Metropoulos Forum

Greatings all. I just took a large step in my life. I moved from a house surrounded by cows into a house that I bought in the burbs of Chapel Hill, NC. My band still practices at the old house, so I left my drums (that will one day join me here) and brought my 5 amps. My amp building days are over unless I build them for others. I'm very sad about that. I'd build them for cost just to do it
Anyway, has anyone had any luck with soundproofing a room? I've got a MASS, but want to get pretty loud (like drumming loud). The middle bedroom has 2 window panes that I plan on shrinking and installing those glass block windows. I hear that they're pretty good insulators. I can also put some massive blocks of rubber mat over them when I'm playing. I also plan on sistering onto the sheetrock some metal tracking to build another "wall" withing the room. Has anyone had any luck with soundproofing? Can you offer some pointers? I'd hate to spend $1000 dollars and a lot of time to have accomplished only minimal results. Thanks, -James

Congrats!

You're on track so far. Put the inner wall on top of rubber, if you can, so the bottom board is off the floor. Keep it from touching the outer wall. You can fill the void with insulation and cover with fabric instead of sheet rock.

What's the floor like? That's what's your low end will use as a resonator throughout your whole house. Concrete slabs with floating floors on rubber work best, but you're not likely to have that in a bedroom.

The house is almost 60 years old. Sturdy as hell, but wood floors. I'm not too worried about the resonance through the floor, though I know that matters. I found a place that is willin to GIVE me some really heavy, thick (about 1/2'') rubber matting. I think that'll go on the wall that goes to the exterior. Right now, I'm looking at building a low stage of sorts to cover about 75% of the floor. Maybe some small rubber U-shaped thing-a-majigs to decouple the the frame from the floor. For the wall, I'll probably put some MDF on top of the new studs (with no bottom plate) and put some 5/8 sheetrock on top. I read that that works pretty well. Sounds like you've done this before. -James

In my former life I helped build two recording studios in Nashville. You can certainly get plenty of isolation at home, though, doing what you are planning.

Don't forget the egg cartons on the walls; the poor man's soundproofing material!

This joint has some useful tips on soundproofing. They're not always practical to the home studio/jam room, but it does give you some clear ideas what does and needs to happen.

http://www.soundproofing.org/infopages/garage.htm

Good luck