[John_Dikeman]

Hello,

Can anyone recommend any isolation booths that work for practicing in an apartment and are available in Europe.
Cheaper the better but I'm interested in any input.
Also DIY.

Thanks!
john

 

[Pete Thomas]

Hello,
Cheaper the better but I'm interested in any input.
Also DIY.

DIY is the most fun if you are half decent with a drill, screwdriver hammer and a saw.

See:

Home Studio Soundproofing

Make a soundproof room for recording or rehearsal, soundproofing your studio

mediamusicforum.com

 

[milandro]

Hi John are you going to do this yourself or will you have this built?

there are also some that you can dismount and re use on other locations. No solution will be cheap.

https://esmono.nl/geluidsstudios/demontabele-geluidscabine/
https://www.meyernoisecontrol.nl

 

[Atratr]

I have one of these at home since 2012.
http://studiobricks.com
It has worked for me but not the way i was hoping cause i had the idea that i could play at any time during the day but....not. I can´t play at night, the above neighbour or my wife in the bedroom would hear me. But it has provided me lot of good study hours during the day, knowing that i didn´t disturb my neighbours mainly. Not cheap, still working well enough. I have not take time to measure exactly how much my wife or my neighbour can hear me. Sure they have improved the isolation(which is good enough for me) since then.

There´s a cheaper company, https://www.demvox.com
They were not avaliable when i bough mine, but i think they are worth the invest too.

Both are in Spain.

 

[milandro]

part of the problem is stil that sound travels through some surfaces like the floor or other walls. You have to address that too. DON"T forget that you need ventilation ( and even better air conditioning, it gets warm in there!, Even in Belgium)

OP is in Belgium now, I think.

This is a Belgian video.

 

[John_Dikeman]

DIY is the most fun if you are half decent with a drill, screwdriver hammer and a saw.

See: https://mediamusicforum.com/home-soundproofing

Based on the prices of some of these... might have to go this route. I'm not entirely unhandy. Just bought a new drill and need to do something with it!

 

[milandro]

well, it is way more complicated than many people can handle but if look around on the web there are many solutions , much depends on what you have available there. If you have small room that you can use it is way easier

 

[John_Dikeman]

well, it is way more complicated than many people can handle but if look around on the web there are many solutions , much depends on what you have available there. If you have small room that you can use it is way easier

Yeah, we have a couple small storage rooms in the basement. I might think about doing it there. Not sure how depressing that would be though....

 

[milandro]

John, it will really take a lot of work (more than one anticipates) if you want to reach a decent result and the materials aren't cheap anyway, whether is will be a cosy space is entirely up to your ability and fantasy.

These videos (in Dutch) will help you. Notice that you will certainly need someone's help at some stage.

One aspect that you shouldn't forget or discount is airconditioning and ventilation, sound isolation equals air isolation and that won't be very good for you if you don't ventilate the space , the airconditioning is not something that you want to forget, it is not a luxury, it rapidly gets hot in a closed space which is designed to be airtight.

There are special units built for this purpose.

Do consult with someone who has construction experience and hopefully someone who has done this before. If you buy a cabin that you can mount and dismount you may bring this with you next time you move, Good Luck!

 

[Wonko]

Milandro has given some good video's to help you along. A few point of advice however:
<disclaimer>I have never actualy done such a conversion, but I did take a course in noise pollution as part of my education a an environmental expert. And it's a matter of interest for me, I have read quite a bit about how sound behaves</disclaimer>

Themal isolation will not help much to dampen the sound, if you need the thermal isolation it will help a tiny bit towards sound isolation (very little actualy).

What you need is dampening materials that have a rather high mass (like high density rock wool) to "capture" the sound vibrations. And a suspended construction (as demonstrated in the second video) is very good.

Some of the materials used in that video have more to do with the esthetics than with the accoustic aspects. Like the plaster boards that are used, I think that dampening materials without the plaster front will work better.

One of the most difficult sounds to capture are the ones transmitted by contact (through walls, floors, construction beams, .....). So the best way to make sure you don't let any sound out is by using suspended walls, suspended floor and suspended ceiling.

And you could also check out this: https://blazersenblazers.be/nl/studio-bricks but that is quite expensive. Still, it works very well, you could go and check it out in Ghent.

 

[milandro]

the studiobricks system works really well and is easily assembled & removed

will it allow you to play full out (as I know your do) at night without any neighbor complaints? I don't know.

 

[JohnMarkPainter]

Building a "room within a room" is the only way.
And you have to do it right.
And then it needs ventilation without letting too much sound out.

There are a bunch of portable booths which are very expensive but probably a better idea if you are in an apartment (where you might move).

My solution has always been to live in a big space where the neighbors aren't close.
Sometimes that is cheaper than building a soundproof room

 

[beau barry]

Whisper Room is amazing. Really expensive.

 

[milandro]

My solution has always been to live in a big space where the neighbors aren't close.
Sometimes that is cheaper than building a soundproof room

Not in urban Europe...

 

[Atratr]

the studiobricks system works really well and is easily assembled & removed

will it allow you to play full out (as I know your do) at night without any neighbor complaints? I don't know.

I have one of those in my apartment and i would not say i can play at night without disturbing neighbours. I didn´t take the time to chek it but i would say the sound when i am inside ends being like a TV at medium high volume. I can say i disturb my wife at night which is in the bedroom and there´s another room and a corridor between us. I must say my booth id from the first ones they made, i thought they even got it better later(like they used triple walls or something).
From the inside i can hear my neighbour if he makes noise up there. If i don´t play i can hear a lot of things from the outside(at very low volume). Maybe putting some light treatment in the room where the booth is could improve a lot the thing, but i don´t need to practice at night so..

 

[mmichel]

Whisper Room is amazing. Really expensive.

I have one and agree with this, but they are made in and shipped from the US (Tennessee) and they are very heavy, bulky, and expensive to ship, even within the US.

I imagine that it would be prohibitively expensive to ship one to Europe.

 

[Pete Thomas]

A lot can actually be done if you site down and think/analyse the weakest points.

If you start off improving these weak points, then often you can reduce a lot of the issue with a much smaller bit of effort.

For example you may find as is very often the case, the door is basically a thin piece of ply with a frame round it. Replacing with a hefty door with no gaps can do wonders. You'll find a bog standard 1/2 hour firedoor properly and snugly fitted will fo wonders. Or even cheaper, screw some 1/2" plasterboard to each side.

To seal any gaps you might use draft excluder but it's probably better to use foam that is actually design to aid soundproofing. The foam matting stuff you get for car "soundproofing" would be quite good for sealing small cracks and gaps.

Windows are a problem if the sound issue is to the outside. So secondary double glazing will be useful but bear in mind double glazing units per se can have an acoustic effect a bit like a 150hZ bass trap (which may or may not be a good thing). I learned (via building three studios) that using thick (1/4") single glazing can be as good and possible a lot cheaper. That was a tip my acoustic consultant gave me and it worked really well.

I've already mentioned ceilings and floors - if possible add plasterboard to ceilings and fill or partially fill cavities with sand (after checking the integrity of the supporting material)

As has been mention a room within a room is ideal, but still a lot can be done with a floating floor. In my first studio which was on a first floor, I put a think layer of underlay down. Ideally you might get some neoprene or dedicated acoustic underlay. Normal cheapo carpet underlay will also do but need a lot more thickness to do the same as the actual "sound insulating" stuff. The point is normal underlay is made for comfort and a nice soft feeling, the proper stuff is denser and designed to get in the way of sound waves.

On top of the underlay I lay down some normal flooring, so it was a bit like a sandwich of actual floorboards, then an inch or two of underlay then then the laminate flooring.

My point is:

Do the basic things - esp. doors and windows, and then re-evaluate.

Then the big one is ventilation. I showed a special box on my studio site article above, but if you think about it this will always be a weak point because air needs to flow whatever. I'm not sure if this is good science but it occurred to me if I built in a ventilator fan, the actual air passage can be comparatively smaller and hence better for sound insulation.

One thing you can't do is rely on an aircon unit for ventilation. Most of them may just be cooling and recycling the same air back.

 

[JohnMarkPainter]

That's the one...I tried it out at the NAMM show.
It works really well and didn't immediately seem to sound bad.

Whisper Room is amazing. Really expensive.

And at $4k, it sounds crazy but you could spend half of that on materials and botch the design and come out with something terrible.

Another issue with trying to soundproof a whole room is that you have air ducts, holes in the wall from electrical outlets and wiring/plumbing.
It gets crazy and you can put in a lot of effort and still have those holes leaking.

I've been really needing to address this in my space because we have two kids and a dog and I work in the basement.
I have plenty of space but don't want to end up with a crappy sounding booth (dead is ok) that isn't ventilated.
Need to do a little homework.

I've just been reducing OUTSIDE noise using baffles/gobos/made with 703 and blankets etc

 

[John_Dikeman]

Sorry folks, I thought I was subscribed to this thread, but I wasn't... So a lot of new information here.
But the latest, I found a used drum isolation booth that is for sale for 1500. 3 meters by 2. Small window and ventilation. However, it's too big to go in our apartment. We do have a garden. But, then I probably have to make a shed as it's not weather proof. Also, still trying to get some info about this specific booth. My trumpet player friend who told me about it said it was really good and you can play inside with drums and you don't hear anything... But, who knows. It's from Meyer Noise Control in the Netherlands. I wrote the company to see if they had an idea what model it might be, etc...
Milandro, you know that company?

 

[milandro]

No direct experience with them. I am sure they have a showroom where you can visit and evaluate the product.

comes recommended from a lot of well known places!
https://www.meyernoisecontrol.nl/referenties/

Not cheap!

https://www.meyernoisecontrol.nl/prijzen/