I found OC 703

ScottMayo · « **on:** 17 May 2005, 09:11 pm »

After a long hunt, I found a distributor for Owens Corning 703 insulation. Lots of folk specify this stuff for absorbers, bass traps and so on, but it can be pretty hard to find. (Forget Home Depot - they can order it in theory, but it practice they don't seem to be able to.)

spi-co.com. In the MA/CT area, call 508-792-1133. I just cleaned them out, but they restock each week. The 1" runs $0.42/sqft, and they can get 2" thick. They also have equivalents from different manufacturers, and some heavier mineral-wool board that might be interesting, for less money.

Tell Mark that Scott Mayo sent you.

ctviggen · « **Reply #1 on:** 17 May 2005, 09:47 pm »

Thanks, Scott. What are you using this for? Perhaps I could try this instead of the foam on the ceiling.

ScottMayo · « **Reply #2 on:** 17 May 2005, 10:35 pm »

Quote from: ctviggen

Thanks, Scott. What are you using this for? Perhaps I could try this instead of the foam on the ceiling.

I'm using this stuff like water, all over the room. I got room plans from Rives Audio, and they include:

A soffited ceiling - dozens of free hanging boards of 703 in the dropped sections (absorbing echoes), with cloth sides. Standng waves check in, and they don't check out.

Bass traps/diffusors (quarter tube) in the rear corners, with 703 on all internal surfaces.

Huge "resonators" (really, these are glorified bass traps - a soft angled wall that lets bass though but reflects higher stuff; the space behind then eats the bass) in the front corners - basically a lot of 703 glued to the hard walls, behind a wall of cloth.)

And diffusors in the front, that use 703 inside to prevent rattling and internal resonance.

Plus a few panels of the stuff wrapped in cloth as your typical wall-mounted absorption, as needed.

I'm glad the stuff is relatively cheap - I'm using hundreds of square feet of it (it's a big room.) I suspect I'll need it all, too - right now the room is just a hollow cube of drywall faces, and the echoes are terrifying.

Ceilings are a good place to mount fiberglass panels, esp. if you have hard floors - and I've never been convinced that foam does a good job. There's just not much mass there.

Bingenito · « **Reply #3 on:** 17 May 2005, 11:04 pm »

Sounds like a nice project.

Do you have any pictures to share?

RGordonpf · « **Reply #4 on:** 17 May 2005, 11:26 pm »

You were lucky. I am also redoing my listening room based on Rives Audio and I could not find OC 703 after spending weeks looking. However, I did eventually find Johns Manville 814 which is the equivalent.

The ceiling diffusers, which are ten feet long and hung at a slant, are absorbing on one side due to the 814 and reflecting on the other. They were a pain to build and install, but they do make a worthwhile improvement to the sound.

Hope your project goes well. I am pretty much done except I can't get the panels I need from RPG. They have been an absolute pain to deal with, one broken promise after another. Even getting Richard Bird of Rives involved really has not helped. Rant. Rant.

JoshK · « **Reply #5 on:** 17 May 2005, 11:27 pm »

Are you doubling it up? I think you need >3" before the freq becomes low enough to deal with more wideband room problems.

ScottMayo · « **Reply #6 on:** 18 May 2005, 01:24 am »

Quote from: Bingenito

Sounds like a nice project.

Do you have any pictures to share?

If I photographed the room now, you'd see a cube's interior, in white. The supports for the soffit are just going up this week, and I'm just cutting the parts for the various traps and diffusors now. I could post the plans from Rives, but visio plans are pretty uninteresting.

Wait until June, when the audio portion of the room should be up and running (better be, or there'll be contractor blood on my hands...), or December, when I put in the video. Then it might look like something.

Dunno if I'll have the best in the region - I bet there are some good rooms in Boston - but it will be a good place to hear VMPS and Bryston strutting their stuff.

ctviggen · « **Reply #7 on:** 18 May 2005, 10:55 am »

Anyone know of a place to find diagrams for corner or ceiling traps? I'm thinking of making fabric-covered traps at least 2 inches thick for the ceiling then a frame around them for hanging on the ceiling. For the corner traps (I have a beam that splits my room and I'm sure is reflecting a lot of energy back toward the speakers), I'd like to build a triangular frame perhaps as much as 15 feet long, then fill it with insulation. I can think of ways to do this, but diagrams/instructions would also give me more ideas. Thanks!

drystream · « **Reply #8 on:** 18 May 2005, 01:36 pm »

This forum has a lot of DIY acoustic info:

http://www.musicplayer.com//ultimatebb.php?/ubb/forum/f/26.html

Ethan Winer's company is RealTraps, and he is very open to discussion and advice on the musicplayer site plus many others, including the Acoustics Circle here. I haven't seen specific plans for corner traps. As Ethan is wont to say, "Read the FAQ!"

I plan to embark on a room treatment program too, as soon as I finish up some other projects.

ctviggen · « **Reply #9 on:** 18 May 2005, 05:08 pm »

Thanks! I have some Realtraps, which I think are great. They're just a bit big for my current plans, due to certain restrictions I have with my ceiling/beam. I do plan on getting at least two more Realtraps, though.

Campindog · « **Reply #10 on:** 19 May 2005, 02:24 am »

Not exactly what you are looking for, but maybe you can modify it to suit your needs...

http://www.pmerecords.com/Broadband.cfm

ScottMayo · « **Reply #11 on:** 20 May 2005, 01:27 pm »

Quote from: Bingenito

Sounds like a nice project.

Do you have any pictures to share?

http://users.net1plus.com/scottm/room_files/

The featured female is my wife, who is helping me with construction. Feel free to writhe in jealousy over the fact that my wife doesn't just appreciate audiophile stuff, she also helps construct the home theater. WAF-issues are for other families. *evilgrin*

http://users.net1plus.com/scottm/room_files/DSCN1000.JPG is the stereo currently in the room.

ctviggen · « **Reply #12 on:** 20 May 2005, 03:18 pm »

The specs on 703 are interesting. If you get the FRK faced version, the low frequency specs go way up, but the high frequency specs go down. The overall NRC goes down, too. I might get two varieties just to experiment.

ScottMayo · « **Reply #13 on:** 26 May 2005, 01:36 am »

Quote from: Bingenito

Sounds like a nice project.

Do you have any pictures to share?

http://users.net1plus.com/scottm/room_files/

More pictures in there, now showing the Rives Audio-designed ceiling in mostly-done state, and my very first, home-built poly diffusor.

ScottMayo · « **Reply #14 on:** 26 May 2005, 04:08 am »

The Story:

http://users.net1plus.com/scottm/room.htm

brj · « **Reply #15 on:** 26 May 2005, 04:55 am »

First, great read! I was laughing at several of your experiences - although I suspect that you only laughed well after the fact!

Second, wow, what a room and setup you'll have! Congrats!

Third... any chance you add the "geeky" electronics details to a future installment? I think you'll find several people interested in those details in addition to the more audio related aspects.

Thanks for documenting your efforts!

ScottMayo · « **Reply #16 on:** 26 May 2005, 11:26 am »

Quote from: brj

Third... any chance you add the "geeky" electronics details to a future installment? I think you'll find several people interested in those details in addition to the more audio related aspects.

I'd like to keep that doc at a level any audiophile could appreciate. If you look at files 1015 and 1016 in http://users.net1plus.com/scottm/room_files/room.zip
you'll see the Awful Control Circuit and its Friends. The plywood on the right holds the processors, input circuitry (to interface 12v signals from motion detectors and preamps and so on), tone generators, serial conntections and the radio receiver. The big black box on the left is the remote control - a little bigger than most remotes. The small board at the upper left with the maze of black wire makes 15 or so LEDs blink in a randomish pattern; those LEDS will eventually decorate Tobor, the metallic statue in 1016 (which will also be a touch sensor, because, hey, metal statues are good for that.) Not shown: the DDS5600 dimmer, the motion sensors, or the circuits that tie in the house doorbell and phone lines.

I'd never recommend anyone go this route. Commercial home automation systems probably do at least 75% of this, in a tenth of the space and with a lot less fuss. I'm not going to admit to the hours I spent on this thing, and frankly a crack hardware geek would probably have found smarter solutions. I'm a software guy.

ScottMayo · « **Reply #17 on:** 30 May 2005, 04:50 am »

Quote from: ScottMayo

The Story:

http://users.net1plus.com/scottm/room.htm

Updated with part 2:

http://users.net1plus.com/scottm/room.htm

Kevin P · « **Reply #18 on:** 30 May 2005, 03:15 pm »

Wow... if you decide to stop writing software you would make a good writer. I enjoyed your story although I winced several times reading it.

Hope it all works out in the end.

jgubman · « **Reply #19 on:** 30 May 2005, 04:28 pm »

Scott,

you wound up making a tube trap out of sonotube? Never thought about that before, how'd it turn out? How many holes did you wind up drilling in it?