NEW attic studio build! advice anyone?

LemonTree

Suck 'em and see!
Ok here we go...

I moved house about 6 weeks ago into a new place with a huge attic. It's about 30' x 36'. I tore apart very carefuly my last studio in the old place and am recycling most of the materials including all the timber & rockwool. Obviously the plasterboard couldn't be saved so that, caulk and screws should be the biggest part of my budget.

The floor joists up there are 6"x2" with 4" of mineral wool between them. I've done a floating floor before and intend to rubber puck the joists and run new (used) 2x2 in the opposite directions so the beams cross at right angles. I'll have my 50mm rigid Knauff RW45 between my 2x2 then particle board tongued floor sheets, a really old carpet and another layer of tongued floor boards layed in the opposite direction again and a new (hurray!) carpet over the top.

So my floor from the bottom up is 19mm plasterboard on the ceiling below, 6" joists with 4" of mineral wool, 1" rubber pucks, 2" floor joists with rigid RW45 in between, tongued particle boars, carpet, tongued particle board and another carpet... and the good news... I don't record acoustic drums. I have a roland TD3 kit and superior drummer 2.0

So for the walls and ceiling up there I'm not really sure how to attack it. I have some angled 4x2 supports and 5x2 trusses 2/3rds of the way up the roof. I've already cut and moved 3 of the angled supports on each side making an inlet for my desk on one wall and an inlet for my couch on the opposite wall.

The trusses I plan to raise 10" each to claw back some of the height I'm losing with the floating floor to 7'2"

Would panneling up the supporting trusses first then floating the floor and building a new room on the floater be overkill? I'm thinking if I double plasterboard the outsides, fill with RW54 and maybe, plasterboard..maybe just carpet halfway up and plasterboard the rest on the inside thisa will be enough.

I done the whole room within a room in the last house and it worked well but an attic isn't exactly a room. For one there's a hatch to down stairs to which I've already fitted a good quality folding sprung ladder and plan to have the control room behind a door away from that as I know it's the weakest spot for sound transmition to the rooms below.

I'll be back up there tomorrow with the camera and get some pics taken. Anyone done an attic studio before that can offer me advice?

Oh yeah..it's a semi...we have a neighbour but they are party animals so I don't see any problems there. I know I'll be making less noise than they do so I'm more concerned about not hearing them than them hearing me.

Thanks,

Alex
 
I have no advice but am interested in your project. I'm moving to a new house next week and have a whole basement to call my own. Look forward to the pics.
 
ok here's some pics

the hatch

the view from the skylight

angled recess mix position in control room

angled recess couch position in control room

I'll get some more up :D
 

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my neoprane substitute rubber safety fall from kids play areas
..tried and tested in the last studio

framework cut and layed out

Framework bolted up and floating


tomorrow I'll get the RW45 rigid in there and cover with tongued floor pannels.... oh after I extend the frame into the two recesses, damn! lol
 

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so the control room will be 13' between the mix position recess and the couch position recess and 10' wide from the brick wall to the wall I haven't built yet. Drums will go on the brick wall...new wall will have door and maybe a window..I have the glass from the last build.


Here's a pick looking up the hatch end...

This will be boxed off it's about 7' x 8' and should do nicely as my vocal booth/access point
 

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Did you says 2x6 floor joists? What is the spacing? That dimension of joist is ok for holding up a ceiling, but not a floor!! Here US stateside second floor joist for residentail are more like 2x10 or 2x12 on 16" centers. My studio is on the second level above a garage, but has 16 inch deep trusses on 16 inch centers.

I would think you would get a lot of deflection and possible joist failure with where your at unless there are a lot of supporting walls underneath.
Even thenm I would not do this.
 
Did you says 2x6 floor joists? What is the spacing? That dimension of joist is ok for holding up a ceiling, but not a floor!! Here US stateside second floor joist for residentail are more like 2x10 or 2x12 on 16" centers. My studio is on the second level above a garage, but has 16 inch deep trusses on 16 inch centers.

I would think you would get a lot of deflection and possible joist failure with where your at unless there are a lot of supporting walls underneath.
Even thenm I would not do this.

Sorry, the floor joists up there are 2x8 on 14" centres and there's a double brick supporting wall running up the centre underneath, so the longest span is 12.5 feet unsupported but as the control room will be staggered across the supporting wall it reaches 6.5 feet on either side of the supporting wall. I've had it checked out and it's all good to go.
 
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