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Research documents and articles that might be helpful in designing and building your home recording studio.
- The Wyle report The famous "Wyle Report" from 1973. A very old but very useful in-depth explanation of how isolation works in buildings, and how to get good isolation with the least amount of materials, in the least thickness, for your purposes. ────────────────────────────
| - IR-761 - Isolating your walls. A study of several hundred different methods for building isolation walls, all of them tested in a real acoustic laboratory, with full details of construction and results. From the Canadian National Research Council. ────────────────────────────
| - IR-693 - Isolation in gypsum wallboard More studies on how walls isolate, what works, what doesn't. From the Canadian National Research Council. ────────────────────────────
| - IR-832 - Isolation walls Even more information on isolation in walls. From the Canadian National Research Council. ────────────────────────────
| - IR-586 - Drywall in front of a concrete wall. What happens when you put up thin drywall in front of a concrete wall using resilient mounting... (Hint: isolation gets worse, not better, for low frequencies). From the Canadian National Research Council. ────────────────────────────
| - Cavity Fill: Insulation inside isolation walls Study showing how insulation inside the cavity of an MSM wall affects overall isolation, and why leaving out the insulation (or not completely filling the cavity), is a bad idea. ────────────────────────────
| - Acoustic Wall Insulation Design Guide Acoustic Wall Insulation Design Guide Document put out by Owens Corning a few years ago, documenting an analysis of their products in many different types of wall construction. ────────────────────────────
| - NRCC-44692 - Resilient Channel Everything you ever wanted to know about Resilient Channel and how it works, but were afraid to ask.... From the Canadian National Research Council. ────────────────────────────
| - IR-802 - Floating floors. A study of the isolation provided by various types of floated floors. My own title: "Read this to understand why your floated floor probably won't work, because it is really, really hard to do it right, and no: a plywood deck over 2x4 joists resting on rubber pads will NOT work. Nope. It just wont. Read this to find out why". From the Canadian National Research Council. ────────────────────────────
| - Light-weight floating floors are impossible. An article published by Kinetics that shows the physical reasons WHY a plywood deck over 2x4 framing on rubber pads cannot possibly work. Ever. Never. Nope. Really! ────────────────────────────
| - ITU BS.1116-3 - Acoustic Specifications for Studio Control Rooms ITU BS.1116-3. What is a "critical listening" room? What are the specifications? Chapters 7 and 8 of this document define exactly what it takes to make a perfect listening environment, such as is needed by a recording studio control room. ───────────────────────────
| - EBU Tech.3276 - Acoustic Specifications for Studio Control Rooms Similar to BS.1116-3, this document lays out a set of acoustic specifications that studio control rooms should meet. ────────────────────────────
| - IR-54 - Vapor barriers and air barriers What is a "vapor barrier"? What is an "air barrier"? What's the difference? Do you need them in your studio wall? From the Canadian National Research Council. ────────────────────────────
| - HVAC - Acoustic Fundamentals The fundamentals of HVAC systems, as they relate to acoustics. By Daikin. Everything you ever wanted to know about HVAC acoustics. ────────────────────────────
| - HVAC - How to Size and Design Ducts Like the title says: a document that lays out the method for determining the sizes of the HVAC ducts you will need in your studio. It also explains air flow, rates, pressure, velocity, static pressure, friction losses, how to calculate them, as well as the difference between round, oval, and rectangular ducts, plenums, fans, and a lot more. ────────────────────────────
| - ROSE - Guide to Acoustic Practice Another "oldie but goldie". From the BBC, way back in 1990. The guide was written: "to ensure that all those involved in the studio design and construction are fully aware of the acosutic standards expected in the fabrication of studios." One of the key goals is to "help acousticians and others .... to enure that buildings can be used for their intended puros, without suffering from acoustic defects which were avoidable at the design stage". Just as valid to day as it was when originally published. ──────────────
| - Acoustic Waveguides This once discusses the basic concepts behind acoustic wavguides (hollow cavities that conduct sound efficiently from one place to another) and how that applies to HVAC ducts. ────────────────────────────
| - What is a Waveguide?Another document about waveguides, but as applied to speakers here, not HVAC ducts (see above for that). ────────────────────────────
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