How To: Make a homemade bass trap acoustic panel

Learn to make your own super effective bass traps and acoustic panels with materials from your local hardware store, just by watching this home audio video tutorial.

Why haven't you heard of a Bass Trap or High Frequency Panel, and what is the difference between the two?

A BASS trap is simply a device designed to absorb low frequency sound and enhance your overall sound experience.

Bass Traps use mineral fiber to capture sound waves. The core of a Bass Trap is a panel of compressed fiberglass that is made of inert fibers [glass - which is of course made of sand]. These panels are an assembly of such fibers formed into a dense mat. The panel is riddled throughout with many little gaps and holes [interstices]. The air that fills these little gaps and holes has a vibrational connection to the air in the room - but this connection is attenuated by the matrix of fibers that makes up the panel.

When a sound hits the Bass Trap, the air inside the panel is caused to vibrate - like a spring - and all this wiggling around turns the vibrational energy of the sound into a small amount of heat. If the panel is of proper size and density - and properly placed in your room - it will absorb sound at all frequencies. This is called a broadband absorber because it is effective on all frequencies in the audible range.

Broadband absorbers are called Bass Traps because they are big enough [4" thick] and made of a material of proper density and structure such that if mounted near a room boundary [a wall, floor, or ceiling] they will provide absorption of low frequencies [bass].