The poor man accoustic treatements

[jens]

I thought egg boxes were a bit of a myth? They may be the same shape as proper tiles but have no density?

But if you've used them and they work then obviously not.

.g

you need density for swallowing sound and for breaking it you need uneven surfaces - people tend to confuse these two different things with each other -

paraphrased: enough egg boxes can kill echoes (and thus the reverb) in a room. But they can't stop your neighbours from wanting to kill you...

[rockstar_not]

I'm not sure if Geocities will let me deep link these photos, but I'm going to give it a try. One treatment helps on flutter reverberation, and the other one I use two ways - as a giant corner bass trap/room shape modifier, and then also as a GOBO/absorber when I record vocals and acoustic guitars.

I bought a couple of stylish throw-rugs at IKEA for about 20$ each.

With one of them, I made a 1"x2" frame and stapled it to the frame. Then I hung this from the ceiling about 3" back from the wall with picture-hanger wire - instant flutter echo reduction in the room, and somewhat snappy appearance.

Scott's flutter echo reducer

Then the other one, I made a floor to ceiling self-standing frame from 1"x3" material and some 1/4" plywood, and stapled the same style rug, vertically to that frame. There is about a 1" air-gap behind the rug and the plywood. On the plywood side, I mounted a several scraps of convoluted open cell foam (which is actually used as acoustic absorber material - similar to auralex stuff) using spray on rubber cement.

As the bass trap, I stand this in the corner of the room with the carpet side out.

As the GOBO, my monitors are off and I'm recording with headphones, I bring it out into the room and put the mic in front of the foam side of the absorber.

Scott's bass trap/gobo thing

The cool thing that this bass-trap partition does, is it breaks up the shape of the corner pretty significantly - which is critical for reducing room mode shape issues.

The local paint store was able to color match a couple of the stripes pretty well. Here is a panaoramic stitched-together shot of the office/studio room with just the flutter echo reducer in place. Sorry for the mess. On the right side of the composite photo at the bottom, you can see the scraps of foam in a pile on the floor, before I built the bass-trap thing. You can also see that I don't have the room to myself!!

The whole room

I read a good tip over on the 'everything else' forum that could possibly save you some time with this. Check out your local office furniture place for cubicle partition wall sections. These usually have some absorptive properties, and you can quickly change their appearance without seriously affecting their performance by covering them in the open weave cloth of your choice. Mount to the walls, make standing GOBOs like mine, etc.

-Scott

[gizmo]

Hey, very cool ideas but I can't get there now, exceeded bandwidth. Will check back later though.

[IIRs]

paraphrased: enough egg boxes can kill echoes (and thus the reverb) in a room.

But only the high frequencies.. and its usually the low ones that need controlling.

[SaviorNeeded]

@rockstar_not: Thanks for putting the effort into your post--good looking studio! (I like that kind of color scheme). In the next year I hope to make a simple studio that young kids I work with can use to make simple music and vocals. Your ideas sound like the ticket.

Tom

[rockstar_not]

Hey, very cool ideas but I can't get there now, exceeded bandwidth. Will check back later though.

This is the problem with being a cheapskate like me. I really need to ante-up for some hosted space; otherwise, you will get these annoying messages.

-Scott

[gizmo]

No problems. Checked back. I love how people solve problems without throwing money around!

[.jon]

Cool stuff, Rockstar, that's a nice & clean looking room you got!

I forgot to up the pics of my problem area...and can't rememeber the ftp pwds

Check out your local office furniture place for cubicle partition wall sections. These usually have some absorptive properties, and you can quickly change their appearance without seriously affecting their performance by covering them in the open weave cloth of your choice.

Smart one! I know a place that sells 2nd hand partition walls dirt cheap, I think I'll start my plannig there. I think I'd be fine with two freestanding wall things, and then something on the concrete wall.

[.jon]

Good day today!

I was handed an abandoned box of 10 fabric-covered acoustic panels (2x80x120cm) from my workplace's warehouse

..enough to dampen the closest sidewall, and for two thick freestanding panels to be placed behind the speakers. I try to document my DIY-project, as I'm far from Blue Peter it will at least be entertaining if not useful