way. Sound enters the studio 2 ways. Either by the structure, or by every little airgap it can find. And I do mean little. A 1/2" hole in a wall can negate all the soundproofing you can afford. Thats why studios are airtight! Except for the HVAC.
Otherwise the HVAC would have to be self contained as they are in the shuttle. The way sound is decayed in an appropriatly designed system is explained in Mr. Everests books. By designing ducting/plenum paths that absorb and reflect sound energy back towards the source. To reach a specified level of noise reduction in a HVAC system, takes professional HVAC design expertize. (Boy, does that leave me out.) To me its-
"How much money do you have". Home studio HVAC is exactly that. If you have the money to invest into a system that meets your noise reduction goals, I would talk to a professional. Otherwise, some compromise along the way is enevitable. Thats not to say that compromise can be completely bad. As far as airtightness in modern homes, yea its probably a concern that I'm not qualified to comment on other than, they still have the same problem as studios do. Ducting paths to the outside world cannot be eliminated, as thats exactly what they are designed to do. Bring in fresh air. Whether or not its then heated or chilled, its still fresh air. The returns from each room do suck it back to the condenser chamber, otherwise the HVAC would have a backpressure (sort of like putting your mouth on a bottle and blowing-it doesn't work)but it is still mixed with fresh air. Or otherwise you would need a scrubber to remove the carbon dioxide, just like the shuttle. So theres the delima. Fresh air vs. noise. So for us homestudio builders, this is the one item that can make it difficult to totally soundproof. If you soundproof to the point that it is airtight, and NOT address the hvac dilema, then you create a situation that is unhealthy and can even be dangerous. Also, pro studios have seperate hvac systems for the studio and control room. This eliminates a path for sound between them. Hope this helps.
fitz
 
more on HVAC and cut slab

I agree Rick, HVAC is probably one of the most overlooked items in most amateur studio construction endevours. It's easy to see how a sealed tight room will reduce sound transmission, but it's hard to understand the importance of those cracks in allowing fresh air to propagate into the studio, and stale air to work it's way out. Actually, the difference is huge once you get a good door seal on....

I've been in enough sweaty, stinky, humid home studios to recognize the importance of air circulation. For my sistuation, I have elected to go with a seperate system, vented to the outside (I'll have to get a hole cut in the side of my foundation for the vent). My reason for doing this was twofold; first, by having a seperate system for my studio I don't need to worry as much about sound leakage from the studio into the house HVAC system and up to the next floor through the vents, and second, having a seperate system gives me control over the environment in the studio, as opposed to being forced to adjust the temperature of the whole house to get some temperature control in the basement. As a bonus, these single room systems offer humidity control too. It's not the cheapest approach, but for a single room studio it's a pretty good one...fancy HVAC ducts cost lots, and may require re-balancing of your whole system.

Regarding cutting the slab, it is legal in my city, according to my uncle (civil engineer). I'm still not sure what you'd seal the cut back up with to prevent moisture problems. Obviously you want some kind of non-hardening sealant.

Cheers,

Kris
 
Sealants/caulking

Hi again, and again I don't mean to drag this out, but dog-gon-it, information is hard to come by sometimes, so if it takes a long paragraph to explain-then so be it! Sealants. Yea, I'm leaving for work in 10 min., when I get there I have a whole catalog and info
pack on sealants/caulking. I'll get the net/page and post it for you tonight. The cut should only be the thickness of the blade, so it won't take much. I would suggest blowing out the cut with air from a compressor if you can. That will clean the surface for the sealant to stick to. Also, MAKE SURE there are no pipes in the cutting path!
I live in an old tract house(built in 58') and just last week, I had a copper pipe start leaking under my slab in the kitchen. NO F_____ING FUN!!! Turns out that during the vietnam war, about a mile from my house, a whole railroad train full of 1000 lb. bombs blew up in the trainyard(I lived about a mile from my present house then) and cracked the slabs in almost every house within a half mile radius from the trainyard. Over the years, because of the crack, the house settles and tree roots raise each side of the crack differently. WALA-cracked pipes! damn. Another thing to take me from finishing my studio, and start playing music!:mad:
fitz
 
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