Do fiberglass acoustic panels break easily?

[Ou_Tis]

I was thinking of getting some large fiberglass panels and just putting them on top of furniture to lean against the wall, but I'm worried they might fall over... do they break easily if they fall?

[BertKoor]

One practical issue with fibreglass is that when impacted or disturbed is produces a fine dust that floats in the air. This dust is very irritating to the throat and lungs.

[Googly Smythe]

Get a professional in. You're just as likely to make things worse, otherwise. And unless you have tippy top monitors it's probably a waste of money.
Ignore if you are a professional!

[Ou_Tis]

Get a professional in. You're just as likely to make things worse, otherwise. And unless you have tippy top monitors it's probably a waste of money.
Ignore if you are a professional!

My monitors are KRK G4 Rokit 5... G4 has a flat frequency response and is supposed to be accurate. I'm particularly interested in hearing reverb accurately.

[Googly Smythe]

Get a professional in. You're just as likely to make things worse, otherwise. And unless you have tippy top monitors it's probably a waste of money.
Ignore if you are a professional!

My monitors are KRK G4 Rokit 5... G4 has a flat frequency response and is supposed to be accurate. I'm particularly interested in hearing reverb accurately.

The point I was making is that the placement of acoustic panels, if not done using the proper measuring devices, can often make a listening environment worse. Resting them on furniture - well, even if placed correctly, they may move just enough to distort what you're hearing.
How "flat" a given speakers' freq response is depends on your definition of "flat". The speaker doesn't exist that has a truly flat response. The best we can hope for is "flat-ish".
The guy in this video talks about "flat-ness". The pertinent section is around the 3-minute mark. (Ignore the snail thumbnail!) (The speakers here cost around £55,000 a pair. )

[PieBerger]

What's stopping you from installing the fibreglass panels into/onto a frame and hanging them on the wall? You don't need to be a master carpenter to create something serviceable. If you're worried about putting wholes in the wall, you can design your panels so that they can safely hang from a short piece of timber (e.g. 2x2") which you can affix with a single screw. My apartment is drylined (plasterboard/drywall on brick) and one medium duty drywall fixing is quite enough for a 1.2 x 0.6 x 0.15cm panel to comfortably hang from.

[Ou_Tis]

The point I was making is that the placement of acoustic panels, if not done using the proper measuring devices, can often make a listening environment worse. Resting them on furniture - well, even if placed correctly, they may move just enough to distort what you're hearing.

Hmm, my monitors do come with an app that's supposed to help measure that I think. But anyway my main issue is reducing reverb. I'm going to try acoustic foam in all the room corners, and I already have a few acoustic foam panels on the walls, but I'm pretty sure panels of the right materials will help. Looks like polyester or rockwool are the main options. Acoustimatic claims their "eco cellulose" works better than fiberglass but I'll need that independently confirmed....

https://www.amazon.com/Acoustimac-Acous ... 984&sr=8-5

What's stopping you from installing the fibreglass panels into/onto a frame and hanging them on the wall? You don't need to be a master carpenter to create something serviceable. If you're worried about putting wholes in the wall, you can design your panels so that they can safely hang from a short piece of timber (e.g. 2x2") which you can affix with a single screw. My apartment is drylined (plasterboard/drywall on brick) and one medium duty drywall fixing is quite enough for a 1.2 x 0.6 x 0.15cm panel to comfortably hang from.

Not supposed to put screws into the wall either.

If DIY is so easy why are all the ones I've been able to find for sale so expensive?...

I'll see how hard it is to get rockwool to stay up.

[PieBerger]

If DIY is so easy why are all the ones I've been able to find for sale so expensive?...

I'll see how hard it is to get rockwool to stay up.

I said easy, as in you don't need to be a qualified carpenter, not quick and time is money and people deserve to be compensated for their labour.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/4x-Mafia-Pan ... SwGzBd3Uf9

£140 for 4 x panels is a decent price imo. I paid about £180 in materials alone to make 4 x 100mm panels, 3 x 50mm panels and two halfsize (I have an angled all in my studio space) superchunk corner stacks and spent a whole weekend putting them all together.

Edit: assuming 16 hours of labour at £15/hr, that's a total of £420. If you look at their other packages and combine them to get a similar setup to mine (6 x Mafia Panels plus 4x Bass Traps), they're basically the same price £380 vs £420.

[Ou_Tis]

If DIY is so easy why are all the ones I've been able to find for sale so expensive?...

I'll see how hard it is to get rockwool to stay up.

I said easy, as in you don't need to be a qualified carpenter, not quick and time is money and people deserve to be compensated for their labour.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/4x-Mafia-Pan ... SwGzBd3Uf9

£140 for 4 x panels is a decent price imo. I paid about £180 in materials alone to make 4 x 100mm panels, 3 x 50mm panels and two halfsize (I have an angled all in my studio space) superchunk corner stacks and spent a whole weekend putting them all together.

Edit: assuming 16 hours of labour at £15/hr, that's a total of £420. If you look at their other packages and combine them to get a similar setup to mine (6 x Mafia Panels plus 4x Bass Traps), they're basically the same price £380 vs £420.

Seems like it would be easy enough to have machines mass produce them.

I've also seen some posts on Gearslutz about (if I'm not misinterpreting them) just using burlap sacks or fabric to contain the rockwool without wooden frames. I'm having an annoyingly hard time finding what I can confirm are flame retardant burlap sacks large enough for four by two foot rockwool panels. Putting some panels in a sack should not be much labor. I have some large (h x w) thin cardboard boxes and I don't care what it looks like, so maybe I'll put the rockwool in the boxes, cut out most of the fronts of the boxes, and staple the acoustic fabric on top. Similarly, for large carboard boxes that aren't already thin, I can cut off the ends to make large thin boxes open in the front, then staple the fabric over the opening. Shouldn't be much labor, though the fire retardant acoustic fabric is an annoying additional cost.