hardwood Vs: concrete in small room?

[Guest]

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In a 19x12 foot room I was going to put hardwood flooring, but what about
leaving the floor in just concrete?

Will have acoustics on the walls and ceiling and an area rug or two.

anyone using concrete floors in control and recording rooms?

Thanks for your input

Craig
Spokane Wa

 

[Guest]

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>In a 19x12 foot room I was going to put hardwood flooring, but what about
>leaving the floor in just concrete?

I don't know how to express this technically, but in my experience the "sound"
of concrete is not a good one. Wood is a much better reflective surface in
terms of native tone of the material. About the only thing concrete has going
for it is that as a uniformly dense heavy reflector it would at least be
predictable, which is not always the case with wood. A wood floor is on a
subfloor which is on joists, etc, so you end up with some areas that are almost
acting like a bass trap, others that are very "dense" as far as the LF sounds
are concerned, etc...

In truth, that's gonna be a hard room to set up with much reflectivity and
still have it sound good, unless you are just doing fairly quiet things... it's
so small. It could make a great acoustic guitar room or whatever but if you
set it up "splashy" and then put drums in there... look out!

-jeff

 

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<< In a 19x12 foot room I was going to put hardwood flooring, but what about
leaving the floor in just concrete? >>



Concrete is really fine. Two of my rooms have concrete floors & two have
hardwood floors. There is a generous supply of Persian carpets available to
take the zing off either surface, if needed. Some drummers adamantly prefer the
bare concrete. It's good to have options.


Scott Fraser

 

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Thanks for both comments....drums will be used in the room and are now and
it is very verbie and loud ...so heavy acoustics will have to be used.

large and heavy equipment racks will be in the room also... so concrete
would be perfered so the rack dont leave tracks in the wood...

thanks again
craig

 

[Guest]

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Craig,

> drums will be used in the room and are now and it is very verbie and loud
....so heavy acoustics will have to be used. <

I agree with the others that concrete can be fine. It's not like a wood
floor is going to vibrate in the same way as a fine old violin! All that
really matters is reflectivity versus frequency.

I'll also point out that reflection problems occur not only at mid/high
frequencies but at low frequencies too. So a complete treatment solution
will not be limited to just mids and highs, and general ambience and echoes,
but should include bass frequencies too.

--Ethan

 

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Ethan Winer wrote:
>
> I agree with the others that concrete can be fine. It's not like a wood
> floor is going to vibrate in the same way as a fine old violin! All that
> really matters is reflectivity versus frequency.

And how much damage it does to a dropped mic!

Standing and working on bare concrete is also rather hard on the body (particularly the knees.)

 

[ebz]

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In my modest observation, the reverberating quality of concrete has an
identifiable-sounding "ping." I think wood floors soften the tone of
this. Either sound could be useful. I would probably not mind the
concrete sound on a guitar amp, but I'd prefer wood for a drum kit. I
guess it depends on a bazillion other factors too.
-dave
www.themoodrings.com

 

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Kurt,

> Standing and working on bare concrete is also rather hard on the body
(particularly the knees.) <

I agree, but slapping a layer of wood over that won't change anything. In
order for a wood floor to be more comfortable than a cement floor the wood
floor has to be mounted on a "flexible" base.

--Ethan

 

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"Ethan Winer" <ethanw at ethanwiner dot com> wrote in message
news:WdidnTkO3cYxUSTcRVn-ig@giganews.com...
> Kurt,
>
> > Standing and working on bare concrete is also rather hard on the body
> (particularly the knees.) <
>
> I agree, but slapping a layer of wood over that won't change anything. In
> order for a wood floor to be more comfortable than a cement floor the wood
> floor has to be mounted on a "flexible" base.
>
> --Ethan

The hardwood is actually glued to the concrete. Maybe the glue retains a
little bit of "flex"??? It seems to feel "softer" in my dinning room (5/8"
solid oak boards glued over concrete). Not much though...

Mike

 

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"Ethan Winer" wrote:

> Kurt

> > Standing and working on bare concrete is also rather hard on the body
> > (particularly the knees.) <

> I agree, but slapping a layer of wood over that won't change anything. In
> order for a wood floor to be more comfortable than a cement floor the wood
> floor has to be mounted on a "flexible" base.

Man, I would up lusting for the dance floors at my daughter's studio in
Austin this summer. Beautiful to see, wonderful to work on, and of
course, expensive. But they put the bounce in one's step in a grand way.

--
ha

 

[Guest]

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>
>I agree with the others that concrete can be fine. It's not like a wood
>floor is going to vibrate in the same way as a fine old violin! All that
>really matters is reflectivity versus frequency.

Absolutely true!
The designer of the Walt Disney Hall in LA replied that it didn't matter if he
use that really expensive Japanese wood that he used in the Tokyo Hall, maple,
spruce, birch or concrete. The sound would be the same.

What matters is the solidity of the structure, and the shape. The wood just
looks a lot better than concrete.

Certainly, finish will have an effect at the high frequencies, so a porous
finish on concrete would hafe an effect, but if it is painted smooth, it will
reflect better.
Richard H. Kuschel
"I canna change the law of physics."-----Scotty