Soundproofing troubleshooting?

[JazzAcolyte]

We did some renovating in the basement, so I took the opportunity to turn what I called the Harry Potter room under the stairs into a drum room. It was not going to be a room within a room and I didn’t expect it to be fully soundproof - goal was to make my practice less of a burden on the family.

The contractor added a double layer of Sheetrock and thermafiber insulation in the walls facing the interior of the house, including building a wall along the bottom of the stairs. (The neighbors are far enough that I’m not worried about the exterior walls.) He put channels in between the wood frame and Sheetrock, installed a solid core door, and used foam to fill in gaps around the doorframe and some pipes running along the ceiling. Unfortunately, none of this seems to have much effect.

Next thing I need to do is cover the walls and floor with carpet, acoustic blankets, and/or foam panels, and take care of a gap between the bottom of the door and the floor. Any other ideas?

I’m not building a room within a room or buying an e-kit, and I don’t need to soundproof the room’s window because either the neighbors can’t hear me or they don’t care - they’ve never complained. Other than those, would appreciate any suggestions.

 

[Pre ‘72]

Maybe you could post some pics?

Sounds like you’re playing drums inside a relatively well isolated space under the stairs. Are the stairs exposed inside the space or how have they been dealt with? Is there a door at the top of the stairs up into the rest of the house? What is the floor of your new space?

 

[JazzAcolyte]

Maybe you could post some pics?

Sounds like you’re playing drums inside a relatively well isolated space under the stairs. Are the stairs exposed inside the space or how have they been dealt with? Is there a door at the top of the stairs up into the rest of the house? What is the floor of your new space?

Here’s the room (still needs post-construction cleanup). Walls are cinderblock and particleboard and I’m going to cover them with Audimute blankets or foam panels. Floor is concrete and I’m going to carpet it.

Door is solid core wood, has a gap at the bottom that I need to deal with.

The contractor put insulation and Sheetrock around some pipes running along the ceiling (that’s the soffit) and what looks like foam to seal the gaps around the pipes where they exit the room. Behind the molding, the gap between the doorframe and Sheetrock is also filled with foam.

Edit: There is a door at the top of the stairs. The noise isn’t terrible upstairs, but it’s very loud in the basement.

 

[Cann_Man28]

take care of a gap between the bottom of the door and the floor.

My guess is that this is your problem. My experience has been small gaps let through large amounts of sound.

 

[EyeByTwoMuchGeer]

Just from a quick glance, and in my very non-professional experience, it just looks like there are a ton of gaps and holes in that room. The sound is likely escaping through those to a decent extent. If air can get in and out, it’s pretty likely that the sound can too.

CanMan28 beat me to it!!

 

[Gretsch>All&Everythang]

A door with weatherstripping and a threshold would have probably helped a lot.

Did you say he put 2 layers of Sheetrock? With isolation clips on the studs?

Wish I would have known before I have some extra Green Glue soundproofing caulk I would have sent to you for free.

As others have said the gaps let out a lot of sound. The door probably is a big culprit

 

[JazzAcolyte]

A door with weatherstripping and a threshold would have probably helped a lot.

Did you say he put 2 layers of Sheetrock? With isolation clips on the studs?

Wish I would have known before I have some extra Green Glue soundproofing caulk I would have sent to you for free.

As others have said the gaps let out a lot of sound. The door probably is a big culprit

Thanks. I took a close look this morning and in addition to the gap at the bottom of the door I found other cracks that may be letting sound escape. So first order of business, I will take care of those and cover the walls and floor with sound blocking material.

 

[DB-66]

In addition to a door seal, you may want to decouple the floor. A riser separating your drums from the foundation will help attenuate sound traveling through the foundation to the rest of your basement which then acts as a resonator.

 

[Joe61]

Here’s the room (still needs post-construction cleanup). Walls are cinderblock and particleboard and I’m going to cover them with Audimute blankets or foam panels. Floor is concrete and I’m going to carpet it.

Door is solid core wood, has a gap at the bottom that I need to deal with.

The contractor put insulation and Sheetrock around some pipes running along the ceiling (that’s the soffit) and what looks like foam to seal the gaps around the pipes where they exit the room. Behind the molding, the gap between the doorframe and Sheetrock is also filled with foam.

Edit: There is a door at the top of the stairs. The noise isn’t terrible upstairs, but it’s very loud in the basement.

hi jazz. i have questions.
is the current state of the ceiling the same as the pic you provided?

are you trying to reduce sound on the main floor above?

 

[ThomasL]

Thanks. I took a close look this morning and in addition to the gap at the bottom of the door I found other cracks that may be letting sound escape. So first order of business, I will take care of those and cover the walls and floor with sound blocking material.

The stuff you are planning to put on the walls and floor will change the acoustics inside the room by absorbing high frequencies, but will do little to prevent sound from escaping.

If you seal all the gaps, you will not be able to play for very long in such a small space without opening the door to let fresh air in.

 

[Tornado]

Do you also have ac/heating ducts in the room? Without dealing with that, you're going to have sound traveling through those as well. Soundproofing is very difficult, as you have found out. The most frustrating thing is that while you may have actually reduced a lot of sound, but it's still annoying to others. Even at low volumes audible noises in rhythm can be irritating.

 

[JazzAcolyte]

Just from a quick glance, and in my very non-professional experience, it just looks like there are a ton of gaps and holes in that room. The sound is likely escaping through those to a decent extent. If air can get in and out, it’s pretty likely that the sound can too.

CanMan28 beat me to it!!

Yup. I went back and looked closely, and you’re right. There are significant gaps where the walls meet the floor and ceiling. Taking care of those now.

 

[JazzAcolyte]

hi jazz. i have questions.
is the current state of the ceiling the same as the pic you provided?

are you trying to reduce sound on the main floor above?

Yes. The ceiling is new, was put in with thermafiber to reduce the sound traveling up.

Edit: I realized that I didn’t actually provide a picture of the ceiling. If you meant those pipes with orange foam around them, those are on the outside of the room. Inside the room it’s a finished, insulated ceiling.

 

[JazzAcolyte]

Do you also have ac/heating ducts in the room? Without dealing with that, you're going to have sound traveling through those as well. Soundproofing is very difficult, as you have found out. The most frustrating thing is that while you may have actually reduced a lot of sound, but it's still annoying to others. Even at low volumes audible noises in rhythm can be irritating.

No hvac in the room, but there are pipes running through it. If you look at the pictures, we built an insulated soffit around the pipes and used foam to seal around them where they exit the room. But they will still carry sound.

 

[dcrigger]

In addition to a door seal, you may want to decouple the floor. A riser separating your drums from the foundation will help attenuate sound traveling through the foundation to the rest of your basement which then acts as a resonator.

True - but I would have worrying about floor coupling (on a concrete slab) way down on my list.
By contrast, having a gap under the door is almost as bad as not having a door at all. On the inexpensive side, I would just treat it like an external door - mount a threshold on the floor and use the normal rubber gasket on the bottom of the door to seal off any air flow.

 

[dcrigger]

The stuff you are planning to put on the walls and floor will change the acoustics inside the room by absorbing high frequencies, but will do little to prevent sound from escaping.

If you seal all the gaps, you will not be able to play for very long in such a small space without opening the door to let fresh air in.

The is the big catch-22 with all of this - it's more than possible to create a "big thermos bottle" of a room - that will get oppressively hot and dangerously devoid of fresh air.
There's ways to deal with this - fan blowing air through a "rat maze" baffle box for one.

But ultimately - with drums, and not going full blow studio-type building this can only get so good. But sometimes, that can be enough to at least make things more tolerable for those around you.

 

[JazzAcolyte]

The is the big catch-22 with all of this - it's more than possible to create a "big thermos bottle" of a room - that will get oppressively hot and dangerously devoid of fresh air.
There's ways to deal with this - fan blowing air through a "rat maze" baffle box for one.

But ultimately - with drums, and not going full blow studio-type building this can only get so good. But sometimes, that can be enough to at least make things more tolerable for those around you.

Yup, I can see that’s a risk here, given the room’s one window is too high up to open easily and there’s no air vent. I’ll have to plug the gaps and see what happens.

 

[kb]

Are you sure that's a solid core door? I'm no expert, but it looks like a generic interior (hollow core) door to me.

I agree with sealing up any and all gaps.

 

[hsosdrum]

In addition to a door seal, you may want to decouple the floor. A riser separating your drums from the foundation will help attenuate sound traveling through the foundation to the rest of your basement which then acts as a resonator.

^^^
THIS. I have my drums on a 6' x 8' riser made from Auralex PlatFoam strips topped with 1½ sheets of ¾" MDF. Works very well for both mechanical attenuation and improved sonics.

 

[mgdrummer]

I used an exterior door when I built my space. That alone helped immensely.

As it's been said before, if air can get in & out than sound can get in & out.