New Construction Soundproofing
Acoustic Challenge
The majority of our clients call with existing rooms and existing sound problems. If you are lucky enough to be visiting this site in advance of new construction, congratulations on your insight. Controlling sound quality within a room can be treated after the fact, but combating the bleed of sound from room to room for new home design should be addressed prior to your framing stage. We address sound quality issues elsewhere throughout our site. Our goal here is to block noise from bleeding from room to room for sound transmission loss.
Soundproofing Treatment
As we outline in our Walls, Ceiling, and Floors sections, there are steps you can take to help structurally disconnect one room from the next for residential noise control. Building a soundproof wall, ceiling or floor will help prevent vibrations from bleeding sounds back and forth through studs and joists. Framing techniques with you new construction design should include staggered stud or double wall construction. You could also use the RSIC clip system to trigger your disconnection. Wall and ceiling surfaces should then be lined with the density of the sound barrier insulation dB-Bloc prior to drywall. This will help impair the surface's ability to conduct vibration. Your flooring surface can receive FloorFighter to combat foot noise bleeding to any rooms down below. All products are designed to help deaden the transfer of noise and force the waves to collapse inside your surface assembly or new wall construction. The products are listed here in the Product Bin.
Acoustic Results
As we outline in our Academy, standard walls and ceilings in a home carry average STC ratings of a 38. For residential sound control, if you properly frame your rooms out in advance and line with dB-Bloc and the other products listed in our Product Bin, average STC levels can reach a luxury grade rating of 60-65. This difference with this sound barrier treatment is dramatic. Note however that no treatment will completely cure the issue of bleeding noise from one room to the next. Any flanking path of noise will allow sound to bleed out. These include light cannisters, outlet plates, supply and return vents, exhaust fans, pipes in your walls, windows, doors and so on. On average, your finished treatment for new build or sound control remodeling can trigger the prevention of more than 90% of your unwanted noise from bleeding through your assembly. Results for home design sound control and soundproofing for new construction are simulated in our Sound Chamber. Results will vary per treatment.
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Start Smart: Good Decision Making Will Save You Money
Making good decisions will save you time and money. Nothing is more costly or pocketbook-draining than to discover that the wrong product, the wrong treatment, or the mis-installation of your order forces you to start over, accept inferior results, or suffer from buyer's remorse.
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offers its famous, safe, and secure email course called StartSmart. It is filled with valuable insider tips on saving money with your soundproofing treatment. This popular teaching tool is your guide to a successful
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Tips
If you are visiting here before your build, you are in a fortunate situation. With a combination of proper framing techniques and the use of NetWell's barrier isolation materials featured in the Product Bin linked to this section, you are one step ahead of the majority of clients who call us after the rooms are built out. So congratulations on getting off to the right start.
The majority of treatments outlined here in this section are designed to help protect and isolate each room in your home from the next, or from your neighbors. Consider these products and their treatments carefully. Once you finish your rooms off, it is more difficult to return to this soundproofing issue and treat existing surfaces. Don't regret later having considered by not performed the treatments prescribed here. Be smart, think ahead, and remember to apply the "disconnection + density" techniques to your common walls, ceilings and floors in your home.
The Walls, Ceilings and Floors sections of this Applications Guide will also review the majority of the treatments you will find here in this Product Bin. Framing for your walls should include disconnection created by double wall, staggered stud, or firring strip building techniques outlined in the Walls section. This includes exterior walls to your home. Note that by simply going thicker with your walls, it does not necessarily mean you are doing a better job at blocking sound. It is the common contact points, not the wall thickness, that triggers your effect. While it is true that with thicker walls you can apply thicker R-19 fiberglass insulation, this material does little to block noise. Your best bet is to frame your home with disconnected structure and line any common walls that pose a threat to bleeding noise with the density found in dB-Bloc.
Floor underlayments will help lift your floor surface up and away from your structure to combat foot noise traffic. Again, since you are here in advance of your build, check the Impacta line of floor underlayments and select the right products based on the floor surfaces you intend to put down. If your floor is already finished, you have no choice to but go below and lower the ceiling instead.
Ceilings should receive dB-Bloc and the disconnecting firring strips to help trigger a drop in sound transmission. For any drop-grid ceiling tile systems, go with our Granite Tiles as finished material, or our Ceiling Caps to rest atop your own ceiling tiles. Either of these treatments will trigger the transmission loss you seek due to their weight. Be careful with a drop-grid system. The density you need to combat the noise bleed will add more weight to your ceiling. Double up on the hangars used to support your grid. If at all possible, opt for a finished ceiling over a drop grid system. You gain more density and it becomes a more air-tight seal to bleeding noise.
Foundation walls to your basement should be framed out with studs and dB-Bloc applied to their face prior to hanging drywall. Do not apply dB-Bloc direct to concrete, apply instead to the frame and create a dead air pocket between the concrete the barrier membrane. Note that any direct contact surface you leave exposed to noise will transmit energy structurally throughout your home.
For quality sound within each room, we recommend you visit each room's section of this Applications Guide for more advice. The majority of these products can be installed after the rooms are built. Pay attention here to the barrier and disconnecting techniques. One absorption issue you may want to address in advance would be in your Home Theater room. If you want to frame this room out properly, you could pre-arrange to have 2" thick cavities cut into your walls so that our 2" thick Fabric Panels can be layed in to run flush with your finished drywall surface.
Finally, pay attention to the inevitable "flanking paths" of noise. These are openings in every room where air flow, and sound energy, can pass freely. They include light cannisters, outlet plates, switch plates, supply vents, return vents, exhaust fans, pipes in the walls, windows, doors, and more. Do not place electrical outlets or switches inside the same stud cavity. Be sure to separate out any of these openings. Also do not locate outlet plates back to back on the same wall. Stagger their location.
Will fiberglass insulation help? In the case where you disconnect your wall, yes. When the sound waves are collapsing inside your wall because of your disconnection, the fiberglass can help absorb the trapped energy. In the case of a standard wall with one set of studs supporting drywall on both sides, not so much. There is no collapse to the wave as the energy pours straight through the structure of the studs. Always, however, consider fiberglass batting for thermal insulation and zone temperature control. But not so much for sound control. Again, you need density + a disconnected surface.
Best of luck with your build. Please call our help desk at 1-800-638-9355 if you have more questions! Return now to our Product Bin to discover the products appropriate for a new construction project.
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