Studio Foammmmmm

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myfipie said:
I would leave the foam wedge and just put the rigid fiberglass in front of it. It is not that the foam does not work but is not working good enough..

Glenn

Sounds good...but my understanding was one reason you should straddle the corners with the bass traps was they required some open space behind them to work well. Would leaving the foam wedge back there actually be better than the open space?
 
Use 4" for the corner traps, and 2" spaced 2" from the wall. When a sound wave bounces off a wall the air molecule velocity at the wall is always zero, and it's max is at 1/4 wavelength from the wall. The absorption works by slowing down the molecules, so the material closest to the wall is least effective.

Foam behind the fiberglass in the corner would work, but not that much better than without the foam.
 
JeffLancaster said:
Sounds good...but my understanding was one reason you should straddle the corners with the bass traps was they required some open space behind them to work well. Would leaving the foam wedge back there actually be better than the open space?

Air gap is good, but mass is better. ;) The more there is to absorb the better it will work. So if you built a corner trap and filled the whole thing with rigid fiberglass (known as a super chunk) that would work even better.

Glenn
 
apl said:
Use 4" for the corner traps, and 2" spaced 2" from the wall. When a sound wave bounces off a wall the air molecule velocity at the wall is always zero, and it's max is at 1/4 wavelength from the wall. The absorption works by slowing down the molecules, so the material closest to the wall is least effective.

Foam behind the fiberglass in the corner would work, but not that much better than without the foam.

YOu are correct and just to add to that. If a 2" panel is spaced off the wall it will also pick up more HF also. The sound comes in from the sides, hits the wall then the back of the panel. Pretty cool, A? ;)

Glenn
 
Anomaly Design said:
The walls are plywood...

That reminds me of this...

RICK FITZPATRICK said:
You're joking of course? Imagine curtains catching fire. Which will burn off quick. However, imagine another scenario.

You have 12 fabric covered panels on the walls, and 2 fabric covered clouds on the ceiling.
Like most HR enthusiasts, you also have designed your room for recording, not safety. You also didn't get a permit/inspection when installing the electrical. Not being an electrician, you inadvertantly place two out of phase circuits in the same room. One of these is a 15 amp lighting circuit fed from an adjacent room outlet, tied with an outlet in the studio to feed the musicians equipment. You also didn't use a lever latchset on the door, but managed to put a double keyed deadbolt which you lock when recording, but do not think ahead and remove the key.
You have 4 people, a set of drums, 3 amps, your recording gear and various other things in a small room. Unaware that the circuit you tied into for the lights is also feeding a freezer in the next room which was installed by the previous owner also without permit. However, he tied in the circuit with a j'box and a 14 gauge extension cord. You must pass through this room, which the previous owner added to the house, to get into the studio.
The musicians are playing, you are recording, and the freezer compressor kicks on. Unbeknownst to you, the circuit is holding, but the 14 ga wire is overheating at a cable clamp in the J box. At some point, the extention cord vinyl jacket melts, and the conductors short together and arc...oops, the previous owner didn't put a cover on the J box either, which allows the arc ignite the adjacent wood chips from drilling a hole in a stud for the wire. Now, when the wires shorted, it throws the circuit breaker that feeds your lights as well as the musicians equipment too. The music stops as does the light. Well, this is a studio, and you have no windows, but you do have total darkness now. Hmmm, whats going on.
You tell the musicians to hold on while you check the breaker. You fumble around looking for the key to the deadbolt. Hmmm, its not in your pocket. Now what did you do with that key. Hmmm, 5 minutes pass while you fumble around in the dark trying to feel for the key you set someplace. Wait,. what is that? You smell something...Meanwhile..

the fire easily climbs the stud, as he also didn't bother to nail in a fireblock in the wall. Nor did he use drywall as a shiething. Since this was "only" a utility room, he used 1/8 ply with a vinyl coating. Ahhhh, but you used 2 layers 1/2" drywall with a 45 minute fire rating each on your side of the wall. Now the fire easily burns through the ply and spreads. The whole wall in the adjacent room is now on fire, as the vinyl melts filling the room with viscious hot smoke which is now spreading to other areas of the house. Now it burns through the 1/8 ply ceiling, and fills the attic smoke, and the structural framing catches fire now.

Meanwhile the musicians are smelling smoke and begin to yell and panic, as they are in the dark and get disoriented. One finds his way to the door and grasps the knob which is now 400 degrees, blistering his hand. He screams in pain, turns and trips over a cord and falls, blocking the small aisle between the drums and an amp. The rest of the musicians are totally panicing as are you. Now you find the key, but are unaware of the fire burning through the wall at the joints in the drywall, which were not even taped. Simply covered with mud. The fire now reaches a nylon fabric covered absorber panel. It burst into flames, lighting the room, while all the musicians are beginning to cough and scream, which no one hears because of sound Transmission loss construction. Now the fire jumps to the ceiling panels which allow melting nylon to drip on the people below, lighting their clothing on fire, and sticking to skin. Screams fill the air while you try to get to the door..which is blocked by the others...you scream to get out of the way to unlock the door, which you are unaware is engulfed in flames on the opposite side. You make it to the door and try to insert the key, only to burn your hand on the deadbolt housing...you scream as you try to insert the key without touching the housing again....luck is with you, and the key turns...but now you have to grab the latch handle and turn it..without thinking you grab it.......screaming again...if only you had used a LEVER latch set..........you now are being overwhelmed by the others, who are clamboring over you to get out, one who is now screaming from the clothing on fire..wrestling on the floor to put it out...total panic...you grab the handle again from total fear regardless of the heated latch..it instantly burns your hand but you quickly turn it, only to have the backdraft of the fire blow the door open and knocks everyone back....there is no escape...the room is totally engulfed in flames.........

Improbable if not mpossible you say....think again.. people die every year from Murphy induced scenarios mostly caused by non inspection of electrical and ignored building code construction. Add flamable materials on walls and ceilings and you add to the probability that someone may get hurt, especially in closed off spaces with only a door for egress, such as a studio. No wonder you have to get a special permit for NO WINDOW construction.

Murphy is ALWAYS around, just waiting for the slightest lack of forethought,
laziness, or just plain stupidity. Just ask those who buried their loved ones because of it.
fitZ :)
 
apl said:
That reminds me of this...

Well I have no worries about that. I built the studio under my dad's supervision, whos been in construction for about 25 years now. He just doesn't know a whole lot about good sound treatments for studio applications.

I also have two windows and half of the recording 'wall' is actually 2 gigant swinging doors, closed, with heavy foam insulation. If there was ever a fire, I have the proper training (i'm a volunteer fire fighter) and 3 emergency exists, plus 2 hose faucets right outside! I love my farm :)
 
Anomaly Design said:
So are you saying that its possible to overkill on absorbtion?

It's possible to overkill on absorption if it's all in one frequency range. Say like if you covered every square inch of your studio with carpet (like a guy did in an HGTV episode of Weekend Warriors that I got pulled from the air :) ). Carpet only absorbes high freqencies, leaving the room boomy. Or, more like the situation you originally illustrated, if you covered most of the walls and ceiling in foam that only absorbed high frequencies. You'd leave the room sounding very dead in the high end but lively in the low end.

A lot of people start by treating the bass freq's. Then once that's tamed, see what you need to do to take care of the much easier to handle high freq's.

Also, has anyone directed you here yet? The first video on treating a control room changed my life.
 
See the thread about the conviction of the manager of Great White.(caused fire in club where 100 people died. A FOAM fire.) I would love to hear his opinion of what I said. He met Murphy personally.
fitZ :)
 
Hey Rick, do you know of a link that explains that issue with circuits out of phase? I'm not making any electrical changes in my studio, I'm just curious, and whenever I go looking for the code, it seems like nobody wants to give it away on the internet :(
 
Hey Rick, do you know of a link that explains that issue with circuits out of phase?
No, but I can tell you. However, I am not an expert, but this is what I understand.

A residential electrical supply from the pole is two circuits of 120volts, plus or minus. That is, the 3 wires coming into the supply panel are two HOT wires(current carrying conductors) and a neutral(NON-current carrying conductors). If you measure the voltage potential between either of the two hot wires and the neutral, it will measure about 120 volts. However, these two circuits are 180 degrees OUT OF PHASE with each other, and don't ask me to explain that :D . What thiis boils down to, is, if you measure the voltage between the two hot wires, it will measure about 240volts.

In the supply panel, each of the hotwires is connected to a BUSS, which are ALWAYS hot. Each of these buss's supply current to a set of circuit breakers. 120v breakers are ONE breaker, because it only connects to ONE buss. 240v breakers are TWO breakers, with each connected to opposite buss's. The Neutral is connected to a Multi connector which all of the house circuits are connected to. This multiconnector is connected to an EARTH ground by a seperate wire. This is why the neutral is at the same potential ground, although neutral wires in a circuit do not perform the same function as the ground wire. Thats another subject in itself. Lets move on.

If you have a room with some outlets fed from one of the busses, and some other outlets fed from the other buss, there is a Murphy potential for connecting two amps or whatever, including yourself, BETWEEN these opposite phases, which is....240v :eek:

Which baffles me. County electrical code where I just moved from, required at least TWO 20amp outlets at my kitchen counter. It also required them to be on OPPOSITE phases. :eek: :rolleyes: I even asked the inspector. YEP. Thats what was code. Go figure

This is the problem with a room where you have this potential. Well, thats what I understand and my .02 :) BTW, my disclaimer is in full force here. I ain't no stinkin expert . And wheres Csus7 when you need him. :D
 
RICK FITZPATRICK said:
This is the problem with a room where you have this potential. Well, thats what I understand and my .02 :) BTW, my disclaimer is in full force here. I ain't no stinkin expert . And wheres Csus7 when you need him. :D

He wisely avoids this board :D Plus I think he works swing shift.

Thanks.
 
I don't think you're quite getting things Rick. You're right about phase to phase being 240 volts, that's what most stoves and laundry driers run on... and we're talking U.S. here. But I don't exactly get how you're saying you could some how connect them together and cause a fire. I mean, legistically how would you do that? If you run regular three wire, two conductor romex cable, you connect the white to the common and the black to hot... EITHER HOT WILL DO. If you are stupid enough to connect the white to one circuit breaker and the black to another circuit breaker, connect those wires on the other end to an outlet, and plug a device into it... well then you deserve to have your equipment fried for being so dumb!!! :D But trust me, it's quit common to have some circuits in a room be on one phase of the supply and other circuits be on the other phase, this IS NOT DANGEROUS. It's not dangerous to have lights on one phase and all the outlets in a room be on the other... this is WHY there are two sides of a breaker panel, so you get more circuits.

What IS dangerous, is putting lights and outlets on the same circuit breaker, for the exact reason you illustrated in your "we're all going to die" post about being burned alive. The only reason though that it is dangerous is because if you have a space heater kick out the circuit breaker, then you're without light. More often than not that'll just be annoying... but like you said in your "we're all going to die" post, if that space heater created a fire and THEN kicked out the breaker, then you couldn't find your way out of the studio.

Everyone should have some emergency lights in their studios. They can be as simple as little devices that plug into a few outlets around the studio that look almost like night lights. When the power goes out (or if you unplug them), a light turns on.

As for the two voltages being 180 degrees out of phase that are delivered to your house... I'm surprised you don't understand that. AC is actually a lot like sound waves, you should be able to understand it. 180 degrees out of phase simply means that while one side of the supply is at its highest peak of the 60 hz cycle, the other side of the supply is at its most negative peak. For an instant every cycle they're both at zero volts.
 
But I don't exactly get how you're saying you could some how connect them together and cause a fire.
Who said anything about it causing a fire? :confused: I'm was simply answering his question about phase difference in a room. And I DID post my disclaimer. :rolleyes:
I mean, legistically how would you do that? If you run regular three wire, two conductor romex cable, you connect the white to the common and the black to hot... EITHER HOT WILL DO.
Of course, what did you think I was saying? However, Murphy is ALWAYS on duty. Especially in a kitchen with a sink and two phases at the outlets. All I was doing was explaining MY interpretation of what he wanted to know. If you can answer it better, be my guest.

But trust me, it's quit common to have some circuits in a room be on one phase of the supply and other circuits be on the other phase, this IS NOT DANGEROUS.
Common? On outlets? Not dangerous? Maybe on your planet. Walk on a stage where your amp is on one phase and is ground lifted, while playing a guitar and touch your lips to a mic connected to a PA on the other phase. :eek: Instant "lip removal". I've seen it happen. :mad:


As for the two voltages being 180 degrees out of phase that are delivered to your house... I'm surprised you don't understand that
What makes you think I don't? :confused: But I'm no expert and didn't feel I should venture into this terrritory. HOWEVER. In a LONG LONG thread a few years back, I was told that current doesn't flow in the neutral leg. Bullshit.
Then tell me why this exists. :rolleyes:
http://jnaudin.free.fr/html/NMac1201.htm
 
SonicClang said:
It's possible to overkill on absorption if it's all in one frequency range. Say like if you covered every square inch of your studio with carpet (like a guy did in an HGTV episode of Weekend Warriors that I got pulled from the air :) ). Carpet only absorbes high freqencies, leaving the room boomy. Or, more like the situation you originally illustrated, if you covered most of the walls and ceiling in foam that only absorbed high frequencies. You'd leave the room sounding very dead in the high end but lively in the low end.

A lot of people start by treating the bass freq's. Then once that's tamed, see what you need to do to take care of the much easier to handle high freq's.

Also, has anyone directed you here yet? The first video on treating a control room changed my life.

Nope, haven't seen this site, thanks for the link... And for hijacking my thread! lol
 
Current most DEFINITELY flows in the neutral leg! Holy crap, if someone's going around telling people that someone could get the very wrong idea.

Yes Rick, it's very common for one outlet to be on one side of the service, and another outlet to be on another side of the service. By that I mean, you've got one single duplex outlet wired into circuit breaker 6. That would be on the right side of the breaker box. Wire that one correctly with the black going to the correct side of the outlet, and the white going to the correct side. And then a totally seperate outlet in the same room could be wired into circuit breaker 7, which would be on the left side of the panel, and that outlet wired correctly. This poses no danger, electrical systems are designed to work like this. Each outlet should be totally seperate from other outlets so it wouldn't matter if outlet A in a room is on the left side of the panel and outlet B on the right side.

In a studio situation will that create a shock on a mic? That I don't know, I'm just speaking from regular construction experience. I don't have lip shock in my studio and I've got multiple outlets and I'm sure a couple of them are on different phases.

As for wiring two hots into one outlet, like if you wired the black into one circuit breaker, and the white into another circuit breaker (NEVER DO THIS) and plugged something into that outlet, you'd know INSTANTLY that you did something wrong because you'd have 240 volts. That isn't something that would go for 6 months without anyone noticing, that would be an instant failure situation. Hopefully the breakers would trip and no one would be hurt.

As for a kitchen stove outlet where there are two phases... that poses no more danger than a regular 120V outlet except for the obvious fact that there is twice the voltage. But the fact that there are two phases at the outlet doesn't pose any kind of danger in and of itself.
 
Current most DEFINITELY flows in the neutral leg! Holy crap, if someone's going around telling people that someone could get the very wrong idea.
Well I'm afraid you haven't talked to the electrical pro's that I've talked to, HERE. They ALL agreed that there is NO such thing as neutral current. Although when I posted the link then, no one said shit. :rolleyes: In my mind, I thought the very IDEA of alternating current was that it "flowed" in opposite directions 60 times a second(USA). At least thats what being taught in laymans terms. However, I was told this is not the case. After reading the link(and the Neuman machine link) I don't believe it. However, it doesn't make a damn bit of difference to me, other than "experts" are proved wrong all the time. I'll tell you what though. Check out the whole "electrical" history of Tesla and Edison, and if you do, you might begin to understand why HISTORY is being changed. :mad: :rolleyes: Don't believe me? Investigate it yourself. I'm done talking about it.
fitZ :rolleyes:
 
Rick, I've got my bachelor degree in electrical engineering. I'm fully aware of the history of Tesla and Edison.

Electrons flow from negative to positive. It's as simple as that. You may be thinking of the ground not carrying current; when that happens that's when circuit breakers trip.

Sure, if you unwire a neutral from an outlet and touch it, you're not going to feel a shock, you could even put your other hand on ground and you'd have no electrons passsing through you. But as soon as you touched the hot wire with your other hand you'd have current passing through you. Where do you think the electrons come from?

When electrons pass through a circuit, they start at the negative and go to the positive. The EXACT same electrons that start at the negative end up at the positive. They don't gain or lose any electrons in that process, and they don't stop half way and have other electrons carry the torch the rest of the way. The SAME current that starts from the negative ends up at the positive.
 
This is fun.

The neutral connection stays at ground voltage, which we arbitrarily call zero and stays there. Each leg coming in is a 60 Hz voltage sine wave, 110~120 V rms relative to the neutral. Since they are 180° out of phase, the voltage between the two legs is 220~240 V rms. So when you need 110, you use one leg and the neutral, when you need 220 you use the two legs.

Current flow is a function of the load across the voltage, and when using 110 flows back and forth at 60Hz between the leg and neutral. When using 220, the current flows between the two legs, and no current flows through the neutral.
 
apl said:
This is fun.

When using 220, the current flows between the two legs, and no current flows through the neutral.

Fun :) haha.

Right, when doing 220 with the two legs the neutral doesn't carry current.

And yes, I should ammend my statement about how current flows. In DC, currently only flows from - to +, but in AC it flows both ways.
 
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Current most DEFINITELY flows in the neutral leg! Holy crap, if someone's going around telling people that someone could get the very wrong idea.

but in AC it flows both ways.

apl wrote
Current flow is a function of the load across the voltage, and when using 110 flows back and forth at 60Hz between the leg and neutral

Electrons flow from negative to positive. It's as simple as that.

So, you both agree that 60 times a second a phase reversal happens, which during 1 second, the neutral becomes "positive" 30 times? :)


Apparently you have never lived in homes older than you Sonic Or a shack.. Of course, I'm 61. ;)
 
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