wood floors under drums...?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Dogbreath
  • Start date Start date
Dogbreath

Dogbreath

Im an ex-spurt
After checkin out TelePauls drum setup pics, (nice place, btw ;)) I started to wonder if the pain-in-the-ass factor would be worth it to do a wood floor of some kind under my drums...?

How much of a diff would it make in the "life" of my drums?

Right now it's carpet over the cement floor in my garage. And since it's a 1 room tracking / mixing place...maybe do wood floors in the whole room. ??

We're talkin roughly 16' X 20'...ish...

Worth the headache or throw the reverb at it?
:D

Whatcha think?
 
You could always try putting some plywood down to see if that makes a difference. The only place I really notice a *big* difference (in my home recording demo goofing around :)) is with the snare, so I'll sometimes have a piece of plywood under that if I'm tracking in my living room which is carpeted.
 
TelePaul said:
Wait, wood is good?
Click to expand...

i was looking at your pictures in the other thread and i'd be glad to try recording drums in that room. i would get a nice big rug to put directly under the drums so that they don't move around and scratch the floor up though. the reflections can help even i think. if they are too much you can damp them down by adding soft surfaces.

the room that i record in has tile floors and lots of drywall. i arrange chairs around the drums and drape blankets over them to damp some of the reflections.
 
solution

get a bunch of pallets. and put them right under your drums and let them extend about 3 feet from each side of where your comfortable throne position and cymbal stand positions are. then put plywood over the pallets. if you do it right it will be sturdy and wont shake your drums everywhere. so get good pallets and good plywood. or just reinforce it a bit. but only do this if you are looking for more resonance. it boosts the bass drums over all dB's a couple. and adds ring to cymbals. make sure not to cover the sides of the pallets with your scrap plywood. it acts as a bass port. its cool stuff. ecspecially for recording a gretsch 4 piece catalina club jazz kit in a pole barn. CAN YOU SAY
JOHN BONHAM MEETS BUDDY RICH????
 
My main tracking room is 13'X27', one end 13'X16' has carpet and heavily treated walls and celing, the remaining 13X13 has hardwood floor and reflective walls and ceiling. I've tried drums on both ends of the room. The end with a wood floor seems much more ringy while the carpeted end is much quieter and a lot less boomy. The area with wood flooring works with acoustic guitars and softer sounding percussion instruments but i prefer the carpeted area for a drum kit, especially with drummers who play hard. The wood floor does bring out the snare, ping and crash cymbals more than the carpeted area.
 
cool...

Thanks for the insight. And the pallet idea doesn't sound too bad. I may just try a small sheet under the snare to start, tho.

But last nite I went to do some mixing and my audio output is dead. :( No nears, no mains, no headphones...
So I guess the drums are on a back burner til I figure out how to fix it. And fix it I will because I'm obsessive like that. :D

Much thanks gentlemen.
 
Me like pallet idea

I'm definitly gonna have to try the pallet idea.

Sounds interesting. I like the idea of the pallets acting like bass ports
 
We have a 3 inch platform at our studio for the drums, which used to be carpeted. I argued with the guy who set it up and finally got him to remove the carpet under the drums so I had a hard surface to reflect up to the overheads. The difference was night and day! Nice an lively and I don't ever have to mic the bottom head of the snare.:)
 
You need it to keep the bass pedal from pushing the set forewards and across the room...drum creep is a bit of a problem without a carpet to give them traction.
 
Some studios here in L.A. now have plywood on the floor of the drum room and they lock the bass drum in place with 1x2's. Others have carpet. For the most part the rooms are fairly reflective.
 
Sloan said:
i see a lot of wood floors with the drums on a rug.
Click to expand...

me too...that's what prompted me after seeing TelePaul's pics.

The 1X2's is a pretty good idea. This is starting to look like my winter project cuz the more I jam the drums the more I like playin em.

Phil, is your platform open around the edges (like the pallet idea) or did he close em in?

Thanks gentlemen.
 
Open around the edges. I mostly wanted it because our studio is very dead sounding because it's multi-purpose. I really had been fighting the idea of micing under the snare, so I asked for the carpet under the drums to disappear. I would think in a more reflective room the carpet under the drums would be fine, as long as it's not shag.
 
PhilGood said:
I would think in a more reflective room the carpet under the drums would be fine, as long as it's not shag.
Click to expand...

I hate shag carpeting in studios......if you spill your coke, you can never find it:eek:
 
Dogbreath said:
After checkin out TelePauls drum setup pics, (nice place, btw ;)) I started to wonder if the pain-in-the-ass factor would be worth it to do a wood floor of some kind under my drums...?

How much of a diff would it make in the "life" of my drums?

Right now it's carpet over the cement floor in my garage. And since it's a 1 room tracking / mixing place...maybe do wood floors in the whole room. ??

We're talkin roughly 16' X 20'...ish...

Worth the headache or throw the reverb at it?
:D

Whatcha think?
Click to expand...

I would not bother putting in wood floors in your room. I converted a crappy garage into a crappy studio my freshman year in highschool...the first thing I did was go to home depot and by some flooring that said like 20x20 sq. ft. Me being an idiot with a severe case of adhd I didnt realize that 20x20 sq. ft really only covered a few ft. So about a year later and another 700 dollars i finish my floor. Anyways - it didnt really make a difference in my recording. A little later a stepped up to recording in this old old house which was elvated a few feet. Im sure you know what im talking about those houses that are up off the ground a little bit....on legs or whatever they call it....but that had hard wood flooring and the difference was incredible. I would get the most monster sounding kick and toms ever! Maybe you could elevate a section of your garage and then put on the wood floors because that was the only way it made a difference for me and it was a really worthwhile, noticeable difference.
 
Was the room you built in your garage treated? Bass traps, diffusion, something to tame all the reflection?

I think that would make more of a difference in drum tracking (and any other tracking, for that matter) than a wood floor.

But my room is treated and it's not that my drums sound like shite, I'd just like to get em better. If that takes a little work, dats fine.

Thanks for your insight.
 
I had done a couple lo budget things by means of Afro-Engineering...some blankets and foam pads up...there was also a portion sectioned off with mattresses for drums and vocals. That did a phenomenal ammount of good after I toyd around with positioning and setup. Its not that the wood floor made it sound bad or worse...it just didnt improve anything.
 
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