A makeshift studio in the garage?

bermudianbrit

Hi All,

I have recently moved to a bigger home which includes a fairly sizeable detached garage. As I don't own a vehicle to put in it, and never will, My intent is to turn this into a  studio/gym hybrid.

I'm in a fairly loud area, so I am not anticipating complaints from neighbours, but I would like to sound proof a bit, to prevent outside noise from getting in, as we're near to a school and those little buggers are noisy. I would also like to make the room, or part of it at least, sound better for recording purposes. I'm not anticipating doing anything truly professional, but I have often heard it said that the best way to improve is to record oneself. 3 walls of the garage are pure brick, with a metal front wall which raises to allow a car entry. I want to block this off so only the side door permits access.

Any suggestions on ways to soundproof which won't kill my bank balance completely? Keep in mind that I am not really capable of much DIY sadly.

Thanks

Jalapeno

Calling @Danny1969 ;

Musicwolf

bermudianbrit said:

Any suggestions on ways to soundproof which won't kill my bank balance completely? Keep in mind that I am not really capable of much DIY sadly.

Thanks

If you want to 'soundproof' then the only way to not kill your bank balance is to start with a very big balance I'm afraid - it's just physics.

For sound attenuation (you will never truely 'proof' it, it's all about how much you want to attenuate) you need three things;

Mass

Isolation

Sealing

In the fist instance you can improve things by fitting decent door seals and secondary glazing.  Basically you are only as good as your weakest link so, if you leave any gaps, sound will find its way through.

Any serious attenuation and you are looking at a room within a room.  Imagine putting a box inside another box - but the two boxes cannot touch.  Obviously, with gravity, this isn't possible so you need to support the inner box on pieces of rubber to decouple as best you can.  The inner structure will, however, need to be self supporting and, unless you have access to Time Lord technology, is going to be considerably smaller than the outer structure (you need a gap of at least a foot between inner and outer walls).  Typical cosntruction for the inner room is for walls to be made of two layers of overlapping plasterboard (overlapping so that the joins are sealed), a layer of mineral wool, then two more overlapping layers of plasterboard.  That's quite a bit of weight and remember it has to be self supporting.

It can be done but, unless it's done properly, you'll just be wasting money.

Acoustic treatment, to reduce reflections / standing waves is another subject and well within the scope of even a DIY novice.

Danny1969

Well the only thing that stops sound is mass ..... well that and a vacuum but mass is much more achievable. 

The easiest and most effective way to treat a common garage is 

Walls ...... battern the walls at 600mm intervals, fill the voids with acoustic grade heavy rockwool slab. Then vapour barrier then 12mm plasterboard ... all joints taped and filled then put another layer on that ... hang one layer vertical, the horizontal so the joints don't all land in the same place. 

Ceiling .... sound goes through the roof so I tend to hang a false roof under the real one on 6 x 2" posts after the walls are done.  Hange the joists on the posts then wire up rockwook then cover with 18mm MDF and a couple of layers of 12mm plasterboard. 

Main doors .... build a concrete block wall inside where the main door is .... concrete blocks not breeze or Thermalite ... you need the mass of concrete .... render afterwards then battern  - Rockwool - plasterboard

Entrance door ..... build another inside around 400mm so there's an air gap between the 2 doors. Use a solid door 

Windows ..... once the walls are done the window reveal will be 74mm bigger than it was so by a doubled glazed unit the right size and fit that in the hole ..... buy the thickest glass and biggest cavity they offer. 

Electrics ... don't be tempted to sink pattresses in the plasterboard for neatness ... this will compromise the soundproofing. Surface mount sockets with surface sockets and small stick on trunking

Remember the lower the frequency the harder it is to stop. The above treatment will certainly enable you to blast guitar at deafening volume but bass guitar and kick drum will go through literally anything short of a floating room within a room. You will find though that once the low frequencies have escaped the garage they will lose all energy a few metres outside it 

I have done 2 full on garage conversions using the above, a very large recording booth  and a professional control room in a studio. The DIY skills involved are pretty basic, just basically cutting timber and plasterboard and screwing in screws. 

The biggest mistake people tend to make is they don't think the build through .... you need to work out on paper where things go based on their actual size .... plasterboard is 2400 x 1200 or 1800 X 900  ... rockwool slab is 600mm for example

I had a blast in my garage studio when it was done and recorded many bands demos plus my own album and various other bits and pieces. Tracking drums was never done late at night but guitars certainly were. I remember one night setting up another take and walking outside for a fag and the sound just disappeared ... I could hear the motorway in the distance despite the fact my mate was playing through a Fender Twin at half whack not 3 metres away. Very satisfying  

PolarityMan

Danny1969 said:

Well the only thing that stops sound is mass ..... well that and a vacuum but mass is much more achievable. 

The easiest and most effective way to treat a common garage is 

Walls ...... battern the walls at 600mm intervals, fill the voids with acoustic grade heavy rockwool slab. Then vapour barrier then 12mm plasterboard ... all joints taped and filled then put another layer on that ... hang one layer vertical, the horizontal so the joints don't all land in the same place. 

Ceiling .... sound goes through the roof so I tend to hang a false roof under the real one on 6 x 2" posts after the walls are done.  Hange the joists on the posts then wire up rockwook then cover with 18mm MDF and a couple of layers of 12mm plasterboard. 

Main doors .... build a concrete block wall inside where the main door is .... concrete blocks not breeze or Thermalite ... you need the mass of concrete .... render afterwards then battern  - Rockwool - plasterboard

Entrance door ..... build another inside around 400mm so there's an air gap between the 2 doors. Use a solid door 

Windows ..... once the walls are done the window reveal will be 74mm bigger than it was so by a doubled glazed unit the right size and fit that in the hole ..... buy the thickest glass and biggest cavity they offer. 

Electrics ... don't be tempted to sink pattresses in the plasterboard for neatness ... this will compromise the soundproofing. Surface mount sockets with surface sockets and small stick on trunking

Remember the lower the frequency the harder it is to stop. The above treatment will certainly enable you to blast guitar at deafening volume but bass guitar and kick drum will go through literally anything short of a floating room within a room. You will find though that once the low frequencies have escaped the garage they will lose all energy a few metres outside it 

I have done 2 full on garage conversions using the above, a very large recording booth  and a professional control room in a studio. The DIY skills involved are pretty basic, just basically cutting timber and plasterboard and screwing in screws. 

The biggest mistake people tend to make is they don't think the build through .... you need to work out on paper where things go based on their actual size .... plasterboard is 2400 x 1200 or 1800 X 900  ... rockwool slab is 600mm for example

I had a blast in my garage studio when it was done and recorded many bands demos plus my own album and various other bits and pieces. Tracking drums was never done late at night but guitars certainly were. I remember one night setting up another take and walking outside for a fag and the sound just disappeared ... I could hear the motorway in the distance despite the fact my mate was playing through a Fender Twin at half whack not 3 metres away. Very satisfying  

I came to the conclusion I couldnt be arsed and jsut swapped my acoustic kit ofr an electric one instead.