studioglass

[cody]

does anyone know of a less expensive alternative for a control room window? i heard that there was some sort of plexi-glass that had soundproofing qualities. but i haven't been able to find any info on it.

[Rec Head]

Sorry I can't answer your question on alternatives but I can say that I had great success with 0.25 inch glass. I think a lot of folks think you need really thick glass but my window was about 3x5 and worked well. Just remember to de-couple the panes of glass from each other.

[cody]

thanks for the input, question: what do you mean by de-couple? are you talking about not having the same thicknesses on the insides of both laminated panes? sorry i haven't done this before.

[Rec Head]

I was actually told by a studio designer that I worked for that glass works best when you use the same thickness. I don't know why.

By de-couple I mean that the inside and outside pane are completely seperated. That means an individual frame for each pane. I was lucky enough to get the glass I used for free. I just framed the glass with wood using plenty of silicon to seel them. Then I set one flush with the sudio wall and the other in the control room wall. The walls themselves were completely free of each other. The windows were about a foot apart at the bottom. The control room window was pitched with the top sticking out further than the bottom. There is a generic formula for figuring the angle but that's something else I've forgotten.

good luck
I hope this helps

[mpedrummer]

From what I remember in acoustics class, it's the dead air that's important to blocking the transmission of sound.

Decoupling refers to an attempt to prevent the direct transmission of vibrations from one pane to the other, which would pretty much completely negate any blocking effects. The ultimate in decoupling would be to have each pane in a different wall, back to back.

Code: Select all

Floating Walls:

                |    |
                |    |
                ||  ||
                ||  ||
                ||  ||  <- window panes
                ||  ||
                ||  ||
                |    |
                |    |  <- walls
                |    |
________________|    |________________
concrete        |    |       concrete
________________|    |________________

So what you wind up with is two seperate concrete slabs underneath, with two back to back self-contained walls with windows that line up exactly. The more air in there the better.

MPEDrummer

[DUC]

Can't you put multi-pane windows like storm windows? They're pretty tight when it comes to noise. Not that I know, 'cos I don't have a "control room".

[Rec Head]

If you go the storm window route you loose all the air space. Depending on the situation and window size I could see it being a good alternative.

[Auxillary]

All this talk about dead air. Is there any benefit to putting compressed air in spaces such as windows?

[Disasteradio]

this topic might be a little old, but seeing as I work part-time doing glazing stuff.. one thing we frequently do for people on a budget is re-sell salvaged plate glass from shopfronts. I'd imagine a partition with two layers of 6.38mm laminate (-don't- know the US standard for that) should be readily available and be pretty isolating. 6.38 laminate is two pieces of 3mm (standard glazing glass) glued together with a clear adhesive.

but make sure you check about the availability of salvage.. for a couple of scratches you're saving yourself 60% of the price (at least where I work heh)

and don't forget the silica gel in the parition between the two panes to keep it nice & dry - you don't want to be wiping out condensation. And if you're siliconing, make sure you use a neutral cure silicone when sealing to metal framing.

ANOTHER thing I saw at the community radio thing I used to do a punk show with, they had one frame with two pieces of (at least 6mm) glass, and approximately 20 cm of seperation, with carpeting around the inside of the frame. for voice and such it was great, but they had a bit of bass bleed between the monitors in different studios. (we played it loud, naturally.. heh)

[Rec Head]

Auxilary, no compressed air is the opposite of what you want. That's more molecules bouncing around increasing the transmission.

[Disasteradio]

this topic might be a little old

so there's a _difference_ between "Joined" and "Posted". duh. my excuse is I'm sick as a dawg.