Geek Group describes its sound studio building process

This is an old post from 2010, which I've left here in the blog, but updated it a little. I had run across some videos from the Geek Group, and they were hard at work building a sound studio earlier in 2010.

In this video, Chris describes how they affixed drywall to the original cinderblock walls of their space. I don't necessarily agree with some of their processes (didn't they read my multiple blog posts about Green Glue?), but they've been attaching wood strips to the cinderblock with glue, then adding resilient channel strips from Auralex, and then attaching drywall to the strips.

However, he confessed that they're not adding insulation behind the wall because of their budget. But they were going to caulk between the pieces of drywall and add a second layer of gypsum (drywall) on top of the the first wall, placing the second layer in the opposite direction so that the seams don't line up.

To see the older Geek Group videos, check out the National Science Institute channel on YouTube. (NOTE: In 2014, the Geek Group had a fire at their labs.)

* The YouTube video that accompanied this origial 2010 post got moved or no longer exists. The Geek Group renamed themselves as "Chaotic Good." And here is a rebranded video about how they built their studio.

Comments

Two layers of drywall and Green Glue

Another YouTube video: layering drywall I have to admit: I never get tired of seeing other people's soundproofing videos. Here's a video from Acoustical Surfaces that shows two guys building a wall out of 2x4s and insulating them with cotton batts, and then layering two sheets of drywall over each side. They make sure not to overlap the seams between the two layers, and they use two tubes of Green Glue on each 4x8 sheet of drywall. We don't get to hear the results, but if I were them, I might have either staggered the wall studs (since they were building the wall from scratch), or put soundproofing green tape (aka " joist tape ") on every other stud to keep the first layer of drywall from touching the wood (a "fake" staggered wall).

Combining QuietRock and Green Glue together

Two great products work great together. As I've mentioned before, I'm experimenting around with ways to reduce some of the noise problems in my apartment on a tight budget. I think I've found the best combination to date: adding a layer of QuietRock 510 over an existing layer of gypsum drywall with a layer of Green Glue inbetween. This was sort of the best of both worlds: taking a pre-made, sound-dampened drywall and then adding it over a powerful, viscous layer of glue....onto drywall that was already on the wall studs. No demo needed. In this project, I basically added two sound-dampening layers to the original 1950s drywall (one layer in the QuietRock and the other layer created by the Green Glue) to address " flanking noise ": feet, furniture, and shoes pounding on the bare floor of my downstairs neighbors' apartment. The amount of banging, bashing, and foot-stomping sounds coming from their very "wooden" apartment has been severe, and I...

How to measure decibels with the NIOSH sound level meter app

For a quick lesson on how to use the NIOSH (National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health) app to measure decibels and noise, check out my latest Soundproofist video. This handy app is free, although only available for iOS devices right now. It's a great app to use if you want to measure average and maximum noise levels with either A-weighted or C-weighted decibels. You can save each measurement as a report. Learn more about measuring noise and about soundproofing from Soundproofist . Download the free NIOSH app from the App Store and learn more about it from this CDC documentation .

soundproofing for urban people

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