My New Studio Build (perhaps overly detailed)

[beans-on-toast]

With glue tubes are you going to rent a pneumatic dispenser of some sort? You can do yourself some harm squeezing out all that glue.

My back hurts reading what you’ll have to lift. This sort of tool help.

Panel Tote - Lee Valley Tools

 

[peterpalmieri]

We had to get 72 sheets of Sheetrock down a narrow stairwell into the basement. It was a day of its own my nephews still talk about it.

I used the refillable caulk gun with buckets but I did it over many days wasn’t any trouble.

 

[silky smoove]

These tubes fire out of a normal caulking gun. I have a powered one that works well.

 

[silky smoove]

All studio insulation is now complete! Time to bag up all the excess, return the one unopened bag, and get it cleaned out in anticipation of a whole lot of sheet goods on Sunday.

 

[silky smoove]

We had to get 72 sheets of Sheetrock down a narrow stairwell into the basement. It was a day of its own my nephews still talk about it.

Sounds brutal! My load-in is roughly 10’ from the back of the truck to the front door with no stairs or appreciable elevation change to contend with. It’ll be a miserable process that will leave me super sore, but it won’t be unbearable by any means.

 

[Bard2dbone]

My wife was about 90% of a hoarder. And even now, more than two years after she died, we're still sorting and tossing huge amounts of stuff. The job basically goes in a spurt of several days, followed by being ignored for several weeks, followed by yet another short burst of activity. So with all that, my daughter had moved out of her room and taken up sleeping downstairs because she'd seen evidence of a rat upstairs. Her room became the store room up there, like the room that I'm trying to turn in to my recording studio became the storeroom down stairs.

All that has been changing this last two weeks. Her room is empty now, being painted, and the carpet will be removed to go to a wood floor. I have had to carry more antique furniture down that staircase than I ever care to think about. Currently the stuff she's keeping is mostly in the eventual music room. But the good news is that when she moves back upstairs next week, I'll have a mostly empty room to start turning into a recording studio. Currently the music gear is in the living room. I wasn't using it as a living room, so why not make it a jam room? This one will be smaller. But will actually have some soundproofing possibilities.

 

[peterpalmieri]

All studio insulation is now complete! Time to bag up all the excess, return the one unopened bag, and get it cleaned out in anticipation of a whole lot of sheet goods on Sunday.

View attachment 2864757

Please give me an overview of the layers again. Your doing hat track and whisper clips?

 

[silky smoove]

Currently the music gear is in the living room. I wasn't using it as a living room, so why not make it a jam room? This one will be smaller. But will actually have some soundproofing possibilities.

Sorry to hear about your wife. If you start looking at sound isolating a room please start a thread about it like @peterpalmieri and I have done. They're great fun.

 

[silky smoove]

Please give me an overview of the layers again. Your doing hat track and whisper clips?

Foundation (ground up):
1' of 1-1/4" crushed minus rock
6" of 3/8" crushed minus rock on top of that
Concrete masonry blocks encasing all of the rock
Steel floor joists substructure on top of the rock
Sand and Roxul filling the joist bays.

Floor (sub-floor to finished floor):
3/4" LP composite plywood sub-floor
Green Glue
7/16" plywood
2mm 3-in-1 flooring underlayment
7mm laminate wood flooring

Walls (inside to outside):
5/8" type X drywall
Green Glue
5/8" type X drywall
Hat channel
Whisper Clips
2x6 wall stud
Stud bay filled with R21 fiberglass insulation
Exterior plywood sheathing
Tyvek building wrap
Hardie Plank wood-cement composite siding

Ceiling / Roof (inside to outside):
5/8" type X drywall
Green Glue
5/8" type X drywall
Hat channel
Whisper Clips
5/8" type X drywall
Green Glue
7/16" plywood
2x4 scissor trusses
Truss bays filled with R38 fiberglass insulation
Eave vents
Insulation baffles
Radiant barrier
Ridge vent
Exterior plywood sheathing
15# felt
Asphalt shingles

You'll notice a middle leaf of drywall and plywood in the roof assembly. This has to be done since the eaves and ridge are vented. Essentially sound could escape through the vents after passing through the inner leaf and prior to being obstructed by the outer leaf. I didn't want to build a three leaf system as they actually reduce performance over a two leaf system despite having more mass, but it was unavoidable given the construction type. I would have built what's called a "warm roof" but I was told by the City of Seattle permit department that warm roofs are not allowed despite me not finding any reference to them being prohibited in the Seattle building code, and them being allowed by the IBC which is what the Seattle building code is based on. A warm roof would have not required the middle leaf, would need less building materials and would have yielded a higher level of isolation. C'est la vie!

 

[markjazzbassist]

i just bought a house and am going to use an already finished 3rd floor room as a music studio. i will start a thread on sound isolation, be forewarned i am cheap as hell and have little to no budget so it will be a lot of homebrew. also i'm not recording bands in there, just me with one amp so really just trying to limit bleed/vibrations/sound to elsewhere in the house. we close next week, once i get on it i'll post in here and share the new thread.

also i'm not an engineer or really adept at that kinda stuff, so really only pop in if you want an idiots guide to kinda making it less loud

 

[silky smoove]

i just bought a house and am going to use an already finished 3rd floor room as a music studio. i will start a thread on sound isolation, be forewarned i am cheap as hell and have little to no budget so it will be a lot of homebrew. also i'm not recording bands in there, just me with one amp so really just trying to limit bleed/vibrations/sound to elsewhere in the house. we close next week, once i get on it i'll post in here and share the new thread.

also i'm not an engineer or really adept at that kinda stuff, so really only pop in if you want an idiots guide to kinda making it less loud

That'll be a fun one. A third floor location presents some challenges. Dealing with airborne sound transmission will be relatively straight forward, but impact-related sound transmission due to flanking paths through the floor will be very challenging. I have the advantage of being at ground level with no habitable space underneath my studio space. Keep us posted, and maybe tag some of the frequent-posters from this thread in your new thread when you get going.

EDIT: Oh, and congrats on buying a house!

 

[beans-on-toast]

i just bought a house and am going to use an already finished 3rd floor room as a music studio. i will start a thread on sound isolation, be forewarned i am cheap as hell and have little to no budget so it will be a lot of homebrew. also i'm not recording bands in there, just me with one amp so really just trying to limit bleed/vibrations/sound to elsewhere in the house. we close next week, once i get on it i'll post in here and share the new thread. Also i'm not an engineer or really adept at that kinda stuff, so really only pop in if you want an idiots guide to kinda making it less loud

A nice space is cool to have. Musicianship and the feel are most important in getting some good tracks down. More so than fancy equipment, you can do a lot with an inexpensive mic such as an SM57 and the right EQ. A house can make a very good studio. More difficult if other people live in the house. A lot of bands rent a house and set up a studio to do an album. Use a tiled bathroom as an echo chamber or a small live room.

Some helpful insights from Jeff Lynne.
Jeff Lynne

 

[markjazzbassist]

A nice space is cool to have. Musicianship and the feel are most important in getting some good tracks down. More so than fancy equipment, you can do a lot with an inexpensive mic such as an SM57 and the right EQ. A house can make a very good studio. More difficult if other people live in the house. A lot of bands rent a house and set up a studio to do an album. Use a tiled bathroom as an echo chamber or a small live room.

Some helpful insights from Jeff Lynne.
Jeff Lynne

yeah i'm would track everything but drums there, so it just needs to be decent sounding, all dynamic mics kinda setup (don't need to hear my kid 2 rooms over with a condenser), small, minimal, but effective. probably just a one mic EV RE-20 do everything. mostly bass, electric piano, saxophone, guitar, and synth (probably go direct). so that mic should work, don't need a locker for all that.

 

[silky smoove]

Just did some "fun" math. The weight of the building materials I'm picking up on Sunday are as follows:

• 96 Sheets of 5/8" Type X Drywall: 7,096.32 lbs
• 22 Sheets of 1/2" Plywood: 999.68 lbs

I get to load in 8,096 lbs of material on Sunday by myself. FOUR TONS! I suppose I shouldn't complain since recent concrete paver projects have been many orders of magnitude in excess of that, but still... I'm expecting to be very sore come Monday.

 

[beans-on-toast]

It might be a good idea to check the tires on the rental trailer before you accept it. The last thing you want is a blown tire with a heavy load.

 

[silky smoove]

It might be a good idea to check the tires on the rental trailer before you accept it. The last thing you want is a blown tire with a heavy load.

Good call

 

[silky smoove]

I’m glad I did the math and that @beans-on-toast had the thought about vehicle capacity. The truck that I have reserved is only rated for up to 2,800 pounds. Now I have to decide if three trips in the rented truck is worth it or if I should just have it all delivered. Home Depot is a short drive from my place (under five minutes), but the hassle and gas expense might negate the value of doing it myself, plus it would save me one loading effort st the store. On the other hand, the delivery would still be on my schedule rather than theirs. Hmmm... Time to call them and get the particulars on a delivery window.

 

[silky smoove]

Delivery times are two weeks out at this point, so I’m just going to bite the bullet and make three trips. I’ll knock out at least one run on Saturday night (picking up the truck at 6pm and it’s right by Home Depot), and do the rest on Sunday.

 

[Inky13]

Lift with your legs, not your back. Seriously, just reading this makes my back hurt. Take your time, work smart and be safe.

 

[silky smoove]

Lift with your legs, not your back. Seriously, just reading this makes my back hurt. Take your time, work smart and be safe.

Speaking of working smart; I’m waiting for confirmation from my young college-age cousin and a buddy of his that they can come and help me schlep all of this. Here’s a pro tip for everyone: If you give college kids money they’ll do back breaking work for you!