Soundproofing vs sound treatment

Are acoustic panels good for soundproofing?

Not the best choice. Acoustic panels are designed for sound treatment. What's the difference? Read next question ;)

What's the difference between soundproofing and sound treatment?

While soundproofing prevents sound entering or leaving a space. Sound treatment makes the sound inside a given space sound great.

What's better, to soundproof or sound treat a space?

Do both ;) Soundproofing will allow you to blast your stereo in your living room and not bother your neighbors, while sound treatment will make your stereo sound perfect.

Making panels

How easy to make are they? Can anyone make them?

90% of persons that have tried to make a panel for their first time make a quite good one. All of these persons make a great one their second try.

Is it safe to make them in my home?

Yes, you just have to follow our recommendations and you can make your own panels in your home. Check out safety tips in each tutorial.

Is it a good idea to start making panels in my home regularly for commercial purposes?

It depends if you have a room assigned for that and in the absorbing material you choose. Rock wool is not a material you want to be working with in your living room every day, since it will end up everywhere.

Selling panels

What's the best price to sell a panel

We recommend an average price, how ever you decide how much your work is worth.

Can I sell hertzlovers panels with my own channels?

Of course!! And we would love to hear from all makers benefiting from open knowledge

Do I need to pay a fee to Hertzlovers?

Not a dime. Eventually we want to develop tools to make buying and selling acoustic solutions as easy as (..). When that day comes you can decide how much those tools are worth.

How does Hertzlovers makes money?

We have sponsors and we get a commission for the product we recommend. Every time you buy a product through our web you are helping the project grow ;)

Diffusers

Is Polystyrene a good material for diffusion purposes?

Polystyrene is an effective reflective material. It does not have high absorption coefficients and is a good choice to diffuse sound and make diffusers.

The absorption coefficient of polystyrene is between 0.3-0.45. If you want extra reflexion, you can paint it with water-based sprays. Click to view graph

Does Polystyrene work as well as wood for diffusive purposes?

Not exactly the same, but for the purpose, they both work fine. None of them has high absorption coefficients. The benefits of polystyrene are that it is cheap, easy to manufacture and lightweight.

Is it better to measure before making a diffuser? Will it work better if it is designed for specific frequencies?

You can measure, design and make different diffusers for specific frequencies. However, when designed well, wide frequency range diffusers are as efficient and more flexible. We recommend the Ultrafusor because it uses the best known geometry for frequencies between 565Hz and 6000Hz approximately.

Remember that shape and depth determine the performance and it’s always better to use calculated geometries instead of random diffusing shapes.

How much does a hot wire machine cost?

Approximately 100€. If you need to make 10 diffusers it would cost you 10€ extra per panel. If we add to this 5€ of material, each panel would cost a total of 15€ per panel, not bad 😎.

You can find all specifications and costs in our free online tutorial ;) Click to check our tutorial

Home studio

When to measure?

After you have installed your bass traps and your first reflexion absorbent panels. You will always have to do this steps anyway, so it makes since to measure after them to find which acoustic cancellations or reverberations still remain after basic sound treatment has been done. Click to check more acoustic tips

Why measure after basic sound treatment has been done?

Measuring an empty room will give you a very chaotic reading and will not help you make any decisions.

Open source

What is open source

Any intelectual knowledge that is publicly accessible so people can modify, remake and benefit from it.

Why open source

The best solutions always arise when communities work together. The most efficient way to maximize this is to share knowledge.

Share the wheel, not reinvent it

Working together makes all efforts to add up, and maximizes innovation.

Communities

Open source communities work together because we all benefit from everyones efforts.

Thank you for sharing

Simon Child from The Noun project.
Ben Davis from The noun project.
Ali Ali from The Noun Project.
Sergey Demushkin from The Noun Project.
Jonathan Li from The Noun Project.