one of the trickiest problems to solve in any studio is that of sound transmission - dependent on location, that can mean both sound leaving and entering the room in question.

when tollbooth moved to a victorian town house in doncaster, the room we had chosen as our main live room was situated right above the kitchen area and right from day one we forehead slappingly realised that we were going to have to do something about the sound coming up from the kitchen during deeply funky cooking sessions and raucous wine drinking!

as well as the legion of tools and hardware you will need for this job - the most vital tool you can get hold of is your best friend's dad.  best friend's dads have a preternatural ability in the field of d-i-y and embarking on this venture without one verges on negligence.  ours was called Sandy, but you may be able to find an own brand cheaper in some shops.

Obvious things you will need:

tape measure; pencil; hand saw; tenon saw; power jigsaw; 1" angle brackets; 6" flat plate brackets; screwdriver; countersink; power drill; 25mm woodscrews; timber; felt spacer edging (or green underlay board); 100mm rockwool; t&g loftboards (or similar); mallet and strike board for seating t&g; wood varnish/stain; sound engineer; best friend's dad; dog for moral support.

First step is to build the frame - this is eventually sit on the 'bed' of rockwool.  we decided to build our in two halves to make it easier to handle.  we used 100mm x 50mm seasoned construction timber.each angle was braced with a 1" angle bracket, and the corners with 6" flat brackets.  care should be taken not to make the frame too tight in the room to ensure it doesn't come in to contact with the wall, defeating the float.

note: early use of sound engineer & best friend's dad is critical

as there is a step down into the live room, we chose to strengthen the frame nearest the door with extra cross bracing to prevent excessive wear and tear on the boards in that area.

note: picture shows all the different plates we used (apx 80p each from B&Q)

timber apx £4 for 2.4m

here, the whole frame can be seen.  this was fixed in the middle to prevent movement between the frames.

the frames were propped up against the wall, while 100mm rockwool was rolled out over the whole floor. (Knauf £3.50 for 10m). the whole frame was then gently lowered onto this bed and floated away from all the walls.  the weight of the frame requires 2-3 people to keep control whilst lowering.  Care should be taken to ensure that any gaps in the rockwool are filled at this stage to keep acoustic integrity.

Once any gaps have been filled in the 'bedding', the inter-joist spaces can now be filled like in conventional loft insulation.  We used 34cm joist centres so that conventional insulation would have to be compressed to fit in.  Also the floorboards were rated for 40cm centres and so it would give us a generally more stable floor.

the principle here is to cram as much insulation in as you can.  the more insulation, the more attenuation - simple.  we managed to get another 200mm of insulation in before the boards went on, though resemblances to 1950's sci-fi b movies were noted by casual and unhelpful non-workers!

once you get over the fact that your rockwool will spookily expand to several thousand x its own volume overnight and you fight your way back in the house; it's time to start laying the floorboards.  though there is an option to lay a neoprene layer down over the frame or cut strips directly onto the joists, we weren't so concerned about impact noise going back down through the floor so we left this step out.

we used tongue & groove loftboards (apx £4 per 3.5m) for economy and they've worked very well. you can also use floorboards or french t&g flooring.

care notes: stagger the joints; ensure board edges always rest on joist centres (means cutting every board); countersink all screw holes.

care should be taken to keep the floor floating at every stage, and so at the floor borders, we separated the boards from the wall using  acoustic underlay board 1cm thick.   this allows for vertical travel of the floor during traffic.

once finished the green board will be covered with skirting suspended from the old skirt.

photo shows the board staggering a little better.  the ever expanding, global apocalypse rockwool can also be seen better.

another detail of the finishing row.  getting the t&g to fit at this stage especially on chipboard based products can be tricky as you can't get enough leverage at the edge to seat them easily.

green acoustic underlay is slotted down the back of the row after the board is fitted to allow extra room for levering the board into place.

the finished floor!  we used three coats of ronseal stained wood varnish, which is fantastic.  erm - just remember to work from the farthest point towards the door otherwise you'll have that whole desert island experience of your very own!

the finish is very tough and really quite attractive.  we were going to put another flooring on top, but have decided that this looks okay and we'll just use very heavy matting when we need to deaden the room.

we've tested the attenuation (more loud wine sessions and ainsley harriot style cooking) and it's done the job perfectly!

the final effect - though you will notice that i still haven't done the skirting boards!!!!!

just because it's doing a practical job, doesn't mean it can't look nice!

i was surprised that the total cost for the project was just short of £150, and took around 4 working days (though we spread that over a few more than that in between recording sessions etc.  we were really pleased with the results both acoustically and cosmetically and we now have a nice lively live room that can be easily deadened if required, with very little obvious spill from the downstairs rooms.

if anyone is interested in asking any questions or further design consideration plans, please feel free to mail me on: designATtollboothmusic.com