Acoustic Treatment & Building a Listening Room

I’m trying to look up people suggestions on corner bass traps to either do diffusion mix with low end or full range corner bass traps. I decided to just go with full range. Now for the recommendation, I see people highly suggesting DIY just to make sure I can make it as thick as possible. Do anyone have a good DIY tri corner bass trap YouTube video they use?

I am also considering the Turbo Trap Pro from GIK Acoustic, but I don’t see too many people use it, so I’m not too sure how good they are. If anyone here got experience, feedback would be appreciated.

Side note: I am going to start downloading REW today and hopefully finish testing this weekend to know exactly what range is best to be treated.

2 Likes

Do yo have a workshop?

I no longer have a workshop but I’ll say that me being a semi competent handy guy, I’d still just order what I needed. Simply to save the headaches and get precisely what I’d drafted up. The Gik stuff is very customizable and to be honest you’d be just crap shooting what you build as opposed to getting something that is measure precisely by the vendor telling you the frequency range of their performance.

In this thread I’ve pretty much shared my reasoning why I chose which panels and my trial and error journey, primarily with the first reflection points as I found that it’s super easy to over do those.

The other thing is that height matters and depending on what you’re trying to address, tall and skinny may work better than broad and short.

3 Likes

I don’t have a workshop, but I know someone that will let me use his. It’s how I was able to create my DIY wooden box to elevate my speaker AMT tweeter to ear level. But I think you’re right on buying it from a professional company since I know my own limitation. It took me all day to make those two little wooden crates lol. It also didn’t really save me too much money compare to buying from someone on Etsy. Plus, making those bass traps is probably going to be pretty challenging for someone like me, so buying professional is better.

For the corner bass traps, I am planning to try to cover from top to bottom. One of the corner bass traps have to movable since I am going to be covering the door. I guess for consistency, I want to keep all the corner bass traps the same. It’s one of the reason the Turbo Trap Pro from GIK acoustic seem really nice to buy since it looks really easy to move it. I’m also going to do the finishing touch on bass room treatment with dual subs, but that’s a 2025 goal.

I have a turbo trap, two soffit traps, and one tri trap in my room. I think they’re worth it. The turbo trap is a little easier to place cause they’re circular rather than square. I think the soffits will suck up more bass energy though. depends on what you need in your room.

2 Likes

That’s good to know. I know every room is different, but where do you usually place the turbo trap?

You can place the turbo traps in the typical bass trap corners or you can even put them at the first reflection points. I currently have them in a corner

1 Like

Thanks! I think I will probably buy maybe 2 at the start and see how I like them. They do seem promising and I do like their form factor.

In the US the average ceiling height is around 8-10’ so the vast majority of rooms will always have low frequency issues, no exception. Treating the ceiling first will likely be the most beneficial out of all the walls because it has the shortest distance between two parallel surfaces (unless your side to side or front to back are less than 8’ apart). This is assuming you’re able and comfortable hanging panels on the ceiling.

1 Like

I have about 8 feet of ceiling height to the ground. I was planning to do ceiling last, but going with something light like (2 total at the ceiling reflection) 242 GIK (8 lb) acoustic because I’m not too sure how much weight I can attach to the ceiling without the ceiling falling apart. Should I just do (2 total at the ceiling reflection) 244 (14 lb)? The attic will be above the current room I am using.

I see many people prioritize the ceiling last and it’s probably for a good reason. But the ceiling is technically the first thing sound will reflect off on (again assuming your side to side and front to back has a greater distance from each other). So it’s very crucial.

Another option is to place panels in front of you on the floor to avoid having to hang it. But that depends on how much inconvenience you’re willing to take.

The more coverage you have the better it is, assuming you have a panel with good rate and level of absorption. I have gik on my ceiling, don’t remember which one though. I’m not a fan of gik, but that’s just me. It is better than having a bare ceiling though imo.

2 Likes

Gotcha, that make more sense. I think I was following either the GIK YouTube video or someone I watched in YouTube to treat the 1st reflection, 2nd reflection and then the corner traps. I treated the back wall already since I just happen to have enough spare money for it.

Treating the ceiling would be cheaper than buying corner bass traps. So I could try (4) 242 bass traps on the ceiling. Two to try to locate the 1st reflection and two I’m guessing in front of me? I haven’t Google ceiling treatment yet, but probably will look into that instead of corner bass traps for now.

I don’t think you should focus so much on 1st, 2nd, etc… The whole wall/surface causes issues and it’s more important to realize that than to think that if you treat your 1st and 2nd you’re good. In reality, you’re only addressing a fraction of the problem. I think that’s a better way of looking at it. Focus on the forest not the trees, in other words.

As for corner traps, it’s the same story. Room modes are strongest between two parallel surfaces not corners. General practicality aside, why would you treat corners when you can address the problem directly by treating the two opposing surfaces? It doesn’t make sense to me.

I thought you want to treat corners because that is where the bass is build up? I thought that treating the built up bass will allow it to be used more else where vs just letting it build up in the corner.

That’s where low frequencies end, yes. But think about it. If you can treat it directly at the source, would that really matter?

Here’s a video that might help…

1 Like

You have to treat everything and it’s why you have to think of it as a whole and not one or two problems to address. Additionally everything works in tandem so one panel affects the others.

It’s why you should IMO 1) start with the basics and build a basis solution that addresses it all. 2) Then fine tune it with different shapes, sizes and locations and adding subtracting.

You guys are both right and IMO wrong. :slight_smile:

1 Like

Thanks for linking the video. I don’t think I can use that scenario unless I got a complete dedicated listening room. My current speaker room is basically my man cave. It has my collection that I cannot quite give up and I can’t really display any where else. My display collection also take up 50% of the room, which is why I always try to minimize showing the other half of the room. I will just go ahead and keep doing the other scenario of applying bass traps in the corner to free up the pressure up bass and to treat the ceilings. When I do get a new place (whenever that will be), I will keep in mind to try to treat the all 4 walls and ceiling completely and not worry about the corners.

2 Likes

So far, my humble experience and research leads me to believe that there’s no practical way to get an even bass response everywhere in a small room. You’re just going to have nulls in some places and standing waves in others. Adding enough absorption to prevent that would occupy the entire space.

So far I have “settled” for good subwoofer placement and letting Dirac Live do its magic so that I have an even bass response at my listening position. I said “settled” because it’s so good I haven’t been motivated to add bass traps. I just have triple panels on each side and a cloud. Someday I might go for tri-traps in the front corners and soffits in the rear corners. Not because I think I need them for the system to sound good, but because it would add to the aesthetics of my dedicated listening room.

Lately, my money has been going to other hobbies because it’s good enough. Maybe I’m not really an audiophile, lol.

3 Likes

Thanks again for showing me acoustic field YouTube video! Idk why people don’t recommend his videos especially for new speaker user. It’s informative and he goes straight into answering the topic in less than 10 minutes most of the time. I met with a local speaker audiophile (same guy that sold me multiple clouds for cheap) and he also informed me about acoustic field video to help me know which area to cover. He told me basically all the treatment is going to work, it just some area have a much bigger impact than others.

I watched the above video and got some more bass traps. I cover the major areas of the side walls next to the speaker and the front wall behind the speakers. It’s really coming all together and everything sounds really good with all walls have some sort of treatment. The biggest impact on the recent changes besides the bass being more tame again and overall clarity being better again is the center soundstage imaging is scarily good. It’s sounds pretty dang perfect. It’s like a focus on a camera, it’s really pinpoint and precise. I had this feeling before when I 1st got the Platimon and the setup was 5 feet from the listening position with the Platimon all the way toe in. My new listening position is 7 feet away from the Platimon with no toe in and I’ve been struggling with room treatment since the beginning of the year because room becoming more of a factor with the new positioning. Now, while still being 7 feet away with no toe in, I’m getting much better results than when I first started with the added benefit of soundstage. It feels complete, but I still got room for room for approvement. I might as well keep pushing since I got this far. But I think I’m finally ready to start implementing dual subs in my system.

Enough rambling from me, all I wanted to say is thanks for talking me out of buying corner traps and starting cloud. Doing this was a much better result and plus I saved a lot of money since it made me wait and used bass traps coincidentally showed up basically next to me.

Just me talking to myself out loud:
The guy I met the other day really knows his stuff. He told me even though I’m really enjoying my Platimon 7 feet away, 9 feet is something I should be looking forward to if I ever decide to go with a bigger room. Apparently the Platimon depth can get more insane which seems kinda crazy to me right now. Idk what to expect, but I got my room wish list if I decide it’s time. Plus with acoustic field room guide, I now know what kind of room I want if I ever go for the next big move.

4 Likes

@orrman
After some time with your new sound treatment, how does things sound now?

3 Likes