Attic Shaped Studio

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endorka
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#346

Postby endorka » Wed, 2023-Jan-04, 21:20

Phew! Today was a lot more work than it looks like!

I removed the old hinges from the door, enlarged the hinge mortises with the router & jig, and added another mortise for an extra hinge near the top.

I also did the same on the door frame, and fortunately the hinges all lined up for a test fit of the door in place.

Tomorrow I'll take the door off again and add mass. I thought it would be easier to fit the new hinges, drill pilot holes etc. before adding the extra mass. Trying to do all that with a very heavy door would be a nightmare.

I weighed the door, it is 30kg, so I'll have to add a little more mass than I thought. No worries though, I have extra MLV. On the upside maybe the improvement will be even more noticeable once done.

Possibly daft question: these are ball bearing hinges. Should I oil them?

Cheers,
Jennifer
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gullfo
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Attic Shaped Studio

#347

Postby gullfo » Thu, 2023-Jan-05, 13:28

they might require periodic lubrication. check the manufacturer recommended maintenance instructions.

next up - proper door closer mechanism so fingers remain attached and minimal change of bones breaking...



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#348

Postby endorka » Fri, 2023-Jan-06, 20:01

gullfo wrote:Source of the post they might require periodic lubrication. check the manufacturer recommended maintenance instructions.

next up - proper door closer mechanism so fingers remain attached and minimal change of bones breaking...


Thanks Glenn. I couldn't find any maintenance instructions for the hinges, alas! I have a 100kg rated quality brand overhead door closer with "fully adjustable variable power with latching action, backcheck & delayed action" ready to install. Cost a pretty penny so hopefully it will do the job!

I've cut the new door face from 18mm hardwood ply, it will add about 12 kg/m2 to the door. I had to cut a fancy profile along the hinge edge to stop it fouling on the door architrave when opened wide.
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Cutting mass loaded vinyl to fit the door. There will be three layers of this, giving a total addition of 15 kg/m2.
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The current door weighs 30 kg. These additions will take it to 75kg, without the door hardware.

Cheers,
Jennifer



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#349

Postby gullfo » Sat, 2023-Jan-07, 15:14

very nice! on the maintenance side - if they're removable pin type BB hinges - i would say (depending on usage) every 6 months or a year, pull each pin, clean and lubricate (silicone or lithium grease), swab to clean the inside of the hinge (i spray wd-40 on the cleaning rag - i use my .22 or .25 caliber gun barrel cleaning rod (not with a handle but one of the extender with a vise-grip plier) depending on hinge) and the dry it (like cleaning a gun barrel) then swab with lubricant. check for any play - loose hinge plates, screws, bearing assembly, and then re-insert the pin, clean up any extra lubricant, dust etc. the nice thing about a gun cleaner kit is i have brushes if i'm fixing a rusty hinge and need to scrub it. also a dental pick and files are handy for cleaning and removing burrs etc. a brass and stainless steel brush for removing hard gunk on the pins etc.
if the pin is not removable, then just keep it as clean as possible (exterior) and use a pin needle oiler (spray works but i find it messy and on painted surfaces is less fun to clean up) to get new lubricant in between the hinge segments. check for play etc. etc.



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#350

Postby gullfo » Sat, 2023-Jan-07, 15:20

example of a kit for maintaining hinges (as well as any personal defense items :-) )
https://www.amazon.com/BOOSTEADY-Univer ... 075RB35LN/



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#351

Postby endorka » Sun, 2023-Jan-08, 07:05

Thanks for that Glenn, much appreciated.

First job yesterday was making notches on the new door face for the hinges. I made those slightly larger than the hinges to allow for seasonal expansion of the wood.
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No "bank vault" overlap of the new face was possible along the hinge edge, but the compression between the door edge and frame here will be very high and allow multiple good seals anyway.
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I screwed the plywood face directly to the door without the mass loaded vinyl sandwich filling to ensure proper alignment. Once this was done I tried a test fit of the door before sanding and applying Danish oil. Hallelujah, it fits!
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This took me ages because of double, triple, and quadruple checking measurements before cutting. It paid off though, I was able to achieve the 2mm gap between the door and architrave I had been seeking.
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Bank vault type step on the top and latch side of the door. There is another step on the door frame, for a total of two levels of seal.
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It still looks like an ordinary door on the stairwell side!
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Next jobs are to remove the door, remove the face, fit the MLV, sand the face, Danish oil the face, put all back together, then rehang.



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#352

Postby gullfo » Sun, 2023-Jan-08, 17:15

nicely done! i like oil finishes. particularly the tung oil versus linseed oil - but either is good. one thing (if you don't already know) is linseed and tung oil as it oxidizes can generate heat, a lot of heat, and sometimes enough to burn... so one thing i do is to make sure the rags i use for applying or wiping are kept separated until they're dried. for a recent guitar refinishing project i had an old coat hook stand which i hung the rags on...



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#353

Postby endorka » Mon, 2023-Jan-09, 07:19

Thanks for reminding me of the spontaneous combustion effect Glenn, I put the cloth outside on some gravel after I was finished. :)

I took the new face off the door, then cut and stapled a layer of mass loaded vinyl (MLV) to it.
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Next I took the MLV offcuts I prepared earlier and stapled them to it. Getting heavier now...
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Then unhinged the door - again - and added several layers of MLV to the parts where the panels are recessed. The door is thinner there, and therefore lighter, so this will significantly reduce its overall sound attenuation. Adding extra mass with 2 layers of MLV makes up for it. I rolled out some putty to ensure the MLV was fixed in place and doesn't rattle about.
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Then added the third layer of MLV on top of the door. I made sure the MLV & putty padding was level by repeatedly rolling the edge of a 20kg weight plate over it.
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Then I put the (now much heavier) door face on top of this lot. The wooden props let me position it in place without disturbing the panel fixing assembly.
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The order is layers is now: 18mm thick plywood, 3 layers of 5 kg/m2 MLV, original door.
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Got a cup of tea, then went back and sanded the door face. Then the first coat of Danish oil applied.
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#354

Postby gullfo » Mon, 2023-Jan-09, 12:57

what's the plan for standing it up and putting into place? :-)



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#355

Postby endorka » Mon, 2023-Jan-09, 22:22

gullfo wrote:Source of the post what's the plan for standing it up and putting into place? :-)


I did it by pulling the green towel forward a foot or so to prevent the door scratching the floor. Then moved 40kg of weight plates on a rubber mat in front of the riser to provide a pivot for the bottom of the door to butt against when I lifted it. Then I grabbed the other end of the door (at the back of the room) and lifted it against the pivot until vertical, then slid it along on the towel to the door frame. Once there, I pushed a wedge under the door to ensure the hinges were aligned with their screw holes in the door frame. Screwed the top hinge into place, and from there on it was easy.

Fortunately my wife spotted me doing this and was able to pass me the correct tools at the correct time!



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#356

Postby gullfo » Tue, 2023-Jan-10, 10:11

yes! this is not a one-person job.



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#357

Postby endorka » Tue, 2023-Jan-10, 14:56

I've never installed a door closer before and it was fascinating figuring out how they work. This one is a Dormakaba TS 83 BC EN 3-6 for doors up to 100kg.
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I assume it works by storing the energy used in opening the door in a spring, and releasing it in a controlled manner when you let go of the door. You can adjust the strength of the spring for different weights and sizes of doors, or if it requires extra force to latch or fight pressure differentials for ventilation. The spring makes the door feel different when opening compared with a normal door - not exactly heavier, but there is more resistance. It was slightly odd at first, now previously solid feeling fire doors feel lightweight & insubstantial

It has a dial you can adjust to prevent it from flying into walls & furniture when pushed open quickly by gusts of wind or hasty musicians. The faster you push the door, the more it resists. The dial controls the amount of this resistance.

There's also a dial for the closing speed over most of the door angle. This can vary between really quick or almost not moving at all. A slow setting might be useful for musicians loading in gear.

Another speed dial controls the last 15 degrees before closing to make sure the door latches properly, yet not too powerfully to cause harm. It's really cool seeing this in action!

An unexpected bonus was that it can exert sufficient pressure on the door seals to keep the door closed without a latch. This meant I could remove the entire door latching mechanism, and fill the cavity routed out for it, so the door is now solid all the way through & better for sound attenuation.
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I applied the pull side seal first on the overlapping bits of the new door face. The latch side of the door frame is slightly off square so the gap between face and door frame widens by a few millimeters as it nears the floor. I know it's the frame as the door is straight. I knew this before starting the door modifications, so tried to plan for it to some extent by leaving an extra layer of MLV at the corresponding place on the door to pad it out. It sill wasn't enough though, and the door is not completely airtight there. More work on this required another day.

If I had noticed this when beefing up the studs around that area and packing & adding extra screws to the door frame I could have straightened it out then. Now the gap between the frame and studs is sealed and all the plastering work has been done, I suspect it would be a major PITA to do this.

For the push side door seal I remove the hardwood "bank vault" trims before applying the seal. I held them in place so there was light compression along a foot or so of the seal without moving the fully closed door. Doing this bit by bit gives a consistent seal. A combination of sub millimeter fine tuning to ensure the seal is good by attempting to hammer thin panel pins through the trims while holding them in place was quite tricky.
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The final seal is pretty good, a big improvement on before, but not quite good enough for a few feet at the off square part. I used a 6mm high D shaped foam gasket, and had hoped it would compress to about 4mm to allow for the off square pull side door frame. Unfortunately there isn't enough pressure from the closer to do this, I'll see if I can find a seal with greater squash variation for the part of the door. One of our exterior doors has an O profile rubber gasket that can go almost flat, something like that might do the trick.
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Cheers!
Jennifer



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#358

Postby gullfo » Tue, 2023-Jan-10, 16:06

a soft oblong O would likely the be the answer



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#359

Postby endorka » Tue, 2023-Jan-10, 19:47

Cheers Glenn, I'll have a look and see what I can find.

On the upside, I've just checked the gaskets and the areas under greater compression are exhibiting a "memory effect", i.e. staying slightly compressed even when the door is open. They've only been on for 24 hours so it's possible the overall seal may improve with time as the gap slightly narrows because of this.

Something else to consider is that my ventilation has negative pressure. I did it this way because (1) I had heard that the fan sucking air in is quieter than the fan blowing air into the room and (2) because I didn't know any better at the time. So far it hasn't been a huge problem as the room is pretty well sealed, with only a few small leaks e.g. around the window seals. One upside of the negative pressure is that these are easy to identify and seal as you can feel the air being drawn if you run your hand across potential leaks.

Of course this means that a small amount of air being drawn in bypasses the filter. No big deal as it's coming from outside. I don't like the idea of the filter competing with those leaks in a static pressure war though.

TLDR; a noticeable side effect of the negative pressure ventilation is the door is harder to close, and so it is tending to pull the door open, away from the seals. If I were to switch to positive pressure, it would tend to push against the door seals, improving the seal, adding to the force from the door closer. Or allowing the door closer to work less hard.

Fortunately switching to positive pressure is relatively simple. All I have to do is turn the fan around in its cradle, and it will blow instead of sucking. And there is space in the eaves for a filter before the fan. The filter on the other side can be easily removed from its box. Another job on the todo list.

Cheers,
Jennifer



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#360

Postby endorka » Tue, 2023-Feb-14, 11:26

Gasket update!

I couldn't find a gasket with enough variation, that was also of the "stick on" type to replace that leaky gasket. The solution lay not in the gasket, but in the frame itself. I found 10mm wide thin hardwood strips online, and use these to build up the wonky door frame so it was level with the door. These strips come in 0.5mm, 1mm and 2mm depths, so I built a very gradual wedge in layers starting at 4mm at the bottom of the door frame to 0.5mm near the top. Attached with double sided tape, the kind you use for carpet tiles. Apologies for the poor quality photos but if you look closely you'll see it.
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Then the original D shape gasket went on top of that. Sorted!
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The double gasket is now sealed well around the entire perimeter. This makes a big difference, as even a small leak allows a surprising amount of midrange sound through. These D shaped foam seals are ok but it is quite tricky to get them airtight all round as their ability to flex is fairly small in the scheme of things, so the fitting tolerance has to be pretty tight. I suspect the type that Rod Gervais recommends that also goes up into the actual gap between the door and the frame would make this easier to accomplish.

By the way, I found a good way of testing the seal was to send loud pink noise through the monitors in the room. Then close the door, and listen closely around the door perimeter. Where there is a leak it is really obvious because you'll hear a noticeably louder hiss at that part.

Here's a couple of photos of the normal side of the door. It goes onto our landing, and having that side of the door kept as the normal panel style makes it in keeping with the rest of the house. It just looks like an ordinary door.

The door across the landing is for the live room. I'll beef that door up sometime too. But not today :D
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