Advice Please : DIY acoustic panels

I too own Maggie 1.6, and found that the "Down and Dirty" Bass traps are the least expensive and work very well! The author of this design says that they are about 80% as effective as the expensive professional boughten ones, which means your getting 80% of the results for about 15% of the cost. Speaks "VALUE" in my book.

They are simply rolls of insulation about 16" in diameter and stacked 4'6" high behind the woofer panels of the Maggies and produce a wonderful improvement. When I first read this on a site I can't remember, I thought the guy was NUTS! But I thought, I can just return it to Home Depot if it don't work so what to loose.

I also use other types of dampening for the higher frequencies on the wall, and corners of the room. The Maggies need some bare wall reflective surfaces to sound their best in my opinion, and thus the "insulation roll bass traps" yields space and air around them as they are away from the wall and about 8" behind the woofer panel. Again, may not be the last word or ultimate best, but for the time and money spent, it is worth way more than the $200 I spent for all four pieces.

Make sure and get a thin long dry cleaner bag to slip over the rolls of insulation so you have no worry about breathing the fiberglass fibers in your house. Assemble them in the garage, not in your audio room. Then wrap in Burlap from WalMart to make them look good. I have 4 traps in my room: one behind each Maggie, and the other two in each respective rear corners of the room.

Good Luck,

R.

Yes the diy is so easy and I don't imagine that you need to spend a lot of money.

Simply buy a sheet of compressed fiberglass and wrap some fabric over it - staple - to the back and you have a nice looking, effective absorber.

I wish I could say the same for diffusors.

Thanks for the responses !
I'll try the diy panel and let you all know of the results.

I take acoustic (fiberglass) ceiling tiles, strip the white off and layer them in a frame made out of 1/4" x 2" deep oak 2' x 4'(I stain the oak for looks.) I place three of the 5/8" layers in between the frame and (staple)cover in a grille cloth to match the room. I put these panels in strategic locations along the back wall and first reflection areas. All I can say is it works.

Ok, go to Jon Risch's website: www.geocities.com/jonrisch/index2.htm . There you will find every thing you need to get you started. I too have Maggie 1.6's and found the addition of these diy panels to be a very significant upgrade to my system. One of the best returns on a modest investment of time and money I ever made. I have a room with 12' ceilings that has a 2' tall ''plant shelf' around the perimeter. I installed 2 traps 20"x6' x 4" thick above the speakers in the plant shelf and 2 more traps the same height and width, but 6" thick in the plant shelf above the listening position. The two behind the speakers made the biggest improvement. I also built the diy "room lens" project and installed them behind the speaker's high frequency panels. This project takes a little more skill and more tools to execute well, but it also is a very worthwhile expenditure of time. You will get much better high frequency reproduction and dispersion in my experience.

Try this Link

Another thing you might consider is cloth acoustic wallpaper. The movie theatre multiplex at the mall uses it and the wallpaper place will have an accoustic wallpaper sample book.