5th Floor Renovation

Stuart Ablett

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Tokyo Japan
If you remember the soundproof studio I built last year, well that client has hired me to build a similar room on the 5th floor of the same building. They just took possession of the 5th floor, which was the former owners personal aparto. It is a very nice space that will be used as part office and part conference room, focus group room and fir parties and even as a gallery.

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Looking from what was the living room into the dinning room. The living room will become the conference room and the dinning room the soundproof viewing room.

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I have to build a wall where the old folding doors were that will have acoustic glass in it.

Here is my workspace all set up.
I want to contain the dust as much as I can, so I used the blue sheet and some extendable poles. I put a fan in the window blowing out, to create a negative pressure, this should keep the rest of the 5th floor much cleaner.

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That is my work space mostly set up, now I'm just waiting on the client. I need them to have written permission for the renovation from the owner before I start, or technically they are breaking their lease. Don't need that headache.

Cheers.


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Had some other stuff to do this am but now I'm going at this wall full speed.
Got the basic frames up, it will be very solid, as that glass is not light.
2x6 construction.
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Another great project. I am sure it will be fantastic.

How do you get all the stuff you need up to the 5-th floor? Is there a freight elevator, or do you do the stairs?

There is just a regular elevator, and it is on the small side, as this used to be a private residence, the elevator is small, but I get everything up there. The 2x6s I bought 12 footers, but I had to cut them 8 footers to get them into the elevator on an angle. The acoustic glass they want it in one piece, it will have to come up the stairs, that will be a 3-4 man job for sure.

Cheers!
 
These are really interesting to see. Are you starting to advertise your specialties for similar work? Seems like building sound proof rooms isn't something that any construction company would do or at least have experience with.
 
These are really interesting to see. Are you starting to advertise your specialties for similar work? Seems like building sound proof rooms isn't something that any construction company would do or at least have experience with.

I'm booked solid with work well into July, so no, I'm not advertising.

In the video above you can see the kind of thing I'm building, at the 0:48sec mark (video might start from that point)
They do focus group research, mainly for foreign companies, so they need to be sound proof, because there is real time translation going on, and we don't want the focus group to be able to hear someone talking in the viewing room.

Domo
 
Dumb questions du jour:
What is a soundproof room used for?
How do you make it soundproof?
Are 2 bys in Japan metric?

See the above answer, but they are used for focus groups.

I use 2 sheets of 12.5mm drywall (that is the thick stuff here) with a layer of Green Glue between them, then a layer of 12mm plywood, this is so if anything needs to be attached to a wall later it is easy and for the added strength of the wall, think torsion box. Then the studs are 2x6 then in each stud cavity I have two 50mm layers of sound absorbing insulation, then 12mm of plywood and again two layers of drywall with green glue. The viewing portal will be the thick acoustic glass.

Yes they are metric, they are 3657 mm long, 140mm wide and 38mm thick :rolleyes::rofl:

I am using regular 2x6s but they do have Japanese sized wood here and it is all in funky millimeters but that is because the Japanese trades used to be based on the Shaku which is 11.93" in length, and the Ken which is six shaku or 5.965' the Sun is 1.193" long, but we don't see that used so much anymore.

Domo
 
I am using regular 2x6s but they do have Japanese sized wood here and it is all in funky millimeters but that is because the Japanese trades used to be based on the Shaku which is 11.93" in length, and the Ken which is six shaku or 5.965' the Sun is 1.193" long, but we don't see that used so much anymore.

Domo


so sound like a cubit.

of course we all know that an inch is 3 barley corns.
 
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Framing is done, next I'll sheet the outside, then do the electrical on the inside etc.
got the glass guy coming this afternoon, going to see if we will be able to hump the single sheet of glass up the 5 flights of stairs, it won't fit in the elevator.



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Looking good so far, Stu. If the roof of the elevator car is the limiting factor in moving the glass, it might be possible to move it on the top of the elevator car. You'd need someone from the elevator company to help make it happen, but in many buildings, the elevator car can be dropped below the door so that the top of the car is exposed when the doors are opened. Elevator mechanics ride on the top of the car all the time while checking out the operation. At times, they also carry oversized cargo on top of the car. (That's a trick I learned from a friend who was an elevator mechanic for 30+ years.)

Hmm, so a Ken over here is only 5.5833 feet long. Or anyway, I am.

In other words, you're about 2/3 of a Sun shy of a Ken. :D
 
Looking good so far, Stu. If the roof of the elevator car is the limiting factor in moving the glass, it might be possible to move it on the top of the elevator car. You'd need someone from the elevator company to help make it happen, but in many buildings, the elevator car can be dropped below the door so that the top of the car is exposed when the doors are opened. Elevator mechanics ride on the top of the car all the time while checking out the operation. At times, they also carry oversized cargo on top of the car. (That's a trick I learned from a friend who was an elevator mechanic for 30+ years.)
Very interesting Vaughn, I did not know that.

In other words, you're about 2/3 of a Sun shy of a Ken. :D

Is that something like Partly Cloudy...? :huh:


Interesting about the measurements.

What would happen if you need the stairs for the glass?

The acoustic glass is a sandwich of two sheets of 4mm thick glass with a special clear sheet of sound dampening material.

It is very fragile, and cannot be even slightly bent and it has to stay vertical at all times, or it will break in two.

I think he said the sheet will weigh around 200 pounds, so we will have four guys getting it up to the fifth floor, just take it slow and there should be no drama. We did a test run today with a piece of styrofoam that is the same size as the glass, it worked.
 
Looking good so far, Stu. If the roof of the elevator car is the limiting factor in moving the glass, it might be possible to move it on the top of the elevator car. You'd need someone from the elevator company to help make it happen, but in many buildings, the elevator car can be dropped below the door so that the top of the car is exposed when the doors are opened. Elevator mechanics ride on the top of the car all the time while checking out the operation. At times, they also carry oversized cargo on top of the car. (That's a trick I learned from a friend who was an elevator mechanic for 30+ years.)

Another elevator trick I learned from my days of installing huge mainframe computers... with the aid of an elevator mechanic you can often substantially overload an elevator. There are counterweights to balance the weight of the car and the normal load, but the amount of counterweight can be increased substantially thus increasing the capacity of the elevator car a comparable amount. The cables and motor are not the limiting factor.
 
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