Putting up acoustic panels

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limetree

New member
I just got 96 square feet of acoustic foam, it's wedge foam in 2X4 panels, and I'm wondering, is it better to have the foam, the wedges, all face the same way, or is it better to have them oriented in different ways, like hand some panels horzontally and some vertically? Any help is appreciated
 
Considering what little foam actually does for acoustics to begin with, I really don't think it matters how they are placed. Arrange them so they look cool. :)
 
I dont really get the replies fellas. If you're trying to tell me hanging up sound absorbing material does nothing to deaden the reflection in a room, then I don't really know what to say to that
 
It isn't that it does nothing. Just very little to anything other than high end reflections and kill some flutter echo. Not saying they are useless, just not very useful. For the price of foam, one can build 'real' bass traps for much better results. Search the topic on here and you will find tons of information. The ones just below are a good start. :)
 
limetree said:
I dont really get the replies fellas. If you're trying to tell me hanging up sound absorbing material does nothing to deaden the reflection in a room, then I don't really know what to say to that
Click to expand...

Foam is almost useless, if not totally useless. You need to use the right material to "treat" a room. In 99% of all rooms, low end is the problem. Foam will kill your high end and high-mids, but do nothing for your low end. Because of that, low end now becomes 100% of the problem, which is actually worse. You need to use rigid fibreglass in as many corners as you can get it in for starters. Then, you'll probably need some at your first reflection points and on the ceiling above your listening area. At the very least, the corners. Once all of that is taken care of, you can place SOME foam in a few spots IF it's needed.

But just using what they call "acoustic foam" is almost, if not totally useless.

Spend some time reading a lot of the threads in this part of the forum. There's a lot of useful information here.
 
Bass traps are actually what I was planning to tackle next, actually. But you think until I have them, padding the room will actually make my bass frequency loss worse?
 
limetree said:
padding the room will actually make my bass frequency loss worse?
Click to expand...

It's not about bass "loss". It's about controlling the bass in the room. Until a room is well treated with bass traps, etc...bass frequencies are bouncing all over the place. So, you have spots where there's a null and you don't hear any bass. Then, you take 2 steps to the left and you have an abundance of bass. That's what bass traps control.

Even if it was about bass "loss", foam wouldn't be the answer, because it's not "sound proofing" material. Sound proofing is a whole different subject completely separate from sound treatment.
 
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