acoustic foam myth or true?

  • Thread starter Thread starter 5eniorFedup
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5eniorFedup

New member
greetings folks
recently i have considered moving in with my father into either a town home or a condo.
upon discussing with the realtors that i wish to have a room dedicated for haing my lil production studio and make sounds from and that i didnt wish to have the sound leave that room , l was told that there is foam you can set up around your walls to have the sound not go through and thus play your work at a louder than normal level( including electric guitars)

now i know a thing or two about sound rec, and one of the things i know are that unless the walls itself are built for sound Not to go through the walls ,,,,the sound is gonna go through the walls....
can some one please myth bust this one for me?

thanks
5eniorFedism
miamifl
 
Acoustics are meant to correct the sound inside the room, and allow excess frequency from bass and other things to escape. It's different then soundproofing, and significantly different in cost.
 
sound proofing (preventing the transmission of sound through the walls) is only done by constructing the room as such. This is done typically by isolation and mass. Acoustic treatment is a way to improve the acoustics of the room you're in right now. Even after soundproofing a room, you'll want to acoustically treat a room so that it sounds good.

There's lots and lots of info in the studio building section of this forum.
 
Yeah, the realtor that said you could sound proof with foam was ill-informed.
 
Realtors are only interested in making sales and getting their commission. Most of them are better than used car salesmen at telling you what you want to hear so they make a sale. There may be some honest ones out there somewhere (I'm sure there are) but most are just salesmen (or saleswomen.)
Acoustical treatment does little or nothing towards soundproofing. Soundproofing (better called sound transmission reduction) is a construction issue, not a simple matter of sticking a little foam on the walls. As far as I know, there is no foam product which does what your realtor told you. If such a thing existed I'm sure most of us (here on this BBS) would already be using it.
 
foam can help create the illusion of soundproofing if you light it on fire and inhale lots of the fumes deep into your lungs.

Otherwise, not so much.
 
There are composite foam products that do introduce an appreciable transmission loss over most but not all of the audio spectrum. The stuff I've used commercially is 6" thick with a mass loaded hard rubber/foam composite construction. You can't make a truely soundproof room with it, but you can make a substantial difference. It'll also make a substantial difference to your bank account though.
 
I don't know how effective it really is, but I've seen it:

http://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/SheetBlok410/

Also, I don't think it's going to do anything about transmission at the floor level. That is, it could block 190dB through the wall and if your floor is still moving air then the neighbors are probably going to hear it. You'd have to isolate the floor somehow (I've seen padding for under the carpet, but I doubt it will snuff out a kick drum, etc.).
 
your realtor is a moron

well, maybe not, but he knows dick about acoustics and how to tame massively amplified sine waves

like some have said, the only way to keep sound from getting from 1 place to another is to specifically build the room in question to block the noise...there's nothing that can be slapped up that will do the trick
 
thanks for all the replies they have been very helpful
federico
miami fl
 
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