Sound Proofing (1 Viewer)

[Tom Scholfield]

So I am moving into a new apartment in Boston, I am building my home theater and I want to put up some sound proofing. But I don't exactly know where to start.

What kind do I buy?

Where do I place it in the room?

Do I need to cover the entire room?

Can I cover the acoustical foam with some sort of fabric to make it look better?

Any help, greatly appreciated.

 

[chris_everett]

Accoustical foam will help make a room sound better, but will do zero for soundproofing. Soundproofing an apartment is difficult, because most soundproofing needs to be done during the construction phase to be most effective.

There are three rules in soundproofing:

1. Airtight. If a room is not airtight, all else doesn't matter. Spaces around normal interior doors are the number one issue, but there are others.

2. Dense wall partitions. (And ceilings and floors) Dense, heavy walls are require a lot of energy to vibrate.

3. Vibration Isolation. The seperation of two spaces with dead air space, or with some sort of flexible material will go a long way toward isolation

The closer you get to all three of these, the better your soundproofing will be. Keep in mind that soundproofing is a matter of degrees. Making a room capable of rock concert levels, while the next room is dead-quiet, is very difficult. How much sound transmission your willing to live with will greatly effect your project.

You may want to go to www.soundproofing.org. They have a good deal of information about some options that you have.

 

[Tom Scholfield]

So if the room is already built I am pretty much out of luck?

Anything I can do to dampen the sound?

 

[Wayne A. Pflughaupt]

Yes, you’re pretty well out of luck. :frowning: Unless you want to construct all-new walls in the room a few inches out from the existing ones.

About the best thing a home theater enthusiast apartment dweller can do is select his housing carefully. Like choose a two-story unit on the corner of the building, with the living room on the outside corner of the building.

Dampening is not the same as soundproofing. Dampening has to do with the acoustics inside the room, i.e., applying cutting down on reverberation. The typical living room often doesn’t need special treatment as it’s usually supplied by normal room furnishings – overstuffed couches, draperies, wall-to-wall carpet (especially the latter).

Regards,
Wayne A. Pflughaupt