Hi I am thinking about converting our garage into a music room so I dont get on the wifes nerves while recording lol. At the moment it's just bare walls and concrete floor! I am going to plasterboard it all out, walls and celiling and want to make the accoustics ok for recording vocals. Couple of questions.

Should I use normal plaster board or the soundproofing type!
should I board out the ceiling so its flat?
What should I do with floor, Carpet or Laminate

Hi Darren

I think that a few more details are required;

Is the garage free standing or attached to the house? What is it made from? Is the roof flat or pitched? Dimensions? What sort of instruments are you recording? (drums? amped guitars?), how much isolation (sound proofing) are you looking to achieve - i.e. how close are the neighbours? Do you need to record during the evenings or night?

Sound attenuation and acoustic treatment are two different beasts and require different approaches.

Oh, and what's the budget?

Chris

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http://www.random-thought.co.uk/

Quote Music Wolf:

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Hi Darren

I think that a few more details are required;

Is the garage free standing or attached to the house? What is it made from? Is the roof flat or pitched? Dimensions? What sort of instruments are you recording? (drums? amped guitars?), how much isolation (sound proofing) are you looking to achieve - i.e. how close are the neighbours? Do you need to record during the evenings or night?

Sound attenuation and acoustic treatment are two different beasts and require different approaches.

Oh, and what's the budget?

Its free standing so not attached to house red brick, concrete floor! pitched roof, no instruments will be recorded just vocals. Neighbours not too close. Recording both at during the day and night.

It's something I am going to be doing over time so budget can be stretched a little, but want to keep the costs down.

Chris

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Hi Darren

One of the most efficient ways of doing this is to use a bespoke practice room which can easily be installed in a garage.

I’ll admit to a vested interest as acoustically treated music practice room installation is what we do for a living, but these have the advantage of being re-locatable should you ever move.

Feel free to drop me an email with your contact details and I can run through all the options:

martin.loft@musicpracticerooms.com

Best, Martin

The best way is to build a totally separate room with a ceiling inside the current garage. The only place that the internal structure touches the existing structure is on the floor. It need not be too expensive - especially if you go to a decent builder's merchant or insulation specialist for the materials.

The recommended wall and ceiling construction would be something like stud, 19mm plasterboard, 12.5mm sound block plasterboard and then possibly a layer of 15mm sound block plasterboard although that may not be needed if you aren't working with loud sources. It would be best to have a layer of Green Glue between the plasterboard layers.

James.

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JRP Music - Audio Mastering and Restoration.
http://www.jrpmusic.net

Quote Darren Rivers:

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Its free standing so not attached to house red brick, concrete floor! pitched roof, no instruments will be recorded just vocals. Neighbours not too close. Recording both at during the day and night.

It's something I am going to be doing over time so budget can be stretched a little, but want to keep the costs down.

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Proper 'sound proofing' will probably entail a room within a room approach but this may not be required if its vocals only. First establish whether there is a sound leakage problem (sound getting in as well as out). Try setting up your monitors in there and play back a mix at the maximum level that you would work at, then have a listen from outside. Do this at night when things are at their quietest so that you really notice the music - is it loud enough to disturb either your family or your neighbours? Also, without music playing, listen to the background noise inside the garage at different times of the day - will this disturb your recordings?

If you need to improve things then first ports of call are the doors, windows and any gaps. If its not air tight then its not sound tight. If you've not blocked off the main doors then this is going to be a real weak point. Plaster board on the walls will make no real difference if the sound is escaping through the door seals.

Chris

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http://www.random-thought.co.uk/

Quote Music Wolf:

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Quote Darren Rivers:

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Its free standing so not attached to house red brick, concrete floor! pitched roof, no instruments will be recorded just vocals. Neighbours not too close. Recording both at during the day and night.

It's something I am going to be doing over time so budget can be stretched a little, but want to keep the costs down.

---

Proper 'sound proofing' will probably entail a room within a room approach but this may not be required if its vocals only. First establish whether there is a sound leakage problem (sound getting in as well as out). Try setting up your monitors in there and play back a mix at the maximum level that you would work at, then have a listen from outside. Do this at night when things are at their quietest so that you really notice the music - is it loud enough to disturb either your family or your neighbours? Also, without music playing, listen to the background noise inside the garage at different times of the day - will this disturb your recordings?

If you need to improve things then first ports of call are the doors, windows and any gaps. If its not air tight then its not sound tight. If you've not blocked off the main doors then this is going to be a real weak point. Plaster board on the walls will make no real difference if the sound is escaping through the door seals.

Chris

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Hi thanks for all the replies, given me quite a lot to think about. At the moment it is a double old wooden door, I am going to take them off and brick part of it up and replace with a normal door. Also there is a couple of windows that I am going to take out and brick up.

Hi Darren

I converted my integral garage by removing the up and over door and having it bricked up / double glazed window installed. Access is from the house via the existing fire door, which is pretty heavy.

I use the room for recording and for practicing to backing tracks. That's acoustic guitar and vocals. Elec guitars and bass are via pre-amps, drums are sequenced (BFD) etc. If I'm practicing after my son has gone to bed or early in the morning then I use headphones (no acoustic instruments / vocals). The family often close the door on me when I'm playing but they've never told me to turn down or shut up (other than the usual complaints of "you spend more time with your guitars than you do us" and "what are you playing that song for, its depressing" etc).

I have treated the space with rockwool panels in all 4 corners and at the mirror points but this is to improve the acoustics, it contributes nothing to soundproofing.

Chris

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http://www.random-thought.co.uk/