New shed studio

pandamonk

Well-known member
Hi guys, hope you're doing well in these crazy times. I've not posted on here for almost decade.

After learning everything you'd ever need to know about home studio building, and meeting a bunch of brilliant people from all over the world, I built a studio from a bomb shelter (like the image below) and timber shed back in 2007 which served me well for over a decade. I called it Bombshed Studios. I had to give it up a couple of years ago but now I feel I should reignite the Bombshed legacy by building a new shed studio.

brick_built-finchley.jpg

I have a 18'x8' concrete base with a ramp at the front and steps at the side, near the back. I have a load of PA equipment and need 8'x8' for storage leaving 10'x8' to play with... I know it's not much but it's all I've got.

So I'm looking at an 18'x8' apex timber garage/workshop. I think an STC of around 30 should be enough, so I plan on installing PIR insulation (I know mineral wool might be better) and a single layer of 1/2" drywall to the frame. The room size should be 7'6"x9'6" and the ceiling height will be ~6' at each side, rising to ~7' at the beam. I know 6'x7'6"x9'7" would fit the 1:1.25:1.6 ratio but a 6' ceiling will be too low; so 6' rising to 7' will have to do.

Now, to acoustics. I know bass traps are key but space is a luxury I don't have. I can have 4" Rockwool floor-to-ceiling corner traps in the back corners (at a 25° angle instead of 45°). My desk is 6'x2'6" so I can't afford the space in the front corners, so I've decided on an inside out wall, with the drywall facing away from the room and the 4" Rockwool (with 2" gap) exposed with fabric covering to make a floor-to-ceiling 6" bass trap wall. I'll also treat the ceiling, side and back wall first reflection points with 4'x2'x2" Rockwool traps.

So, to my questions:
  1. Do I really need need to worry about bass trapping the hell out of this small room if the bass will mostly just pass through the walls?
  2. What do you think of my plans below (the area with coefficients is for PA storage, 2'6" is the door and 3' is a window)?
  3. How are you guys coping through lockdown?
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The bass won't just 'pass through the walls' - yes, you're going to need to completely deaden the sound in such a small space. Your plan for the front wall and the rest of the space makes sense. You could start with just the front wall, rear corner traps and point of first reflection ones, see what the sound is like, then add more as needed.
 
The bass won't just 'pass through the walls' - yes, you're going to need to completely deaden the sound in such a small space. Your plan for the front wall and the rest of the space makes sense. You could start with just the front wall, rear corner traps and point of first reflection ones, see what the sound is like, then add more as needed.

Thanks Mike. I've calculated that 44% of the surface area of the walls and ceiling will be treated and 33% will be treated with 4" Rockwool with a gap of at least 2". I know the space is pretty tiny, but surely that'll help somewhat.

Also, on the point that bass won't just pass through walls, if 90% of bass below 125Hz is transmitting through the walls is it really reflecting within the room and causing issues? Is 90% transmission not similar acoustically to 90% absorption? I'm not against bass trapping, like I showed I'm planning on treating 33% of the surface area, just wondering if it'll really require the same as a space with better isolation.
 
Where are you getting the 90% figure from?

It was just an assumption/guesstimate.

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I've seen an example of a stud wall with an STC of 40 where the transmission loss is >35dB for most frequencies but tails off below 160Hz down as far as 15dB. If we assume an average volume of 85dB, then 15dB is 17.65%. The stud wall described is staggered stud, so would provide better performance than mine, so I estimated 10%. I know isolation doesn't work in percentages, and this guesstimate was likely too low, but my question wasn't really about details, but simply "would high sound transmission work a bit like absorption at low frequencies?". If so, it won't stop me treating with bass traps (I might go with 4'x2' in the rear corners rather than floor to ceiling) but would perhaps give me more confidence in my plans.
 
Try it. Play a track with lots of prominent bass in ti and walk around the room, listening for what happens to the bass (and other frequencies) as you move your head. There are practical reasons why people put traps floor to ceiling. You can't know what happens in a room until you try it. Its quite amazing to hear the bass all of a suddenly jump out at you (albeit modulated and phasey) as you move your head near an untreated corner.
Note: to do this, you of course need speakers that reproduce the low frequencies accurately.
 
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