New place, new sound proofing, need ideas

[Gustopher]

Big rugs work wonders, even without wall treatment.

 

[Jeff Hughes]

I built some baffles using 1x1 or furring strips to make frames. I made a 3’x4’ , 4’x4’ , and I also made some that were hinged so they could stand up on their own for placement in front of drums or amps.

I bought some foam from a foam retailer nearby and cut them to fit inside the frames.

I wrapped each baffle with black landscaping cloth (the kind you put under mulch or soil in a garden to prevent weed growth. I just used a staple gun to hold the cloth down.

They are super lightweight and look cool. The whole project cost about 120 dollars plus sweat equity.

I used them at gigs to help control a drummer with a heavy hit. I also hung them from the ceiling without fear that they would fall and hurt someone.

 

[BarfanyShart]

Corner trap are the single best thing for bass and drums. Usually there is enough stuff on and against walls to not be a huge issue - just cover any big piece of glass (window or mirror) with a soft, thickish curtain. Rug for the floor, and that leaves you with the ceiling - depending on the room, you may actually want sound reflecting off the ceiling for rehearsal and one-mic recording purposes, maybe just a tapestry or panel above the drum set, or more ceiling coverage if you are trying to do lots of recording. Small rooms are tough, but rugs, curtains, corner treatment, and lots of junk laying around will get it about as good as it can get, IMO.

 

[CB3UK]

Go over to the John L Sayers forum, or buy Rod Gervais' book "Build it Like the Pros." They're both reputable sources for building adequate treatments. The most common approach is to build broadband absorbers using a wooden frame and OC703 or Knaff Ecose. You can build lower performance traps with Roxul or denim insulation to save a little money, but the cost savings, to my ears and the measurements I've seen, do not make it worthwhile. Stick with the standard OC703 or Knaff Ecose materials and you'll likely be happier. What you'll find at John L Sayers and in Rod's book is better information about placement than you'll find in most places. As I've stressed in this thread, every room (EVERY room) needs corner treatments. Beyond that it's down to individual needs for the space. Concentrate on all the vertical corners and as many horizontal corners are feasible, then worry about placements on the walls and ceilling with as much of an air gap behind them as possible.

Right on man. Definitely a good starting point for me advice wise.

My goals are mostly just improving the sound quality for rehearsing purposes in my basement.

Its poured concrete slab walls, apx 2-3 ft thick. The lone spot for serious sound escaping to tick off the neighbors is my French doors. Besides hanging some sort of sound dampening blankets in front of them, the only other idea I had was to build some sort of baffles on rollers I can slide in front of there whenever we rehearse.

Otherwise my set up is an unfinished basement...exposed joists, insulation, ducts, PVC, etc. I hate how my bass sounds down there, and my drumset really just bounces off the walls.

So yeah, we have a really solid rehearsal space elsewhere that we rent that's setup properly, my concern is just getting my own basement to sound better on the cheap, purely for my own satisfaction, not recording, and to also help mitigate any racket for the neighbors. I play several instruments, but bass and drums are my main gotos, which is definitely not a neighbor pleaser lol. DIY dampeners and baffles is definitely what Im looking for for my home setup.

 

[silky smoove]

Its poured concrete slab walls, apx 2-3 ft thick.

I highly doubt that it's that thick unless you had a contractor building your house that was looking for a place to dispose of excess concrete from another job where they overestimated. The common thickness in the US for a concrete basement wall that's retaining 7' of soil is 8" thick. If you have a tall basement it might go as thick as 10" but that's on the upper end of what's built. Regardless, 8" of concrete is still a huge amount of mass for sound to travel through. Add soil to that and it's about as good as it gets.

The lone spot for serious sound escaping to tick off the neighbors is my French doors. Besides hanging some sort of sound dampening blankets in front of them, the only other idea I had was to build some sort of baffles on rollers I can slide in front of there whenever we rehearse.

Doors, windows and HVAC are always the weak points in terms of isolation. You can use blankets, baffles and other means of controlling midrange and higher frequencies from leaving, but it's unlikely that they'll provide any benefit from low end escaping. Generally speaking if you did enough to make the doors sound isolated you'd probably also have to build a fresh air return and stale air exhaust into the room, and in turn sound isolate that. This all sounds like a lot of expensive work because it is. If you can tone down the midrange and higher frequencies escaping the French doors, then mitigate the other sound escape socially with your neighbors (agree to only rehearse at certain hours, give them your contact info to reach out to you before calling the cops, bring them a plate of freshly baked cookies, etc.).

So yeah, we have a really solid rehearsal space elsewhere that we rent that's setup properly, my concern is just getting my own basement to sound better on the cheap, purely for my own satisfaction, not recording, and to also help mitigate any racket for the neighbors.

The former is very doable and I stand by my suggestion of treating the corners first, then reassessing what needs to be done, if anything, along the length of the walls and ceiling. More often than not if you fix the corners the rest of the room doesn't really need much, especially if it's a non-critical listening environment like a rehearsal space compared to a recording studio. The latter, sound isolation, will be the real challenge, but as I mentioned above it can be handled through other means and the concrete walls and soil will help a ton.

 

[cornfarmer]

So, I spent a few days using GIK's room simulation / estimator thing, submitted it and one of their guys came back with suggestions.....so I pulled the trigger on a little bundle from them that will be functional and look nice as well.

Shipping across the country to me is brutal but it ended up being well under $2k. Because of quarantine scamdemics, they are doing lots of business, so it might be 6 weeks until I see anything.... fingers crossed.

 

[Tosh]

my two cents - Silky Smoove is right on.
three cents more - Egg Cartons (the paper ones). CAREFUL! THESE THINGS BURN FAST!! NOT APPROVED BY THE FIRE MARSHALL!!!

My old band recorded a demo in a garage studio that was all egg cartons, top-to-bottom-and-ceiling. Also bass traps in every corner, with carpet on the floor. Sounded great.

Austin Power Plant | Instrumental from Austin, TX

 

[cornfarmer]

Somebody did something, and eventually something happened.