Room treatment help

**darwin** · **01-23-08, 08:54 AM**

I'm a first time poster here and a newbie when it comes to acoustics, so I'm looking for some help with treating my room. It's nice to see that there are some top notch pros participating here, such as Ethan and Bryan, and I'm hoping that you'll all steer me in the right direction.
First of all, my HT/music room is also my living room, so in order to keep my wife happy whatever I use has to be as decorative as possible. The room measures sixteen and a half feet wide, by twenty three feet long, and ninety five inches from floor to ceiling. The walls are pine bead board over sheet rock and the ceiling is pine library paneling over sheet rock. The floor is concrete slab covered with vinyl flooring most of which is covered by a rug.
The room has a number of issues: along the long wall on the right there is an open bay window (which my wife would prefer to keep open), along the left long wall there is an open hallway, and the rear of the room is entirely open to the kitchen. My current speaker setup is 5.1 using Magnepan 3.6Rs as fronts (with a sixty one inch DLP TV between them), Magnepan CC3 center, Magnepan 1.6QRs as rears, and built into the ceiling above the TV is an infinite baffle subwoofer using 4 eighteen inch Avalanche drivers.
My goal is to treat as much of the room (walls, corners, and ceiling) as needed, and without making the room look too much like a recording studio. I really don't have the time or the equipment to do room measurements and with my schedule I don't have time for DIY bass panels, diffusors, etc.. I'd rather buy pre-made treatments and install them myself after I've been told where to put them. I get told where to put things a lot, so I'm used to it.

I realize that pictures of the room would be helpful and I will try to get some posted this evening. And I would greatly appreciate any advice you folks could give me on this project.

**Ethan Winer** · **01-23-08, 09:03 AM**

I'm glad to help, though it sounds like you already understand the basics. Since you say you're looking to buy commercial treatment, I'll be glad to advise you by email on our specific products since some consider it a no-no to discuss products in public. But the general goals for all rooms are:

* As much corner bass trapping as possible

* Absorption at the first reflection points on the side walls and optionally the ceiling

* Either absorption or diffusion on the rear wall behind you

--Ethan

**bpape** · **01-23-08, 09:16 AM**

Welcome to the forum.

Ethan outlined the basics that all rooms require. Sounds like a couple of those won't be possible due to the layout though. There is always a tradeoff in a situation like that.

I'd be happy to discuss your needs and come up with a plan of action that would be both effective and visually acceptable to the significant other. Treatments don't have to be 'ugly' or make the room look like a studio if done properly.

If you can post or email me a sketch, that'd certainly help.

Bryan

**darwin** · **01-23-08, 11:40 AM**

Thanks very much, guys. I will post pics of the room this evening after I get home from work to give you a better idea of the room layout. I'll also attempt to do a sketch of the room layout and post/email it. Could you give me some idea of how much detail the sketch should have (other than the room dimensions) and what measurements I need to include?

**bpape** · **01-23-08, 12:00 PM**

The biggest things are the ceiling height, location and size of any doors and windows, etc. Also, if there are specific things that can't be done (like rearranging furniture...) then please just put that in the text. If we have an idea of what kind of furniture needs to go in there, that will help too - not just from figuring out what will fit, but how it should be laid out and how much impact the furniture will have on the acoustics of the room.

Also, please include in the text if the floor is tile, wood, carpet, etc. The sketch doesn't need to be anything fancy.

Bryan

**darwin** · **01-23-08, 06:09 PM**

As promised, here are the pics of the room that I have to work with. Please disregard the mess and the furniture. We're in the middle of some remodeling in another part of the house and the living room furniture is being replaced.
The first pic is of the left wall (23'L to just behind the left rear speaker and 7' 11" to the ceiling).
The second pic is the rear of the room toward the kitchen and adjacent hallway (16.5' wide x 7' 11" high).
The third pic is the right wall (23'L x 7' 11" H) with the large bay window. My wife prefers to leave the window open for the view into her garden.
The fourth pic is another shot of the left wall.
The fifth pic is of the front wall (16.5' wide x 7' 11" high). The built-in IB sub is in the ceiling above and just to the left of the front right speaker.

I hope these pics help to clarify what I was trying to describe earlier. I'll get a sketch drawn up and post it as soon as time allows.

**darwin** · **01-23-08, 09:03 PM**

Here's the rather rough sketch of my room. I have a larger version which I can email if needed.

**RedMed427** · **01-23-08, 10:53 PM**

**** when i saw that room i thought "Thats guys got to live in florida" lo and behold you do lol

**darwin** · **01-24-08, 07:38 AM**

Quote:

RedMed427 wrote:

**** when i saw that room i thought "Thats guys got to live in florida" lo and behold you do lol

Yes, my wife has developed a taste for bright colors. You should see the Florida room, which is a bright Granny Smith apple green, and the master bedroom which is a bright pumpkin orange. As long as she lets me do pretty much whatever I want with the A/V stuff, she can paint everything whichever colors she likes.

**bpape** · **01-24-08, 08:29 AM**

That's plenty good.

The paint color vs audio sounds like a good trade to me. Curtains on that window would help so you could close when listening and open for viewing.

Bass control in the front corners is going to be necessary as it's the only viable place for it assuming we can't go over the top with panels from the wall/ceiling intersections.

A panel on each side flanking the screen will also help imaging and slap front to back. It appears that you have room for a couple more on each side wall for refelction and general decay control between the speakers and the window/hall.

Quite honestly, the Elite series would fit very nicely in that room - stained wood frames and GOM cloth choices.

The rear of the room doesn't look like we can do much and the ceiling would only be for knocking down any additional ringing as the Maggies don't have much in the way of vertical dispersion.

Bryan

**darwin** · **01-24-08, 11:08 AM**

Thanks Bryan. How many of the Elites would you recommend total? Would you also recommend your diffusors for the front wall directly behind each of my front 3.6R speakers (2 panels per speaker) in addition to floor to ceiling Tri-Traps in both front corners? I can spend about $2k or so on this project, so I'd like to do everything at once while my wife is so agreeable.

Would you PM me with your email address, so I can contact you directly about ordering, etc.?

Edit: It seems that I can't receive or send PMs or emails until I have a minimum of ten posts.

**eugovector** · **01-25-08, 07:33 AM**

Quote:

darwin wrote:

Would you PM me with your email address, so I can contact you directly about ordering, etc.?

Edit: It seems that I can't receive or send PMs or emails until I have a minimum of ten posts.

I'll jump in so this doesn't get awkward. If you check the signatures (at bottom of posts) for two of the posters in this thread, "bpape" and "Ethan Winer", you will find links to their respective companies.

**darwin** · **01-25-08, 07:38 AM**

Quote:

eugovector wrote:

I'll jump in so this doesn't get awkward. If you check the signatures (at bottom of posts) for two of the posters in this thread, "bpape" and "Ethan Winer", you will find links to their respective companies.

Thanks. My senile old self just figured that out not more than five minutes ago.

**darwin** · **01-28-08, 12:31 PM**

First of all, I would like to thank both Bryan of GIK and Ethan of RealTraps for the sharing of their impressive expertise and their seemingly endless patience in answering all my questions.
I've given your lists of recommendations to my wife and she'll be making the decision on which setup we'll be purchasing, since I care only about effectiveness and she's more concerned with aesthetics. Plus, I don't have the role of bad guy in picking one of you over the other. It's all her fault.

With that said, I now need some advice on how to treat the large bay window on the right side wall. I think the easiest and most cost effective treatment would be to install some type of drapes, but I haven't been able to find much info on the best fabrics to use or what to use as backing on the drapes. Does anyone have any ideas?
We're also trying to figure out what to do with the floor to further improve sound quality. The current flooring is some rather heavy, commercial grade vinyl flooring over concrete slab, which we would like to cover, at least partially, with some thick, plush carpeting and pad. Would it be best to cover as much of the floor as possible, nearly wall to wall, or is it better to leave some of the flooring exposed so as not to deaden the room too much?

**bpape** · **01-28-08, 12:36 PM**

I'd not go too crazy the floor just yet. Yes - a wood floor would sound better but I'd see what else is going to go on in the room first.

As for the window, yes, it would help to have drapes but the other side isn't really treatable either so you'd have a mismatch there in terms of symmetry. If it were me in that room, I'd look for some really nice wide vertical wood blinds - maybe something 2-3" wide and 1/8" thick or so, solid wood. You can turn those to tweak light and sound without killing one side and not the other.

Bryan

**darwin** · **01-28-08, 07:17 PM**

Quote:

bpape wrote:

As for the window, yes, it would help to have drapes but the other side isn't really treatable either so you'd have a mismatch there in terms of symmetry. If it were me in that room, I'd look for some really nice wide vertical wood blinds - maybe something 2-3" wide and 1/8" thick or so, solid wood. You can turn those to tweak light and sound without killing one side and not the other.

Thanks much, Bryan. You're a veritable genius. I've been racking my brain for days trying to figure out what to do with the window to get the room closer to the sound I want and keep my wife happy at the same time. She loves your idea.

**darwin** · **02-02-08, 08:34 AM**

My wife and CFO has very generously increased my room treatment by almost double, so I've been reading up on rear diffusion which seems to be favored by some of the experts for the rear speakers in a multichannel setup. Would diffusion work with my rear speakers (Magnepan 1.6QRs), even though the speakers are placed very close to the side walls?

Also, does anyone know where I could buy some acoustic cotton and what type I would need? All I've been able to find for vendors are commercial suppliers and I only need enough to fill four GIK D1 diffusors which are on their way to me for the front wall.

**bpape** · **02-02-08, 08:39 AM**

I can get you the cotton. It's not cheap but I can get you just a couple pcs if you want. PM me.

As for diffusion behind your surrounds, personally, I don't think that's what you need. Diffusing the reflections of a surround speaker is one thing and can be useful. In your case, you don't havre a lot of room behind them and I personally think the wall/corner proximity bass issues will be more of a problem.

Bryan

**darwin** · **02-02-08, 08:58 AM**

I would like to put some type of bass trapping back there, and my wife and I both like your new pillar traps a great deal, but they just won't fit without having to pull the speakers out too far into the room. So, I'm scratching my head over what to do next with the rear of the room. I would like to get the entire room fully treated before my wife changes her mind about the budget.

**bpape** · **02-02-08, 08:01 PM**

For what needs to happen, you could likely get by with a couple of the 242 Elites. The speakers are close enough to a boundary that the SBIR issues are pretty high and we can absorb it basically directly before it spreads too much. I really think that's a better solution in your case than diffusion which will not deal at all with the low frequencies.

Bryan

P.S. I got your PM - trying to catch up on a few things - will get back with you.

**darwin** · **02-03-08, 08:54 AM**

Thanks Bryan, there's no rush. My wife has done some brainstorming and has come up with some more things to do with the room, so I've already got my hands full. She wants me to install a door in the room at the entrance of the hallway that's next to the A/V cabinet of the left wall to provide more sound isolation for the guest bedrooms off that hallway.
She also wants me to move the built-in media cabinet forward so that it butts up against the A/V cabinet, which will allow me to pull the rear speakers forward a bit.
She also would like me to come up with a system to make a temporary back wall out of panels to go across the room just in front of the kitchen peninsula, sort of like the partitions for office cubicles, that can be moved as needed. I'm thinking of making them out of aluminum channel, one or two inch OC 705, and GOM fabric. I'm trying to decide whether it would be better to have panels on wheels, similar to Ethan's GOBO traps, so they can be completely removed from the room if needed. Or making a bifold panel type set-up with a track along the ceiling, so that the panels can be folded up flat against the side walls when not in use. Any thoughts on this?
This is all going to make for a great deal of work for me, but at least her projects aren't coming out of my room treatment budget.

**bpape** · **02-03-08, 08:57 AM**

If you don't want to make the stands, we do have stands available that are also Maple and can be stained to match the Elites. You could, if you want, mount casters on the bottom of them for the roll-around effect.

Bryan

**darwin** · **02-04-08, 06:31 AM**

Ready made stands would make my life easier. Since the panel traps will essentially be creating a rear wall in the room, and I'll also be adding some bass trapping in the rear along the ceiling to wall junction and on the floor near each of the rear speakers, would you recommend using one inch or two inch OC 705? And should the foil side be facing into the room or away?

**bpape** · **02-04-08, 08:40 AM**

Darwin.

I have to call you for a couple other things today anyway. I want to know more about what you're planning for these before I speak as to what's best.

Bryan

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