Bass Traps & Room Acoustics

DodgeTheViper

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Yes, this old chestnut . . . . . don't bother, waste of time, blah, blah, blah :D

But, i've been having a tinker with REW Room Sim and it looks like some small improvements can be had by adding some surface absorption to the front and back of the room. It appears to reduce a peak.
I was thinking maybe some corner traps but i reckon something like an on wall panel may be better suited.

I don't want to spend loads of money on expensive stuff. So, are the ready made panels of foam any good or is a DIY option better ?
 
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If you fancy a road trip and have a big boot I've got a pair of GIK Acoustics Tri-Traps you can have. They're just sat in a storage shed gathering dust.

On wall panels won't really have a big effect (if any) on bass frequencies but can certainly help to tame any first and second reflections higher up the frequency range. Got a few DIY ones in my room on the side walls and rear wall.
 
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Fantastic offer, thanks :smashin:

I think they'd be a little on the large size though :(
 
i've been having a tinker with REW Room Sim and it looks like some small improvements can be had by adding some surface absorption to the front and back of the room
bear in mind that the room sim assumes the entire surface is covered with a substance that provides the stated absorption from DC to infinity Hz. In reality a broadband trap provides absorption to a relatively high frequency (for a sub).
 
Just been reading about the high frequency absorption, no good here.

Example here:
 
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Is that your room? Invert the phase on the subs one at a time and see what happens.
 
Inverting the phase on one of the subs gets rid of the peak but produces a huge roll off at 50Hz
 
When I played with REW room sim and asked advice it was pointed out just moving the seating position by a few inches made a massive difference. Try moving the MLP icon and see what happens.
 
It's always worth trying as it's just a flip of a switch. Sometimes it can work well, sometimes not!

Two subs can really smooth the response but as I found out recently they can have a huge effect on each other when you start applying EQ. Not sure if REW can show that though??
 
The biggest difference comes from adding absorption to the back and right side of the room.
 
I've got four on my sidewalls, one in the centre of the rear wall and either side of that a couple of Auralex Pyramid Panels that I had left over from a previous setup. They're in wood frames and covered to match the others. Fuzzy phone pic of the fronts below to give you an idea.

View attachment 676459
 
I've got 17 panels up in my room + diffusion panels.

You need to look at what you wants to achieve from the treatment and buy the right products and use them in the right spot.

The panels will help with room decay times probably more than Freq response initially depending on how many you put in and how big
 
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That would be a trap at half the width of the room. Where would I sit :eek:
 
Now theres a thought for a hiding place :D

Here's how it looks untouched:
 
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2 metres deep not wide
his room is less than 4m wide so a 2.25m deep trap on the R wall would take up ~2/3 the width of the room :)

this is why active bass equalisation (aka multiple subs) is a v good thing!
 
On the face of it, it looks an easy fix. Just build a couple of wall panels and job done, but it's certainly not that easy when you start looking at frequency absorption and moving the scale a little in Room Sim.

For me, it's the dip at 90Hz and the peak at 35Hz.
 
Don't obsess over one peak now in the sim. Better to measure what you have see the waterfall and see how the sound is decaying in your room. See what your freq response actually is and then make an overall plan to improve the overall sound.

If you then want to reduce one peak or dip from a passive solution look at the gik scopus tuned trap range.
 
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