Read more about it in this comparison post I wrote on drywall, plywood, MDF and OSB Insulating Compounds It is made from large, cross oriented wooden strips and is generally considered a stronger material than your standard plywood. #6 Oriented Strand Board(OSB)Ī comparable material to drywall in terms of mass and soundproofing benefits, OSB, is a pretty great product. You may just find out you don’t need to invest a 1000$ extra. One quick suggestion here- try out sealing the cracks and leaks around the window sill first and see if the amount of noise reduction you get is worth it. Yes, I am talking about adding a layer of soundproof glass on your window. The REAL solution, though, will be expensive, and will put you back by about 1000$. This will only cost you about 20$ and 30 minutes of your time. For instance, you could go around the edges, and seal any cracks with caulk/acoustic tape. If the majority of the unwanted sounds are coming in through your window, it makes sense to actually devote your efforts into soundproofing it first. Makes them eco-friendly too as they don’t require as much of the VOC laden glues and resins. Floating floors are useful because they are placed together like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle and aren’t hard-glued together like your standard flooring. This is basically a new layer of flooring that goes on top of the underlayment(see point #5). In fact, this is another really popular use for MLV #4 Floating floor That’s another way of saying add mass to the floor. This is why, most soundproofing contractors you speak to will recommend reinforcing your flooring with underlayment. If the flooring on the upper floor isn’t properly reinforced, there is a very big chance you’ll be hearing every footstep, down on the ground floor. If you live in a house with multiple floors, you really don’t want to be woken up in the middle of the night when someone needs to use the upstairs bathroom. Sounds like a lot of options, doesn’t it? Don’t worry, I’ll cover all of them in this post #3 Floor Underlayment Adding a damping compound in between the drywall layers.There are a couple more sophisticated techniques you could apply, such as: Adding another layer on top of that is simple to do and provides some real soundproofing benefits.Īnd it doesn’t just have to be a brute force tactic of installing another layer of wall on top of another, and hoping that their combined mass brings a reduction in noise transmission. Most US homes already have a layer of drywall. More flexibility means that it performs even better at stopping sound vibrations #2 Drywallĭrywall or as it’s known in the US through a popular brand name- Sheetrock- is again, one of the top materials for soundproofing. Go on, I’ll wait here!Īnother great thing about MLV is that it is supple. The ¼” category has a standalone STC rating of 32 and the ⅛” has a STC rating of 26.ĭon’t know what STC means? Read this article first. To give you an idea- MLV usually comes in two types- ¼” and ⅛”. This is a huge thing because a big issue with soundproofing a wall, say, is that as you add mass- an extra layer of drywall, or some insulation, you’ll have to give up a bit of floor space around the walls. I’d say it has to do with the fact that it is extremely dense and at the same time, is very thin, and doesn’t add to the wall thickness by much. MLV is one product that is heavily used for soundproofing, and it’s probably the most popular also. To this end, here are a couple of materials that are great barriers for sound: #1 Mass Loaded Vinyl(MLV) In fact, when it comes down to seriously soundproofing a room, adding mass to the walls, doors, windows, etc becomes a must. Adding mass is one of the most important things when it comes to soundproofing, as it can block sound vibrations very effectively.
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