Basement studio and pipes

[mpedrummer]

Nothing, it would seem, is ever easy.

The goal here is an iso booth. The neighbors are actually pretty awesome - as long as they can't hear me past 10, it's fine. I'm looking to extend the working hours a bit

My basement has a high ceiling for the age of the house (104 years!) but not by modern standards.

8'2" to the bottom of the floor
7'4" to the bottom of the joists
6'7" to the bottom of the radiator pipes

It's the last number that really makes me a sad panda.

A couple other "special" numbers:

The floor of the room above is only 3/4" - there's no subfloor. It's a beautiful, hand-crafted parquet floor - http://picasaweb.google.com/mpedrummer/ ... 5147996482 - so ripping it up and installing a subfloor is not realistic.

Money is an object.

It is possible to reroute the pipes, somewhat. Money is an object, just to reiterate. I can solder pipes myself, but unfortunately the corner where I want the booth is where the new copper meets the old black pipe. I'd trust myself to do this soldering...if it wasn't going to be closed in a wall and really expensive when the mold eats the lead singer.

I just ordered Rod's book - I should have that later this week.

The realistic goal is to be able to record vocals and have my wife not feel like she needs to walk on eggshells.

The "still realistic" goal is to record acoustic guitars, meet the realistic goal, and do it after 10.

The "I realize I might have to punt on this one" goal is to be able to do the same things, but also be able to put a guitar or bass amp in there. The goal becomes keeping sound in, not out, with this one, obviously. I know that these are mutually cohesive goals.

I'm thinking about 5'x6' for size, with wiggle room for making the proportions more "good". I'm a drummer, so the potential to make a sound-resistant practice room is desirable. I might make it a little larger, though it then becomes a pain to have rehearsals in the studio, which is a common enough occurrence.

The floor is poured concrete. The exterior walls are not an issue - 18" of sandstone. The basement is only about 60% submerged.

The current though (inklings of a plan?) is to screw or green glue two or three layers of drywall to the underside of the floor above, damp that with 703 or 705, then build the booth below that as a room-inside-a-room.

I'm worried about height - both for proportions and comfort. Would having the pipes "penetrate" the room negate any effectiveness of the soundproofing?

Any suggestions?

Sorry this is sorta rambling. I'm just getting started, so I'm in the "excited babbling" phase of the idea

Tim

[Jeff White]

Tim, all I can say is that I am in the same boat. I'll measure my basement ceiling tomorrow. I'm going to follow this thread to see what advice appears.

I have thoroughly enjoyed the photos of all of the work that you've done to your house. The transformation is amazing and inspiring. I'm in the middle of refinishing my upstairs (row home in Philly) and just spent 14 hrs + this past weekend patching plaster in the middle bedroom after refinishing and priming... and learning... how to do stuff in the master bedroom since October.

Sorry I have nothing to contribute... yet.

Jeff

[mpedrummer]

Damn I hate plaster. And spackle. But I have "a guy" now! He did the mud in the bathroom project for nearly nothing - lives in the neighborhood and likes helping people fix it up.

Reading over my babble, I've decided to see if I can phrase this more in the form of actual questions.

Question 1:

Is it absolutely necessary to re-route the pipes? I could alternately build a hobbit-hole booth, which is not good, or have the pipes come through the wall and caulk/spackle around them.

Question 2:

The exterior wall is 18" of sandstone. Is there much to be gained by adding a second leaf to the system and building my own interior wall? My concern is space and cost. I'm less concerned with flanking noise into the rest of the basement; more concerned with "up".

Question 3:

Assuming the pipes are re-routed, is using hat channel or RC for attaching the drywall to the floor joists directly going to significantly reduce my TL? If I do that, I can have the minimum interior height much higher, 7'2" or so. I figure the "room-in-a-room" style would need at least 6", potentially more, which would cut the interior height to 6'10" or less. Less if using 2x6 is required for the ceiling, rather than 2x4.

Question 4:

Is a 2x6 staggered stud wall worth the trouble? This would be for the walls facing the rest of the room only. My concern is that the STC will only be as good as the weakest point, and it needs a door. I like the idea that I'd be able to weave the wiring around the studs and not need to drill. I also like that I'd be able to weave the OC703 and not have to cut it! Or is that dumb?

That's it for now!

Thanks
Tim

[mpedrummer]

This might help with the discussion:

http://www.hotelmorrell.com/studio/Basement.jpg

The depth is not to scale, but the length and width are. The NS10s and PS8s are, as are the speaker stands. That's approximately the current mix position.

The red lines are approximately where I expect to put the booth. As drawn, the booth would be about 7'x8', more or less.

This was my "if I had money" plan. Really, it was me just fucking around with SketchUp. Looks fancy, but I betcha all the angles are bad, proportions are terrible, etc.

http://www.hotelmorrell.com/studio/Basement01.jpg

Anyway, this isn't happening, at least not now. The booth in front of the mix position is a possibility, though - there are still pipes to deal with, but they're higher and parallel to the direction I would likely run the ceiling joists.

Anyway, gotta get to work! Thanks for looking!

Tim

[b3groover]

Just want to comment on the nice work you're doing. Great job. We have a 100 year old house as well that I am slowly fixing up. So far I've done the first floor bathroom (total remodel, right down to the studs and a new subfloor), the kitchen (totally gutted), the kids' bedroom, and a partial fix on our bedroom. Last week I totally gutted the upstairs bathroom (again, down to the studs and the subfloor).

Anyway, a few comments and a question. First the comments: How strange that there is no subfloor under the parquet floor. It's beautifully done, but I am staggered there is nothing underneath. That's wild!

Secondly, great job repairing the floor. Looks great! Covering up pocket doors with a wall has to be one of the dumbest things I've ever seen. Thankfully, they weren't painted. The wood is beautiful.

Now the questions: Did adding those braces help? My old floors (which are a combination of yellow pine in the middle and oak around the border) that do have a subfloor underneath squeek like mad in some places. I keep thinking of ways to try to fix that.

If you don't mind me asking, how much did the tin ceiling cost and where did you buy it from? We're thinking of doing the same thing in our dining room.

And finally, have you looked into any programs from the city to help with the renovation of the house? It seems like a city like Pittsburgh would have some grants available. We just qualified for $42k worth of work to our house, which is in a historic district, from the state and the city. We are THRILLED, since we've been doing everything ourselves. We're going to get all new, modern windows (yet they still have to be oak to match the original windows due to the historic classification, which is awesome because I did not want to replace my 5' windows with ugly vinyl crap), a new furnace, electrical and plumbing upgrades, repair and repainting of the original wood siding, restoration of our front porch to the original specs, and a bunch of other stuff. The only caveat is we have to stay here for 10 years (or else pay the "loans" back). After that, all is forgiven. And the best part is I don't have to do the work!

Of course, it's all based on your income. We's poor, so we're thrilled!

Just an idea.

As to your situation, my ceiling in the basement are very similar to yours. One thing that helped me in both isolating the sound and improving the sound of my room was hanging panels of 2" 703 in place of the drop ceiling panels that were already down there.

[mpedrummer]

I got the tin here - http://www.tinceiling.com/ Brian is a great guy, very helpful on the phone. The total (including shipping) was $1400, but it would have been less if we hadn't gotten the powder-coated stuff.

Sadly, at the time I looked into URA grants, I had just gotten a raise - which put us over the income limit. We're one block short of the higher limit - bastages.

The braces helped immensely. Not so much with squeaking, but overall bouncing. The bookcases in the room above used to wobble precariously when even the dog walked through the room, and now they're rock solid. That project was a bitch - I discovered that I'm not strong enough to hold a framing nailer in place over my head! It bounced back, then (since I was pushing) smacked down again, and I hit the trigger, repeat. Kinda scary. I disconnected the hose immediately after I gained control and my heart rate dropped back toward normal.

For squeaking, the only real option is to find the squeak, have someone stand on it to hold it down, and screw into it from the bottom to keep it down. Make sure the screws are short enough!

Tim

[Jon Nolan]

the electric guitar/bass solution might actually be kind easy. check out jeff's thread about grendel sound deadrooms.

as for the vox booth, im confused. are there radiator pipes like, all over the damn place? can you take a pic of the corner you're proposing to put this booth? it might be easier to make suggestions if i(we) can see exactly what you're talking about. i'm no rod gervais, but i did stay in a holiday inn express last night.

[mpedrummer]

LOL...yeah, I'll take a picture tonight.

The pipes are a big mess. The boiler used to be over there, so this is where the new boiler was Frankensteined into the old system. They run (mostly) perpendicular to the joists, and hang between 4 and 9" below them. Thbbt. Stupid lazy plumbers.

That deadroom thing looks pretty neat. That goes on the list for "later, when I have money"

Thanks
Tim

[Jon Nolan]

i guess the next question is - if that's the corner with the most pipe problems, is there a better place to put one?

[b3groover]

I assume the pipes are just standard copper water pipes? Put those babies up into the joists! I had to do that with multiple ceilings on the first floor, where the previous owners had run pipes to the second floor, demolishing half the plaster ceiling and then covering the damage with ugly drop ceilings.

Soldering copper pipes isn't hard. Make sure you get a heat guard (kevlar fabric to place against the wood) so you don't char your joists or floor. And if you have your washing machine in the basement (which I think you do) you can use that to help empty the pipes of water after you shut the main off. Open up all your taps upstairs, turn the washer on "fill", and let all that extra water drain out. You can't solder a pipe if there's any water in it. The water keeps the temperature from reaching the right point.

Also, they make these awesome fittings nowadays that have the solder already IN THE FITTING. All you have to do is sand the ends, apply flux, and heat. They rock!

[mpedrummer]

Nope, they're 2" copper pipes for the radiator, joined in this corner with 3" black iron pipe. I'd need to drain the heating system (not the end of the world, but no heat for the duration!)

Unfortunately, the pipes run perpendicular to the joists, and there's no way I'm drilling 2" holes in the joists, even if getting the pipe back in wasn't impossible

This is the corner with the most pipe problems. It's also the corner that lets the studio keep operating while I'm working on it. Putting the booth in the other position (basically where the mix position is now) is certainly better, except I'd need to mothball everything for the duration.

Tim

[DrummerMan]

It would seem to me that you should split your needs into blocks, since cost is an issue, instead of try to make one thing that'll do everything, at least for now. Making a booth that can handle vocals and acoustic guitar shouldn't be too hard, so I say focus on that. Leave the amp isolation to an iso cabinet like suggested above, or even build a bigger iso booth dedicated for amps. You could make a sizeable enough (for amps) little room with all the proper sound isolating techniques that doesn't have to be tall enough for a person to stand comfortaby, but still be big enough to put in any amp and have it not sound overly close and "boxy".

Now for your vocal/ac.guit booth, I would think that you could use rc-2 channels on your existing ceiling joists (assuming there's no pipes hanging underneath) and hang double sheetrock from that, with green glue between the layers. You cold also stuff Ultratouch between the joists before doing this (though you may have to use fiberglass if there's going to be hot pipes up there). For your new walls, I honestly think you could get away with one set of 2x4's, 2 layers of sheetrock on the outside, and 2 layers of sheetrock hanging on rc-1 strips on the inside. Just for vocals and acoustic guitar, I can't imaging that not being enough, but perhaps someone with more experience can verify or deny these claims.

As for drums, that's a whole other beast. That's going to require doing all the stuff the best way possible, but then that goes against the fact that cost is an issue.

[Corey Y]

Have you tried hitting John Sayers' forum about this? If you've already put this much thought into the space, what you want out of it, what your concerns are, the budget and played around in sketchup you're certainly up to par with their requirements for some pretty productive answers over there.

[mpedrummer]

I haven't - figured I'd start here with my imaginary internet friends before venturing into the great unknown

I've been lurking over there, though

[mpedrummer]

OK, editing the quick post from earlier. Here's a few pics as requested.

Current Mix Position

http://www.hotelmorrell.com/studio/mix.jpg

This is where the current mix position is. You can see the two glass block windows, set in the 18" foundation walls. I'm reasonably happy with the sound here, but frankly, I sit in the near-field range. The sound changes pretty drastically if you move around in the room.

This location is probably the "best" place to put a booth, though the problem is that I'd need to mothball the studio during the build, which would be fairly disruptive. I could make do, I'm sure.

The pipes above that

http://www.hotelmorrell.com/studio/above_mix.jpg

These are the pipes above the mix position. I'd either build a tunnel around them, or make the ceiling slanted up toward the exterior wall.

The corner

http://www.hotelmorrell.com/studio/corner.jpg

This is the corner where I'm tentatively planning on putting the booth, though as I outline the issues, I'm seeing that there's trouble with this location.

Pipes above the corner

http://www.hotelmorrell.com/studio/pipes.jpg

Here's a better shot of all the pipes that are in the way. Like I said, it is possible that these could be re-routed, though that would make things more expensive.

Now that there's pictures, I have another question to add to the list. The house is basically sitting on top of the foundation, but it's balloon construction, so the floors are inside the walls - this means that sound from the basement goes unimpeded into the exterior walls, which should probably stop

I'm thinking that the drywall I add to the bottom of the floor will just be extended to cover the gap of the bottom of the wall, then caulk the edges to seal it. Is that adequate? Is there a better technique I should know about?

Rod's book should get here tomorrow - can't wait

Tim