Need Help re Soundproofing My Living Space

http://www.realtraps.com

Theres a good place to start looking.
Cj

Or should I bite the bullet and choose the crappier but more isolated living option?

Don't want to sound negative, but that place sounds like heaven to live in, but close to impossible to isolate. Or, if you can afford it, rent a cheap basement (indeed) that nobody wants, somewhere else - on the side.

Well, just hang some absortion on the walls and on the ceiling above your DAW, Hell even some thick Down comforters will do some good. Or maybee even some carpet on the walls.
CJ

I wouldn't even consider trying to sound proof an apartment. IMHO, you're going to spend a lot of money for very little return. I used to play sax and I was told by my neighbor two houses down that he could hear me practicing. So all your immediate neighbors will too.

Your only options would be head phones for recording. Maybe one of those sound proof room kits for practicing the sax.

Definitely check out the John Seyer's site. Soundproofing is difficult and expensive. I agree with Mod Bod: Not something I would attempt to do to an apartment. Soundproofing is totally different than acoustics inside the room. The Realtraps site is great for acoustics, but won't do anything for soundproofing.

Thanks again to all.

Maybe sound*proofing* is the wrong term, since it implies that you could have Led Zeppelin playing inside the room and there would be complete silence right outside the door. How about sound*minimizing*? I'm not so concerned about my synths or monitors, since I can turn the volume down or use headphones, and I'll probably start farming out my mixing/mastering anyway. It's mainly the sax I'm worried about. I just want to reduce the volume enough so that even if people can hear it somewhat, it's not loud enough to motivate them to complain.

Here's the link to the floorplan again:
http://www.watergatesales.com/html/wg-02.html

The kitchen is internal, so that's two sets of walls the sound has to penetrate. I'm thinking that if can play in the kitchen, have some big sound-absorbant flaps that I can temporarily hang over the doorways, and maybe even lay something down on the floor (there seem to be various products available for this purpose), that might do the trick. I'm on the top floor, so I'm not too worried about the ceiling.

Your thoughts ... ?

Hello,

Use your kitchen (interior room) and get a couple of furniture pads from Markertek and hang them up to cover the doorways. (You can probably get away with buying one and cutting it in half.) This should attenuate the sound somewhat as far as the outside world is concerned. That may be enough to make the level palatable to your neighbors. Furniture pads have the same effect as using a quilt or duvet, but are less thick, more dense and more attractive. The down side is that room will get hot and "close" (short on oxygen) pretty quickly, especially in the summer.

GK

Nick,
I built an isolation booth in my living room specifically for my sax playing musical partner. It is small: 6'x5'x7'. So I put the guy in there and of course we have to shut the door or the sound is just as loud as it was originally. Since soundproofing requires an airtight enclosure, he can only stay in there for 10 minutes or so before we have to open it and air it out. But it works. The neighbors could hear him before, and now he's basically inaudible to them. This is a recording solution, not a practicing solution. And trying to ventilate iso booths is a costly endeavor.

Don't they make something you can stuff in the bell of the horn so it's quieter? I'd try that before soundproofing. Also, the midi wind controllers might be a possibility if practicing on them will translate to usable technique on a real sax. Or buy a van and then drive somewhere and practice in the van.

Watch you get an apartment next to some old lady that lives alone, and is stubborn, and mad at the world. And if she hears a pin drop from your apartment, she wont just complain, she'll call the police... There are people all over the place like that..

Tell me about it! I once moved into an an old apartment where the floors creaked. Couldn't help it. The downstairs neighbor apparently thought I was doing it on purpose. Finally, two months after moving in, he banged on my door one day, then walked back downstairs. When I stepped into the hall to calm him down, he said he was "going to get me" and pulled out a semi-automatic handgun. I made a hasty exit out the back and called the police. They did a quick check on the guy and concluded this was a SWAT operation. The guy had over fifteen rifles, handguns, gas masks, Kevlar vests, etc. I moved out the next day.

I never even played my sax there! This happened in a quiet bedroom community in California's "wine country." I had lived in New Jersey, San Francisco, and Los Angeles with no problems. It's really all a roll of the dice.

Use your kitchen (interior room) and get a couple of furniture pads from Markertek and hang them up to cover the doorways.

I went to the Markertek site and searched for "pads" and "furniture pads" but didn't see anything that fit the description. Any idea specifically what the product is called?

The down side is that room will get hot and "close" (short on oxygen) pretty quickly, especially in the summer.

Well, that's a little frightening. I'm willing to suffer for my art, but not to the point of suffocation. ;-) I would hope that I could leave a little opening for some air to come in. Or would that cause too much sound to escape?

I tried to find some net references to Deep Purple's Machine Head recording (1971) that was done in a Hotel with a bunch of Mattresses piled up around amps, drums and singers. It's amazing how much a mattress can do - not too attractive but can be covered and look fairly cool.

I think rock 'n roll bands have done worse things in hotel rooms than make noise, especially in the 70's. ;-) A mattress would probably be a little unwieldy; I need something I can set up and take down for each session and doesn't take up loads of room since its a small apartment. But that's the general idea: something to block and/or absorb sound.

Nick,
I built an isolation booth in my living room specifically for my sax playing musical partner. It is small: 6'x5'x7'. So I put the guy in there and of course we have to shut the door or the sound is just as loud as it was originally. Since soundproofing requires an airtight enclosure, he can only stay in there for 10 minutes or so before we have to open it and air it out. But it works. The neighbors could hear him before, and now he's basically inaudible to them. This is a recording solution, not a practicing solution. And trying to ventilate iso booths is a costly endeavor.

That's good to know. How much did your booth cost? I called one place that said I could build such a booth using their materials for about $1000. There's also something called the "Whisper Room" that does the same thing which is more expensive. The downsides, of course, are the expense, taking up space, and having to sit in an enclosed space which seems a little claustrophobic. I may ultimately have to do this, but I'm hoping that the make-my-kitchen-an-isolation-booth approach would work first.

Don't they make something you can stuff in the bell of the horn so it's quieter? I'd try that before soundproofing. Also, the midi wind controllers might be a possibility if practicing on them will translate to usable technique on a real sax. Or buy a van and then drive somewhere and practice in the van.

I usually stuff a cloth in the bell to muffle it, but that only goes so far. Unlike, say, a trumpet, the sound emanates from all over the sax, not just the bell. And when I record, of course, I can't do this.

I bought the Akai EWI wind controller earlier this year partly for the reason you state: so I have something to play that doesn't make noise (when I use headphones) and I can practice anywhere. Plus, I think it's cool. The actual playing technique is much different than the sax, so I don't feel there's much of a benefit there. But I suppose that whatever happens mentally (i.e., new harmonic concepts) transfers over.

I like your van idea. :-) Actually, the apartment is right on the bay, so I could probably go somewhere outside that's secluded and play. I may be able to find a church, or a business, that will let me use their space in the evening for little or no fee. This would not be ideal, since I use my computer for various things in my practice sessions, but it's better than nothing. And I still need to record at home. No sense in having this terrific software if you can't use it, right?

I feel your pain. Apartments aren't easy places to practice/record in. Interestingly, it's usually the low frequencies that are hardest to attenuate so you're in luck as a sax player. Most freq's are in the mid to high range. It's fairly inexpensive to create a "room within a room" that can drop those frequencies by better than 30-60dB. There is a very expensive/heavy pre fab from a company called Quiet Solutions. Check them out. Basically, to maximally attenuate sound you need an airtight space with walls that are rigid and dense. Sometimes that can be impractical to say the least.

If you take a sheet of standard drywall, apply a very thin sheet of foamed neoprene, then add one more layer of standard drywall, you can make a relatively cost effective room that can cut sound transmission to about 40dB. There's lots of info out there about that.

I would definately try to get ground level apartment, see if you can get one that has a "firewall" which is often a cinderblock divider between apartments. That helps a lot!

But no matter what you do, an apartment is a crap-shoot. Maybe get one near the airport so that noise-abatement laws are a non-issue? My house/studio is in between 2 runways and even with my loudest band "jammin' on 11" and all the windows open, the cops can't say a thing to me!

good luck!

ORIGINAL: CJaysMusic

Well, just hang some absortion on the walls and on the ceiling above your DAW, Hell even some thick Down comforters will do some good. Or maybee even some carpet on the walls.
CJ

None of that will solve his isolation problem. You could put carpet and blankets on every wall, floor, and ceiling, but it will not do anything for isolation. The high frequencies will diminish in that particular room, but that's about it.

quote:

Use your kitchen (interior room) and get a couple of furniture pads from Markertek and hang them up to cover the doorways.

Hello,

Sorry about that. Guess what? They don't call them furniture pads, they call them "sound absorption blankets. : :-) Here's the link: http://www.markertek.com/SearchProduct.asp?off=0&sort=prod

GK

Hi Nick--

I commute past that complex a lot. Very pretty! I feel your pain on the cost of living. As I see it, you have two options that would work. 1) take a look at craigslist. There are a couple whisper rooms up for sale, or have been lately. Around $2k and under, IIRC. There's also a guy in Santa Rosa that advertises on CL his "soundbooths unlimited" products, at about $500. They look like acoustic foam and acoustic blankets adhered to the plastic that anvil cases are covered in, then all hung from tubing. I have no experience with them, but they might work.

Option 2 is to take a look at Soundwave Studios...they have a rehearsal complex off Grand Ave/880, just a few miles to your building. Not the best option, but you should be able to pick up a roomshare for around $200-300 that might work for you. Again, craigslist.org under the 'musicians' section is going to be your best option for getting into SW on the cheap. No fun to commute to practice, but hey, the neighbors ain't gonna complain.

Option 2.5: if you don't need to be in that complex, take a look at Alameda, it's got a lot houses with cottages in the back yards, is very safe, good public transit to SF, not terribly expensive.

ORIGINAL: Geokauf

We're not talking about isolation from the outside world. We are talking about attenuating the level that is going TO the outside world (e.g., the neighbors). And "sound absorbtion blankets" (furniture pads) will certainly attenuate the level. And blankets most certainly do absorb bass because blankets are not rigid so they don't pass the energy through. Like I said the hope is to attenuate not eliminate. My suggestion is to take a positive approach, which is to try something and see if it works. You haven't offered a solution, only a negative statement. Remember the OP is talking about a saxophone, not a 4 piece heavy metal group playing flat out.

GK

GK, I wasn't responding to you, and I wasn't trying to be negative. It just won't work, no matter how nicely I say it. Blankets will not keep the sound in. As an example, put a blanket on your kid's bedroom door, then step in the hall and play that sax. You'll still wake up the kid. The blankets will have a small value of isolation, but will absorb high frequency content. They will absorb minimal bass content, as well, very little. Try it, and report back. Rigid or not, a blanket is not a good isolator of bass frequencies. A sax is pretty loud, even though it is not a full-on metal band, and in his situation of close proximity to neighbors, blankets and carpet will not be enough.

As far as positive solutions, they have been discussed. Build a small booth you can stand in while playing. Sound proof a room if you own the structure, etc. etc. It is tough and pricey. Maybe try recording when everyone is off to work? Ask them if they mind you playing for an hour or so? Get an MIDI wind instrument and use headphones?

ORIGINAL: sscannon

ORIGINAL: Geokauf

We're not talking about isolation from the outside world. We are talking about attenuating the level that is going TO the outside world (e.g., the neighbors). And "sound absorbtion blankets" (furniture pads) will certainly attenuate the level. And blankets most certainly do absorb bass because blankets are not rigid so they don't pass the energy through. Like I said the hope is to attenuate not eliminate. My suggestion is to take a positive approach, which is to try something and see if it works. You haven't offered a solution, only a negative statement. Remember the OP is talking about a saxophone, not a 4 piece heavy metal group playing flat out.

GK

GK, I wasn't responding to you, and I wasn't trying to be negative. It just won't work, no matter how nicely I say it. Blankets will not keep the sound in. As an example, put a blanket on your kid's bedroom door, then step in the hall and play that sax. You'll still wake up the kid. The blankets will have a small value of isolation, but will absorb high frequency content. They will absorb minimal bass content, as well, very little. Try it, and report back. Rigid or not, a blanket is not a good isolator of bass frequencies. A sax is pretty loud, even though it is not a full-on metal band, and in his situation of close proximity to neighbors, blankets and carpet will not be enough.

As far as positive solutions, they have been discussed. Build a small booth you can stand in while playing. Sound proof a room if you own the structure, etc. etc. It is tough and pricey. Maybe try recording when everyone is off to work? Ask them if they mind you playing for an hour or so? Get an MIDI wind instrument and use headphones?

Hello again,

(Takes a long slow inhale, then exhales with a long sigh of exasperation). This is a problem solving exercise. Let's work backwards.

1. "Build a small booth..." OK and he lives in a 3 bedroom flat. So where does this "small" (and it won't be as small as you think) booth going to be stored when it is not in use? In the corner of the living room next to the telly?
2. "Sound proof a room, if you own the structure..." He's renting a flat.
3. "Get a MIDI wind instrument..." You don't play horn or you wouldn't suggest it.
4. The "blanket on your kid's bedroom door..." Not talking about isolating one room in a house or flat from another in the same flat. Not talking about isolating this flat from an adjoining unit or one on the floor above or below. I am talking about attenuating (that means lowering) the sound level that gets out through the windows and therefore reaches the neighbors windows.
5. The simplest solution (since he has no room for a booth - unless you like an unsightly wood structure taking up a significant amount of your living space) and he doesn't own the property (so he won't be building cinder block walls), considerating that a "sound absorbtion blanket" is only $18.00 and that the best place to play for isolation is the interior room with the entrance way (or ways) covered with a sound absorbtion blanket so that you decouple your sound from the outside world BEST AS IS POSSIBLE. My result in a few dBs of attenuation and that might be enough to keep the annoyance factor for the neighbors down to reasonable. (NOTE: the Markertek blankets are considerably more dense and heavier than the duvet on your bed, especially if doubled over.

Try it and report back to me.

GK