Manufactured Slat Wall Panels

Yeah, a bass trap or maybe on walls with some rockwool behind them.  The installation manual for them even has graphs showing how performance improves, and how to go about installation, by putting Rockwool behind these panels.  So they've already contemplated this.  It looks to take nothing more than placing 2"x2"s on the wall, with 2" rockwool between then, and then screw the panels into the 2"x2"s.

Yeah, a 4'x8' section of wall would cost $300, so I hear you.  That said, wood isn't exactly cheap right now and, unless you're doing the labor yourself, neither is cutting and attaching all of that wood if you were to individually attach each slat on its own.  Add in the cost of some Guilford of Maine fabric, behind all of these slats that you're individually cutting and attaching, and the price of the wood, fabric and labor starts to get expensive too.  The nice thing with these panels is that you can attach them in no time at all.  I need to do a price comparison to see how these panels might compare to doing it all DIY with individually cut/attached slats and GOM fabric.

Price concerns aside, I'm just interested in seeing if these panels might work well in at least some applications, like as a covering over a bass trap or something.  As much as anything, I'm wondering if the "felt" layer, used as the backing for the slats, might detrimentally impact the effectiveness of any absorber or bass trap that you might put behind these panels.

I haven't done an exhaustive price comparison but, based on the width of 66" and the price of $21.50 per yard of GOM FR701, there are 16.5 sq ft in one yard and that runs at $1.30 per sq ft.  So assuming no slop, which there inevitably will be, a 4x8 section of wall would cost $41.70 for the fabric.

There are a lot of options for wood, and the prices seem to be fluctuating all the time, so it's a little hard to nail down.  That said, just looking at some prices for different kinds of wood that I might want to use for slats, the wood would run $100 or more for a 4x8 section of wall.

So that's at least roughly $150 total for a 4x8 section of wall, though I imagine it will be closer to $200 when it's all said and done.  Those premade panels would run $300 for the same size wall, so that's going to cost $100 to $150 more for a 4x8 section of wall.  That said, those panels would be so easy to slap up there that they still appeal to me, even given the price difference.  Granted, on a big job, the difference in cost might add up.  

However, we're also not talking about labor at all.  If you do the work yourself to build a custom wall with fabric and slats, you save on the labor, but this kind of work is time consuming, for whatever that's worth.  If you pay somebody to build something like this from scratch, I think the cost difference between the custom job and premade panel is eliminated.  So it's kind of a wash if you don't want to or can't do the work yourself.

That's my two cents.  I'm still interested in these panels as a cover for bass traps and absorbers.  I really just want to see if anyone has any knowledge of whether or not the felt/duct liner kind of material that is uses for these panels will significantly impede the absorber or bass trap behind these panels from doing the intended job.  If you custom build something like this, with GOM fabric, that stuff is basically transparent and I don't think you'd need to worry about anything.  That's basically what my decision is coming down to.  How transparent is the felt/duct liner material that is being used on these panels?

^^^ I have been there and Matt’s place is cool as fuck.

I’ve made these with wider spacing over owens 703 and or over rock wool worked great ! You can cut cost finding some used even weatherd wood for some nice character.

Yes.