[ScottMayo]

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

Incomplete, ongoing account of why you don't want to try to build a dedicated room for music.

[Saurav]

This is brilliant. You're a very good writer I posted this on another forum, I hope you don't mind. And I hope everything works out well for you in the end. My woodworking skills are nonexistent, so this is definitely food for thought

[ScottMayo]

This is brilliant. You're a very good writer I posted this on another forum, I hope you don't mind. And I hope everything works out well for you in the end. My woodworking skills are nonexistent, so this is definitely food for thought

As long as you described it as the ravings of some lunatic over on AudioCircle (which won't narrow it down much), it's fine. I do face the problem than when my general contractor goes missing, the article will lead the police straight to my door, but frankly only an audiophile would think to look inside a 2' bass trap for a body - and bodies do have a pretty decent absorption coefficient for low bass*. So it's probably ok.


* You don't need to ask how I know this.

[bpape]

That's one of the best reads I've had for a long time.  It's so true and anyone who's ever remodeled a house, built a room, etc.  will certainly feel for you and relate.

[JLM]

Scott,

I'm glad that my goals for my listening room are far less ambious, but many of the fustrations are still the same:

1. Contractor follows plans only when he feels that its important.

2. Contractor said he'd done these kind of rooms before, obviously he lied.  (He does nothing but custom homes.)

3. Contractor's first priority is to make money (I knew that) without taking any responsibility (he's smarter than he looks).  He continues to amaze me at this.

4. Contractor waits until 80% into the project to annouce that he won't hang ceiling drywall from the metal furring strips as it might crack.  This, "we don't want to do this because..." issue is coming up repeatedly as we near completion.  My choices are to agree to exclude cracks from the drywaller's responsibility or give up the furring strips.

5. Eliminating the furring strips of course throws off precise room dimensional ratios I was striving for.  But they were already thrown off when, after I'd measured the framing and told contractor that it was an inch off in length and width (drawings had included a "hold" note on these dimensions), the contractor announced that he assumed all dimensions were to framing, not finished walls.  My 30 years of construction related experience knew much better than that.

6. Project is behind schedule.


Wifey wants to avoid conflict and so agrees with contractor at nearly every point, so guess who keeps losing?  At this point the contractor is having us sign forms stating that we're accepting exceptions to the drawings, so we won't sue later.

You're right, if contractors don't want to do something, they'll find a way to avoid it.  This is true even when like your job, its on a time and material basis where they can make unlimited money.

Major construction projects that are so perfectly built amaze me all the more now.

I'm surprised that Rives didn't have more practical/buildable ideas.

[ScottMayo]

I'm surprised that Rives didn't have more practical/buildable ideas.

I don't really blame Rives. I suspect someone handier (and with access to soft masonite) would have had less trouble building the bass traps. I have castigated them for not coming up with 3D renderings of the room and the treatments, because that would have eliminated a *lot* of confusion and last minute emails.

My contractor has been better than my humorous piece makes him sound. Yes, he's late, and he was willing to suck me dry until I announced that my budget was blown and I'd be doing a lot of my own finish work, whereupon he simply became very scarce. But he also managed to build the room (inc. sheetrock) to the proper dimensions, and there was only instance I caught him grossly misunderstanding/violating the plans (and he fixed it.) The one thing that does leave me furious was the flooding: his response was that "he hadn't done anything wrong." I'm sorry, but when new construction is under an inch of water, the guy that approved the plans, dug the hole, poured the concrete, put in the drainage and put in the subfloor is the guy on the hook when it floods.

Don't fret over being an inch or so off on your overall dimensions. As long as you're consistantly off in all dimensions, the ratios of the room won't change all that much - and the ratios aren't going to be as important as the treatments you add afterwards. Spreading out modes is nice, but you'll have modes anyway, so you'll be treating anyway. It's the treatments that matter. But recalculate the modes with what you know about the finished dimensions, so you'll have some idea what the problem frequencies are - and start planning places to put helmholtz resonators (the real sort, with ports and openings) and tuned absorption. And take my experience with blasting the room with a subwoofer to heart - it's a fast way to find out everything that's right and wrong with a room's construction and low bass response.

[ScottMayo]

Next update is in:

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

See also .../guts.jpg for the interior of a resonator, near completion; and mommyhelper.jpg for a black and white assistant to the project. (Yes, it's alive, and that small piece of fiberglass is in deadly peril.)

[rosconey]

90% of contractors and subs are what you describe-im in the trades i know-

i was told years ago the biggest reason for divorce was kitchen remodeling

[beemer]

Hello Scott:

Your trials and trepidations on getting your room built are a real hoot. I hope when all is said and done it exceeds your expectations. I have it in the back of my head to raise the roof on my 2 car garage and remove my breezeway to add to my home eventually. After reading your prose I am wary.  

Fortunately for me my girl is understanding and when I took out one wall and lost the dining room I did gain a 15'6" x 24" listening/living room.

I'm in central Mass as well, just a tad west of you.

Best,

Paul  

[Stan Y]

Wow, that story is just ... amazing.   I think I would have given up around the  point of the plywood steaming/bending.  

I met some of the guys from Rives down at the HE Show in NY a couple of months ago.  They seemed likd good guys, but I did wonder what it would be like to actually get those plans built.  (They mentioned that they're starting a list of contractors who are familiar with the sorts of issues audiophiles worry about ... sounds like a pretty necessary idea)

Good luck and hang in there!  From what I've read about other Rives designed rooms, I'm sure it'll be amazing.  And you'll be able to look back at this years from now and laugh (or cry ... or both ... but at least it'll sound good   )

[ScottMayo]

Wow, that story is just ... amazing.   I think I would have given up around the  point of the plywood steaming/bending.  

Once you dig a hole that size and pour concrete, there is no turning back. I mean, I suppose I could have made the room into a wood shop instead (and the carpenter on site suggested that would be a great use for the room), but I hate carpentry. Oh, the irony.

I met some of the guys from Rives down at the HE Show in NY a couple of months ago.  They seemed likd good guys, but I did wonder what it would be like to actually get those plans built.  (They mentioned that they're starting a list of contractors who are familiar with the sorts of issues audiophiles worry about ... sounds like a pretty necessary idea)

My GC is young - this is, I believe, his first big remodelling job. The work, when he gets it done, is solid: mostly because he takes no chances. The Rives plans scared him to death. Or maybe I did - when he caught me caulking the outside plywood (to aid in sound proofing), he decided I was a dangerous nut case who couldn't be kept off the job site (seeing as I lived there.) Out of my hearing (as they thought - I have good hearing), the working folk used the word "fanatic" a fair amount.

I think a more experienced GC would blanch less at these plans. It's not rocket science, there are just a few strange rules to be learned (like not letting a spring suspended ceiling rub against the wall, let alone mudding them together.)

[JCC]

The title is appropriate - It sounds like a GC from Hell!!! Obviously you had a heck of a lot more money than I have, so mine was finished quickly.

So tell us all, how long will it be before you have a finished product?

[ScottMayo]

The title is appropriate - It sounds like a GC from Hell!!! Obviously you had a heck of a lot more money than I have, so mine was finished quickly.

So tell us all, how long will it be before you have a finished product?

The last date I believed was June 15th. At this point, that's a miss. Maybe July 1? There might be unfinished cosmetics (like a finished floor and a projector - those are December), but I hope to have the everything closed up and the music installed in 2 weeks, and then the tuning begins...

...at which point I hope to be operating as a VMPS owner/agent, so people interested in the VMPS RM/x can come by and give a listen. There aren't a whole lot of them on the east coast.

[JLM]

rosconey,

Wifey says building our house has been the worst time of her life.  

BTW her ex was an abusive/cheater and she was in bankrupcy after the divorce with three kids to feed.

Now the builder does want to provide a post for the roof over the front porch (that's been on the drawings from day 1).  This section of the roof is made of structural insulated panels (a styofoam/OSB sandwich) and without the post is acting as a double cantilever.  The 4 foot by 18 foot panel has only an 18 inch by 8 foot corner with anything under it and is nailed across the 4 foot end where the corner is supported.  A continous 2x10 trim piece holds up the free 4 foot end.  Design snow loads is 35 pounds per square foot in this part of the country and this section of roof will be highly susceptable to additional drifting.  

BTW I did the drawings and am a registered engineer, with 8 years of structural design experience and 30 years around construction.  And the builder, with an accounting background and 5 years experience building houses is still "thinking" about it.      

[Carlman]

Scott, you are my hero.
That is quite an undertaking... Not just the project but trying to get non-audiophiles to understand or at least implement your plans.

I have come to accept that it is you/us (the 'Audiophilia') that is from the different planet... and the folks from Lumberon, Contractua, and Electroland are indeed the indigenous ones.  We are stifled by their closed-mindedness but we press on.  

You have pressed on and documented your travels with aplomb.  My hat's off to you, ScottMayo.

I really hope the project wraps up and you can enjoy the tunes this summer.

Congrats on getting this far amidst the multitude of obstacles and challenges!

-Carl

[ScottMayo]

...I have come to accept that it is you/us (the 'Audiophilia') that is from the different planet... and the folks from Lumberon, Contractua, and Electroland are indeed the indigenous ones.  We are stifled by their closed-mindedness but we press on.  
 ...

I sometimes wonder what the world would be like with more audiophiles in charge.

Appliances would come with db ratings. "This washer cleans up fifty pounds of speaker grille material at a shot, putting out only 35db@1m and no measurable electronic noise!"

Wallboard would be 2" thick, with viscoelastic layers, and cost 0.10$ a square foot; there would be a national law mandating that every citizen had the right to as much mineral wool as they wanted, free.

Airports and motor scooters would be illegal. You want to get somewhere, use an underground subway. Quietly. And not under my house.

Computers wouldn't be water-cooled, as that's far too noisy. They'd simply have 150# of passive heatsink. Geeks would become muscle-bound.

It would be a criminal act to perform public, live music without proper, calibrated microphones in place to record the event. (No Notes Left Behind!) Conversely, humming to music during concerts would be grounds for public execution.

AM radio would never, ever have existed, but tripath chips would have been invented two decades ago. CDs would have been originally created at 32 bit, 256K samples/sec per channel and been 1' across. It would be illegal to produce an amplifiers with s/n of less than 100db. And disco would never have happened.

I hope someday you'll join us. Quietly.

[youngho]

Hmmm...if "audiophiles" were in charge...

Computing technology could take divergent paths...
1. Some would prefer ENIAC and other humongous vacuum tube computers for the sheer purity of the processing...
2. Some would use only incredibly expensive computers using motherboards with silver wiring, Mpingo wooden cases, and Bybee filters at every I/O...

All sinks would have disproportionately expensive faucets, as it's the last several inches through which water travels that is absolutely critical. Garden hoses, of course, would have solid gold terminations so that lawns could receive maximum H20 transmission...

The speed of sound would be shown to be vary, depending on how "fast" or "slow" the bass is...

Medicine would regress decades, if not centuries, as all double-blind placebo-controlled trials would be declared Objectivist and therefore invalid. Any perception of benefit from a treatment would be deemed sufficient evidence. Leeches and lancing to remove ill bodily humours might come back into fashion...

[brj]

The speed of sound would be shown to be vary, depending on how "fast" or "slow" the bass is...

Well, it appears that we haven't taken over then (yet?) since I haven't seen the speed of sound vary with bass output... Of course, it does vary with temperature and density (and thus altitude), so those mafia guys in Denver hear everything in slow motion compared to us speedy folk at sea level! (Speed of Sound = 1096.0 ft/s vs 1116.5 ft/s)

[ScottMayo]

Hmmm...if "audiophiles" were in charge...

We really need a term for the folk who adore custom power cords, solid silver interconnects, frozen wire, quantum spin and skin-effect theories about audio signals, and cable lifters. Audiomystics?

We need, I stress, a *nice* name. These people are keeping the high-end industry afloat, after all.

[ctviggen]

Scott,

Some applianced do come with dB ratings -- notably, Bosch dishwashers.  The one I bought was 3 dB less than the one my friend bought (which is also very quiet).  Now, if they had a dB rating for their washer -- which could sound like a jet in takeoff when it was trying to reach 1,600 rpm.