damonrpayne Posted July 29, 2004 Share Posted July 29, 2004 I believe I have heard from a few sources that you really want to avoid installing a drop-style tile ceiling in a listening room. Why is that? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdm56 Posted July 29, 2004 Share Posted July 29, 2004 There may be other reasons, but every room I have ever been in that had suspended acoustical tile ceilings was horrible for music; too dead sounding. Very good for intelligibility, but lousy for music. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Klipschfoot Posted July 29, 2004 Share Posted July 29, 2004 Just look for some non-acoustic panels. There is a wide variety to choose from, some decorative and attractive. Google "drop ceiling panels" and you will come up a wide variety of possibilities. Just avoid "acoustic" panels if you want a livelier room for theater use. (Not everyone wants/likes studio sound.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FlyingV Posted July 29, 2004 Share Posted July 29, 2004 Damon, How often do you get into the Madison area? You should stop by and look at my room... My thought was that the framing around the tile would be more critical in terms of vibration/sound isolation. I decided to use the GridLock vinyl system in my theater area. Basically, the tiles are "locked" into place using a two-part tee that is screwed to the underside of the above floor joists. I also gained a couple of inches in ceiling height vs hanging the ceiling. The down side is, the grid cost much more that the tiles. I think the tiles have helped isolate my theater area from the rest of the house (big advantage for late movies without the kids) and the locked ceiling does not have the "flex-noise" of a traditional hung ceiling. Finally, I have the option of removing the tiles to repair/replace cables if needed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dale W Posted July 29, 2004 Share Posted July 29, 2004 ---------------- On 7/29/2004 9:22:26 AM damonrpayne wrote: I believe I have heard from a few sources that you really want to avoid installing a drop-style tile ceiling in a listening room. Why is that? ---------------- Does the word vibration come to mind ?? I can rock my tiles so hard in the tracks that it looks like it's snowing in the room . The grid vibrates as well . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
damonrpayne Posted July 29, 2004 Author Share Posted July 29, 2004 Vince, I'm not often in the madison area but I may be picking up a pair of Belle's there soon. We could set something up and maybe have John and Scott and myself come out. I'm still at least 3 months away from starting construction so I'm not in a big hurry. I was more asking because I was at Scott M's house last night and the subject of suspended ceiling came up and I didn't have very much knowledge on the topic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FlyingV Posted July 29, 2004 Share Posted July 29, 2004 That would be cool... I just closed on some land yesterday and we plan to start building before the end of the year. I tried some things in this house to get an idea of what I can do in the next. We'll have to compare notes. John talked about talking a trip to Artos room in the next month or so... Any specific day of the week/time work best for you? Vince Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Royster Posted July 30, 2004 Share Posted July 30, 2004 Hi all, I am in Appleton. It's good to see some fellow heritage users from Wi. If anyone is up this way please feel free to stop by. Regards, Roy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
damonrpayne Posted July 30, 2004 Author Share Posted July 30, 2004 Royster, there's a group of us who get together as often as our wives, jobs, kids will allow. A couple folks live in Hartford and I'm on my way up there. How long a drive would it be for you? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
picky Posted August 2, 2004 Share Posted August 2, 2004 Damon: I used a black, drop ceiling over the main portion of my basement theater. I used special 2-1/4" thick, fireproof, melamine acoustic foam 2'x2' panels (Sonex Harmoni-flat finish) that are rated to absorb about 90% of the sound they are exposed to. The tiles require only a standard suspended ceiling grid. Nothing special. I bought ours at Home Depot right off-the-rack. I must tell you that they not only improved the projection of the sound emmensly during movies, music listening has never been more enjoyable in our room since the addition of the ceiling! The rest of the theater has a drywall ceiling and the entire floor is tiled, concrete. There is no longer any reason for us to install a rug over the floor as reflections are not an issue. Another added benefit to the black ceiling: no light reflection from the screen off the ceiling. The only pitfall of the tiles: They're expensive. About $600 for 2-cases of 14 (28, 2'x2' tiles total). I originally hesitated to go with a drop ceiling for many of the same reasons some of the folks here have mentioned. If I had to do it all over again, I'd go the same route again with the foam suspended ceiling. It's awesome. Best of luck! You can see part of the ceiling (black) in this photo of me (left) and fellow forum member Michael Hurd: (white lines are grid I hadn't painted black yet) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michael hurd Posted August 3, 2004 Share Posted August 3, 2004 I must say that the foam tiles do not shed any debris, and they did not reflect light from the screen. I did not listen to a lot of music there during my visit, but what I did hear was quite good. Due to the nature of the layout and room size, you would expect a lot of high frequency and midrange emphasis, with bass problems. Overall, I would say that the room had excellent intelligability, with a slight emphasis on the lower midband. Vocals were very smooth, with no strident sounds at all. The only fault ( not that it is a fault, really ) is that the room has no reverb time, and that is due to the nature of the size, and the absorption from the tiles. This is a multi-purpose room that is used for both listening to music, watching movies and relaxing at the bar. And as such, you must always make compromises. I really think that Glenn and his wife Verna did a lot of planning and hashing out on paper, to make the most usage of the space available. I have been in showrooms that have regular drop ceilings, that rattle and buzz, showering you with " snow ", when the volume is up on a bass heavy scene. Again, the room that picky has is fairly small in comparison to most showrooms that I have been in. I would imagine that the length and width of the tracking has something to do with the tendency to vibrate, and also how heavy the tiles are, and how tight they fit in the frames. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
picky Posted August 3, 2004 Share Posted August 3, 2004 Thanks for the kudos, Mike! It was certainly our pleasure having you and your lady visit us! I agree with what you said exactly; Our room is multi-purpose and therefore there are a few compromises. As Mike so astutely points out, there is little reverb-time in the room due to its size (10.5' W x 19' L x 7' H) and the use of the foam drop-ceiling. The foam ceiling solves so many other issues such as early reflection and bass problems that we did decide to keep it. Therein lies the compromise, albeit, a very small one in my case. By the way, although very dense, the foam tiles are very light in weight. They stay put and do not make any audible noises or vibrations within the grid, such as conventional acoustic tile is notorious for. Damon: Perhaps you would prefer not to compromise at all for you listening room? That would be completely understandable. I suspect your planned room is probably a lot larger than mine. I can say that the foam drop-ceiling out-performs a drywall ceiling in my given application. Unfortunatley, every room is different. Best of luck on your project! -Glenn Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MD1032 Posted August 22, 2004 Share Posted August 22, 2004 At my school our auditorium used to have this fuzzy acoustical ceiling (actually, the design was backwards LOL) that didn't work right. You could hear people at the back of the auditorium talking easily, but not hear people on the stage for the reason given above. We got a new auditorium (well, samee room, they just completely redid the interior.) and they put in a drop-ceiling. We thought the acoustics were bad before. This was just TERRIBLE. It's literally like a vacuum in the auditorium right now. You can't hear anything well, especially in the audience. It's absolutely horrible. Performances are actually hindered, no doubt, by the room's poor acoustics. I wouldn't ever think of putting it in a room I would be using for sound. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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