OK, stirred the pot did I?? LOL............I'm a D-I-Y guy, so I took the time to build all my panels, 22 so far, with a few more to come.
Built my panels much the same way as many of the commercial ones, simple wood frame.............I used 3/4 plywood, very cheap that way and works fine.....stuffed with, in my case 3 inch rock wool......There are other things that you can use, but from my research it all performs more or less the same, depending on thickness. Bought mine at Lowes, just because it was cheap....about $1 per square foot..and readily available. I picked up fabric from Joann's Fabric store, although you could get it anyplace. I carefully wrapped the frames, as if they were a Christmas present and stapled the material to the back.......done....Pretty simple really..........The fabric was the most expensive part of the operation, largely because I went with an attractive cotton print, but I could have gone very basic and saved a significant amount..they also have good sales all the time.
You can make the panels thicker for more low frequency control or thinner if you're just trying to clean up the imaging and sound stage...or mix and match. I went middle of the road and it turned out fine.
As far as how many and where...........first let me say that I am NOT an engineer or acoustics expert.......I just read a lot and largely followed the "smart people" as far as installation.
My room is 14 x 23, with a low, 7'8" ceiling............At first I wasn't sure what to expect, other than an improvement, so I built a few panels at a time, installed them, played music and listened. Each time I heard real improvements and each time I played the same music for some confidence in repeat ability. I played different discs, different types of music and tried to stay with things I knew were well recorded.
I treated first reflection points initially.........sorry Eric, I tried to follow the "professionals"..I figured they knew more about it than I did. YMMV
Then I began to treat the room corners, primarily ceiling/wall, straddling all corners with the same traps around the room. I have open door ways in three corners, so treating wall/wall corners wasn't necessary or practical in my case. Sound apparently concentrates in corners and reflects back into the room from a thousand different angles......not good.
By straddling the corners, the panel behaves as though it's deeper/thicker than it actually is...........it's all about wave length and you can read about it easier than I can explain it........but it worked..............Despite the fact that I didn't build any "bass traps", the low end of my system got much deeper, cleaner and tighter......I attribute that to straddling the corners with relatively thin panels..........Everything else improved substantially as well.
One important point. Panels that straddle corners should be open in back. no plywood on the back. This allows the sound to pass through, bounce off the wall or ceiling and pass through again on the return trip. effectively increasing low frequency absorption.
I also placed 4 panels on my ceiling and plan to add 2-4 more, as well as a couple more to the rear wall behind me. I have hard wood floors and only a small area rug in that room.
It works guys/girls/folks and it's the cheapest significant upgrade I've ever done.......made me a believer...................Whole project, including fairly pricey fabric cost like $500, maybe less, I wasn't watching pennies that close................You can get several frames from a single sheet of plywood, rock wool or comparable fiber glass is pretty cheap if you shop around. Fabric can be whatever you want to pay...............Suggestion for spousal approval. Let her/him pick the fabric, something THEY like. It will make it easier to get them to allow you to hang boxes on the walls and ceiling!! LOL..............Think of it and sell it as "wall art"...I did and if you pick nice fabric it's not far from the truth............YOU don't care what they look like, you just care what they SOUND like.
For those of you who don't play with tools or don't have time or have deeper pockets than I do, you can buy any of this stuff, pre-made from a number of places..........I like to build things and I had the time.
Any further questions I will answer to the best of my ability, but everything I know I learned from reading articles and blogs by people who had more experience and knowledge than I did...........ain't the internet a wonderful thing :)
