Re: sound absorbing material

["Daniel L. MacIsaac" <Dan.MacIsaac@nau.edu>]

Ah.  If you just want to deaden the reflections there is much cheaper
stuff than the genuine anechoic-chamber grade solutions.  Try a curtain
(flame-resistant) in the end of the room you want to deaden, or some
combination of curtain and cheap (again flame-resistant) cork tiles.  
Or just hang a sheet of construction styro covered with a tacking of
flame-retardant material 1" out from the wall.  Or cover the wall with the 
soft and cheap tiles they hang in suspended ceilings like you probably
have already in your building (white duct tape the joints).  These are
all cheap campus-radio-station-budget tricks for creating a live and dead
end in your broadcast or recording studio.  Tiles and glass are amongst
the livest possible materials.
 
Or ride the wave and start a band.  Apparantly the band _Hootie and the 
Blowfish_ 'developed' their characteristic sound by rehearsing in a 
tiled college residence bathroom.

Dan M

Dan MacIsaac, Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy, Northern AZ Univ
danmac@nau.edu  http://www.phy.nau.edu/~danmac/homepage.html

> We tried the egg crate solution in one of our labs. The room was
> rectangular with tile floors and student noise (high school) made it
> impossible to think in that room. The egg crates worked until our
> insurance inspector spotted them and made us take them down. Seems as if
> paper egg cartons in a laboratory setting makes for a nice fire...... Oh
> well, we went back to the noise.
>
> Ray Rogoway
> Independence Hi
> San Jose, CA (where it never gets as cold as NYC.)