www.youtube.com/FernandoPagesLledo
TRANSLATED TO ENGLISH:
TUTORIAL TO CONDITION,
IMPROVE ACOUSTICS AND SOUND A REHEARSAL ROOM.
ABSTRACT:
In this
short tutorial I tell you about my experience to acoustically condition and
soundproof by ourselves and with a very tight budget our rehearsal room, this
is not a scientific text prepared by a professional, it is not a treatise on
acoustic engineering, far from it, Nor does it pretend to be, it is just my
simple experience that I share with you in case it can be useful to improve the
sound of your group and avoid uncontrolled reverberations when we are playing
our instruments due to the rebound of sound waves when colliding with rigid
surfaces. I think it is worth the effort because with the improvement, the
rehearsals are much more enjoyable afterwards.
They gave
us the 12 m2 test room (3 x 4 m and 2.5 m2 in height, that is, a total of 12 m2
of ceiling area, 12 m2 of floor and 35 m2 of walls, giving a total of 59m2).
The premises were handed over to us with the walls “bare”, that is, made of
cement, except for the floor that already came with laminated flooring (the
wood insulates very well), and the ceiling to which they placed plaster plates
between beam and iron beam , and the air chamber was filled with rock wool
which is also an acoustic absorber.
Our room
does not face wall to wall with other rooms, but rather has two walls that face
the outside of the rehearsal premises (concrete block walls) and two other
walls face corridors in which there are other rehearsal rooms in front. (one
wall is made of bricks and the other is half brick and the other half
plasterboard) therefore what I have tried is above all to avoid reverberations
and unwanted echoes produced by ourselves when we rehearse inside the room
rather than soundproofing the room as such in the sense of isolating ourselves
acoustically from the rest due to the above.
MATERIALS:
For
acoustic conditioning we have not completely covered the surfaces to the point
of leaving our premises completely "dead or off" acoustically, but we
have used approximately 19 m2 of materials that cover approximately 40% of the
total ceiling and wall surface. which adds up to 47 m2:
10 m2 (20
panels of 1 x 0.5m and 40mm thick) of acoustic foam anti-echo panels with a
pyramid design that absorb sound waves and prevent their rebound (The t.akustik
HiLo-N40 by Thomann).
6 m2 of
cocopren (3 2 x 1 m polyurethane panels, 2 cm thick, "Acoustic insulation
panel Copopren T-CA-150 by Leroy Merlin), is a material used to soundproof and
insulate and we have applied it in One of the walls that is built with
plasterboard and also coincides with the metal door that gives access to the
room and the corridor in which we have the closest rehearsal room to ours.
Approximately
1.5 m2 of 4 cm thick copopren (which I found next to a container of someone who
removed it from a wall) and we use it to cover a horizontal iron beam on the
ceiling since it is a material highly reflective.
1.2m2 of a
cork panel used for a board where we hang our common documents but which also
absorbs something acoustic.
The
anti-echo absorbent panels are distributed between the ceiling and the walls,
in our case, we do not cover the surfaces in their entirety.
BUDGET:
Regarding
the budget spent on the acquisition of materials, it was just over 200 euros:
€ 68 20
anti-echo panels of 1 x 0.5m.
56 € 3
copopren soundproofing panels of 2 x 1m.
€ 25 5Kg
of contact glue to glue the panels.
In
addition to our own costs for acoustic conditioning, we also spent about € 60
on 5 pieces of 1.20m wood and 18 squares; 2 hangers and 100 dowels and 6mm
screws. These distances will allow us to leave our instrument covers and other
belongings up high and thus be able to make the most of the space in our
premises.
In total…
209 euros.
It would
be necessary to add a 1.20 x 1.20m cork panel, 10 linear meters of gutter so as
not to leave the cables of the microphones especially on the floor and the
wooden frame that I made for the mixer to place it in position vertical that
will allow us not to occupy more horizontal space in our premises, a small
wooden window that I made to cover the hole in the extractor, but I already had
that material at home so I don't add it… ..
As for the
time we spend to place the panels, condition the door, install gutters,
hangers, place the sound equipment, it was about 30 hours in total (two
afternoons two people and one afternoon only one).
TOOLS:
Regarding
the main tool used: Level, meter, bow saw, jigsaw, bucket, small roller, and
spatula for glue, cutter, screwdrivers, drilling machine and drill bits for
wood and wall, radial with disk for metal to cut a metal shelf that I used to
add it to the bottom of the door and cover the existing hole that had about
3cms and a rivet and rivets for said door.
EXECUTION:
Well, if
you have read this far relax, I will not torture you anymore because I will not
continue writing, if you are interested in the explanation of the execution of
the work I think I will explain it better in the video tutorial that I have
assembled with photos since an image is worth more than a thousand words. Thank
you very much and I hope that you will encourage yourself to prepare your
rehearsal room to enjoy it with your groupmates.
You can
see all my videos published on my youtube channel and if you like it you can
subscribe, thank you very much:
www.youtube.com/FernandoPagesLledo
