Hi all Would really appreciate any advice from people with experience in the above. I bought a 1940’s 1st maisonette a year ago and the soundproofing is terrible, can hear the family below cough, talk, laugh etc and when there’s music on forget about it! It’s really distressing now. Initially we refurbished and we placed some high density 2mm soundproofing matting down over the floorboards (1 layer in most rooms, 2 layers in the bedroom) but it hasn’t worked too well! It has come to the stage where where the only option is sell or lift up all the floorboards, new floors, skirting doors etc and fill in between the joists. Has anybody got good advice as there is so much on the internet mostly from people selling their own products. Is acoustic quilt better for airborne noise than mineral wool? Any advice would be appreciated, I have good tradesmen to do the work but soundproofing is not their speciality
Hi Fiona, unfortunately I think it will be difficult to reduce the noise to any great extent. Whilst sound originates in the air, it will go into the fabric of the building and spread very easily. I used to live in a ground floor flat and the (nice) lady on the 2nd floor could hear my TV as it travelled into and up the walls. This is part was due to the poor sound quality of my TV (so had it turned up loud) and I was able to remedy this by buying a sound bar with better sound quality and a slightly reduced volume. I would proceed very carefully and be sceptical of claims made by people selling sound insulation. I hate to say it, but you might be best selling up and moving elsewhere, although there's no guarantee another place will be any better. The folks opposite me, who own a Victorian semi, told me that their next door neighbour was selling as he can hear their young kid's noises that travel through the party wall. So its not just flats that have this problem.
Unfortunately in your position, being above them the best you can do (to my knowledge, I'm not a sound expert) is to lift your floorboards and fill the gaps with rockwool acoustic batts, the deepest you can get. An ideal situation would be if they needed to replace their ceilings to reboard with soundbloc blue plasterboard, but obviously they're not going to do this just because you can hear them. I would put the acoustic matting or quilt over the tops of the joists rather than on top of your floorboards, just make sure you know where any cables and pipes are before you refix the floorboards.
Ive used acoustic wool ( rockwool ) in the joist gaps, and its working pretty well for stopping TV noise etc. We also had a room where we couldnt get access to the joists, so ended up using SBx boards straight on top of the floor, which work well ( but more expensive than acoustic wool )
Fiona, are there any common flue stacks in the building? It seems very unfortunate that sounds is so audible. The apartment below does have a ceiling, doesn't it? The current vogue for laminate and wooden flooring have, in my experience, worsened noise problems especially in multi-occupancy buildings. From a building perspective I think you seem pretty much up to date with current best practice.
Forums
Facebook
Twitter
You Tube
Instagram
Shop