Types of noise
Sound insulation of walls in an apartment can be complete or partial. Sometimes, by eliminating a certain element in the design, you can completely get rid of extraneous sound without large financial costs.
Noise has two types: vibrational and wave. In the first case, the vibration goes along the walls, for example, a blow to the battery, the knock of a washing machine, the operation of a perforator. Wave noise is transmitted by sound waves through the air. For example, barking dogs, loud music, talking in a raised tone. In addition, there are other sources of noise transmission:
- The sound from the entrance enters the apartment through the front door. It could be swearing neighbors or loudly slamming elevator doors. To remove this noise, carry out soundproofing of the front door. To do this, use seals, special upholstery.
- Street noise can be heard from the windows. For example, the scream of children, the sharp brakes of a car, a flying plane. Triple glazing on the windows helps eliminate extraneous sounds. In addition to it, you can buy blackout curtains.
- Sounds inside the apartment, creating noise from the neighbors. For example, active and mobile children who are used to laughing out loud and playing catch-up. Or musician neighbors who love loud parties. Sound and noise isolation in the apartment will help to avoid quarrels with neighbors and calling the district police officer.
- Adjacent premises. If there are through sockets or gaps between floor slabs between two apartments, noise will penetrate through them. Sometimes soundproofing a room bordering on a neighboring apartment is enough.
Permissible norms
The loudness of various sounds is measured in decibels. There are acceptable standards at which noise will not harm a person - up to 45 dB. This number can be compared to a quiet conversation between two people. This rule is valid only from 7:00 to 23:00 hours. At night, up to 30 decibels is considered the norm. Approximately 20 dB is equal to talking in a whisper.
At enterprises, noise standards can reach up to 85 dB. A worker can perceive such a sound no more than 8 hours a day. If the indicators are higher than this figure, then the enterprise should issue special protective devices, for example, headphones. 110 dB is a critical noise level, if the sound reaches 130 dB, unpleasant sensations on the skin may appear.
By determining the noise level, you can choose the most appropriate method of soundproofing for the room. Unpleasant emotions are often caused by loud sounds coming from the neighbors, and this pushes for the installation of additional materials.
Soundproofing methods
Most often, noise worries people who live in panel high-rise buildings. There are three ways to soundproof:
- Installation of membranes or plates. During such work, the material is installed or glued to the floor, walls, ceiling.
- In the frame way, guides are installed on the walls, then - sound-absorbing material, and then - facing panels. This method of operation is of high quality, but is also expensive.
- The floating method is used only for the floor, an insulating material is spread on it, which is covered with a waterproofing layer. A reinforced screed is installed on top, and a floor covering is placed on it.
To choose the sound-absorbing material suitable for the apartment, you need to pay attention to the size of the room. In small rooms, a drywall sheet is suitable, which will not reduce the area
In a spacious room, you can install a multi-layer structure, for this, styrene, kraft cardboard or mineral wool are suitable.
To decide how to improve the sound insulation of an apartment, you should determine what the room is intended for.For example, in the kitchen, high humidity and temperature fluctuations, so you should not use materials for the bedroom in it.
The texture in houses from a monolithic block will differ from that in frame buildings. For interior decoration, it must be taken into account that the material does not contain substances harmful to human health, for example: lead, formaldehyde, mercury, volatile resins, etc.
Soundproofing with soundproof boards
Modern building materials can significantly reduce the amount of work in order to achieve maximum results. Do not stand still and technology in the field of sound absorption. Special boards, which can be purchased from specialized stores, guarantee a high level of sound insulation with a minimum of effort.
The advantages of this material include its lightness, compactness and ease of use. With the help of such panels, even one person who is not a professional builder can make soundproofing in an apartment. The boards can be cut to fit the room, which also facilitates installation.
Another "plus" is additional thermal insulation. Since this material consists of wood-shaving or stone wool, the fibers also retain heat inside the apartment, which is especially true for houses with low thermal insulation.
The plates are attached to the wall directly, without any additional frames. Special dowels guarantee the strength of the structure. The joints between the panels are covered with putty, which helps to create a perfectly smooth wall. Prices for Isoplat panels are currently much lower than they used to be, as this technology becomes more and more popular.
Start of soundproofing work
First of all, you need to start by examining the disadvantages of insulated walls. This may be a crack or gap in the wall, resulting from the shrinkage of the house.
Such shortcomings must be carefully filled with soundproofing material (for example, foam rubber, fiberglass, etc.), and then plastered with gypsum mortar.
You should also insulate electrical outlets, which are most often through holes in the wall.
Due to the sound insulation of the walls, the thickness will slightly increase, and, consequently, the area of \u200b\u200bthe room will decrease. But these shortcomings are more than offset by the peace that soundproofing will bring.
Most often, when thickening the walls, wooden frames sheathed with foam rubber are used. Between the frame and the wall, a material is placed that helps to reduce the conductivity of sound (most often fiberglass and foam rubber) and is diligently attached to the wall so that in the future the material does not deform or slip.
If a soundproof board is used, it must be screwed on top of the wall. Then the surface should be sheathed with drywall (you can also use glue). To increase the sound insulation of walls, sometimes a steel profile is used - it will give additional reflective properties to the wall. It must be installed between the wall itself and the insulating material. This laying option will provide the best level of sound insulation.
Remember that self-renovation of an apartment is a rather complicated and very responsible process. If you strictly follow the instructions described above, you will get a very high-quality result.
Also, do not forget that the soundproofing of the walls in the room of an apartment or any residential premises is only part of the soundproofing.
To ensure maximum sound insulation, you must also pay attention to the level of insulation of the floor, ceiling and windows.
Soundproofing windows and doors
The soundproofing of window and door blocks has a very big influence on the final result.It is enough to recall the example of noise transmission through the heating system, after which it immediately becomes clear why even 15 cm wide window slope can be an excellent emitter of all noises in the house.
Fig. 2 Correct mounting options for door and window blocks
Figure 2 shows the correct installation options for door and window units in a room when implementing the “box-in-box” principle. Figure 2a shows the correct installation of the second string of glazing in an insulated room, and Figure 2b shows the correct installation of a soundproof vestibule
It is important to remember that such a room must necessarily be equipped with a forced ventilation system. Otherwise, when opening windows and doors, noise will come in for ventilation along with air, including noise from neighbors.
Fig.3 Correct mounting options for door and window blocks
Figure 3a shows a variant of mounting a window unit to a facade wall on vibration-isolating Vibroflex mounts. At the same time, additional soundproof wall cladding covers all slopes adjacent to the window unit. Figure 3b shows the correct installation of a soundproof door in a room. The door block is inserted into the contour of the soundproof lining and does not have rigid connections with the doorway of the original room.
The most common mistakes when installing soundproof doors and windows
Fig.4 The most common mistakes when installing soundproof doors and windows
Figure 4 shows the most common errors when installing these elements. In Figure 4a, the window block, and in Figure 4b, the door block are rigidly connected to the supporting structures of the building. In addition, in Figure 4a, the slopes of the openings were left without additional soundproof lining. In this case, after completing the work on the complex soundproofing of the room, the noise in it will be heard precisely from the window area and the entrance door to the room.
As a result of such solutions, the effect of additional sound insulation can be reduced by 10 dB with externally fully implemented measures. Therefore, when installing soundproofing according to the “room-in-room” principle, technical supervision in the person of a professional acoustic engineer is not only desirable, but extremely necessary.
Soundproofing with drywall
One of the most popular and fairly simple ways is soundproofing with drywall. He, of course, is not an insulating material. That is why you will need fiberglass or mineral wool. When choosing a material, give preference to soft and semi-soft options, as they have a higher level of sound absorption.
First you need to carefully inspect the walls for damage. All cracks, chips and discrepancies must be carefully sealed. You can use special sealants, or you can get by with ordinary cement mortar.
After that, you can build a frame for the future drywall wall. Experts recommend using a metal profile with a vibration-proof pad, but you can also make a frame from ordinary wooden beams. Do not forget to step back 1.5-2 centimeters from the wall itself to create an air cushion, which will also have a positive effect on the level of sound insulation. After mounting the frame, proceed with laying the special insulating material. Make sure that the thickness of this inner layer leaves enough space for the air cushion.
Your "filling" is ready, it only needs to be hidden behind a layer of drywall. Sheets are screwed to the frame with self-tapping screws. The joints between drywall sheets must be sealed with a special mesh and plastered. After that, the wall is ready for painting or wallpapering.
This method has one important drawback - installing drywall takes at least eight centimeters of area on each side.
Soundproofing in the apartment
After the master arrives in the room, determines the type and source of noise, he will begin preparing the walls. To do this, they look for cracks and crevices that transmit sound. They are all neatly putty.
Next, it will be necessary to work with sockets, most often this has to be done in panel houses. According to safety regulations, you must first turn off the electricity. Then the specialist will check the outlet with a tester to accurately determine the absence of incoming current, after which he will disassemble it and completely pull it out. The resulting hole is filled with fiberglass. On top of this, a building mixture solution is applied, for example, gypsum, since it has a fast-acting property.
In addition to cracks and sockets, heating pipes can bring excess noise in those places where they come into contact with the wall. To eliminate such noise, it is better to make the elimination of seams between the wall and pipes with an elastic sealant that is resistant to temperature extremes.
When the master is soundproofing the walls using drywall, he prepares the walls in the above way. After that, the frame is installed, retreating 2 cm from the surface. An anti-vibration lining made of cork or rubber is placed under the profile.
Glass wool or mineral wool is placed under the frame
Before choosing a sound-absorbing material, you need to pay attention to its sound absorption coefficient. Soft materials have greater sound absorption than hard materials.
Then the gypsum boards are fixed to the profile.
Ceiling work
To soundproof the ceiling, drywall or acoustic suspended structures are used. For noise-absorbing materials, they use: basalt wool, coconut fibers, cork, polyurethane foam mats.
Before starting work, an auxiliary ceiling system is placed. It comes in several types:
- Stretch ceiling. Brackets are attached to the surface, on which the fabric is stretched.
- Suspended are placed on a metal frame. Later, soundproofing plates are placed in them.
- The hemmed ceiling is attached to the frame in the same way as the suspended ceiling, then sheathed with drywall.
Popular materials
On the modern market there are a large number of special substances for performing soundproofing work in an apartment. The most popular of them:
- ISOPLAAT softboard is a 25mm thick softboard. Mounted under a concrete screed, it has the ability to eliminate noise up to 26 dB.
- TEKSOUND is a heavy 3.7 mm thick aragonite mineral membrane that absorbs sound by 28 dB.
- SHUMANET - rolled material, 3 mm thick, eliminates noise of 23 dB.
- ISOPLAAT - underfloor slab, 7 mm thick, absorbs sound 21 dB.
- Vibrostek-V300 is a roll material, its thickness is 4 mm. With it, the master creates a multilayer sound insulation.
In addition to eliminating sound, they often perform thermal insulation in the room. This type of work will provide not only protection from the cold, but also from the melting heat in the summer heat.
A source
Sound and noise isolation
First, a little terminology: noise is a background set of sounds, sound is a wave vibration of the air medium. Noise can be structural and airborne.
With airborne noise, it is created by fluctuations in the air environment: voices, sounds of cars, screams outside the window, signals, sounds of beeps.
With structural noise, vibrations are caused by the influence on the transmitting substance that makes up the house. In this case, mechanical vibrations, for example, from the drill used and during repair work on the first floor, are transmitted along the walls and partitions to the fifth floor.
In old houses, the noise effect is damped due to the thickness of the partitions and walls and the quality of the building material - the vibration is damped by the porous material of bricks and plaster.
In houses with thin walls and high vibration conductivity of the walls, it is vital to soundproof the room.
Ways to make soundproofing in the apartment
If we are talking about soundproofing, then we must definitely proceed from the purpose of the room. The kitchen, bathroom and even the living room can "get by" with partial insulation
But the bedroom and the nursery are rooms of increased importance, here you need to achieve complete peace and quiet.
Experts have long noticed that the sound is muffled in multilayer structures. But they have a clear disadvantage - a decrease in the useful area of \u200b\u200bthe room. The thicker the partitions, the less noise penetrates into and out of the room, but also the more space this structure occupies.
The main ways to achieve silence in the apartment are: the use of drywall, plastering and the use of special soundproof boards. Each of them has its own advantages and disadvantages. It is, of course, up to the landlord to decide. Professionals recommend combining these methods, applying them in different rooms, depending on the desired level of sound insulation.
