Moving to Townhouse---Soundproofing

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Jaycay

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My mom and I are moving to a townhouse after many years of living in a regular house. Anyway, I was wondering what I should do to soundproof it better so I dont have the neighbors trying to kill me. From what I read, the thickness of the walls and dead air are your friends with sound proofing, but Im not sure I can change that much. My friend said that maybe I should cover the walls with carpet, but I dont think my mom is going to go for that idea. When I am at the townhouse, I dont here any of the neighbors so I suppose its pretty soundproofed, but I can't be sure. Anybody have any experience with this?
 
Hello Jaycay. Usually, townhouse are designed and built to meet a Sound transmission class which will attenuate NORMAL foot traffic, tv and radio, talking and day to day noise levels. They are NOT designed to keep medium volume low frequency sound or very loud mid and high frequency sounds from transmitting through the structure. What is it you want to do in the townhouse? Record? Practice? Are there neighbors above, below or either side? You might play a radio or CD fairly loud, and ask your neighbors if they can hear it. This will give you an idea of what you are dealing with. One thing is for sure. Carpet will do little to nothing to impede sound transmission. It will absorb high frequency in the room, and thats about it.
Do you rent, or did you purchase the townhouse? Without knowing what it is you want to do soundwise, and what your dealing with as far as the actual construction of the building, and how it is laid out in relationship to your neighbors, it is almost impossible to help you. Please provide more info in order for people to supply proper solutions. I can tell you this. Total soundproofing is difficult at best, and there are NO shortcuts to actual soundproofing. There are techniques and materials to improve the sound transmission attenuation. But if your mother won't let you even put carpet up, I seriously doubt if she is ready for the real solutions. I suggest you read ten or twenty recent pages of this forum to give you a little insight into what soundproofing intails. It is NOT something you can whip out in an afternoon. I will offer this last little piece of information. When you completely soundproof, you completely airproof. That is the bottom line. Then you must deal with the problem of breathing. And removal of heat build up from human beings and equipment. That means proper design and installation of HVAC or venting. And they also create noise. Sooooooo....welcome to the world of home studio design and construction. There are lots of people here who will help you with info. But you must help yourself first by reading. Then you will understand the nature of soundproofing and the issues you are facing. And they are NOT easy. BTW, if your friend tells you to use eggcrates, laugh.
fitZ:)
 
I agree with Rick Fitz. I would add an even more dour tone of discouragement, as I think your success is going to be more dependent on your neighbor's goodwill than any non-invasive retrofitting of your space.

Remember, 95% soundproofing is equal to 0% soundproofing, as sound has a sneaky way of finding a weakness. As Rick Fitz mentioned HVAC is a wonderful conduit for distributing sound from one space to another. Some townhouses have separate units, which is good. Some have shared units which is bad.

How much can you hear your neighbors now?

If I were you, I'd meet the neighbors, bring 'em home made cookies, tell them about your hobby, and determine when they'll be out of the house.
 
If I were you, I'd meet the neighbors, bring 'em home made cookies, tell them about your hobby, and determine when they'll be out
Click to expand...

Tod, thats the best idea I've heard. Cookies and friendliness go a long way for tolerance!:D Why didn't I think of that, duh!
fitZ
 
Thank you for the responses

Hmmm...I suppose the cookie idea is a good thing, but I hope that I don't have to keep giving them cookies to have them stay quiet... The eggcrate thing gave me an idea for decorating my room. :)

My mother bought the townhouse and there is no one above or below. I sorta did a crude test as to how sound proofed the house was. I had my mom shake a tamborine inside the front door. I stood outside and only could here the tamborine because I knew it was there. If I had been walking by the house I would not have noticed. I don't know how different sound proofing is between walls, but Ive heard that the concrete between homes is pretty thick (I heard 3 feet of concrete, but Im not sure if the real estate agent knew what she was talking about or not). With the bass range, I don't have to turn my bass amplifier up to 10 ten get a good recording of it, so I don't think that will be that much of a problem. And I don't sing death metal. I guess its mostly the grand piano Im worried about. I dont think I have to worry about acoustic guitar and probably could get away with the occasional horn (I rarely record someone who plays brass) If Im going to end up recording anything with a drum set, I suppose I could move my recording stuff to someone else's house temporarrily.

I suppose my choices regarding sound proofing are a bit dim seeing how I probably am not allowed to change too much of the house without going against some regulation.

Again, thank you for the help.
 
Hello Jaycay, are you recording yourself and friends or clients for monetary rewards?:D I have a couple of suggestions for you. For electric bass, use a Direct box into your mixer, and monitor through headphones. You do have a mixer I presume. And if you have enough mics to record drums, then forget my next suggestion. Nowadays there are plenty of sampled drum sounds and midi programs for rhythm tracks. If you are seriously trying to record bands or loud instruments such as drums or electric guitar, you probably have to do what you said. That is unless your neighbors like live music.
No one here likes to discourage anyone, but its best to know the truth from the outset. At least you know what your dealing with, BEFORE you spend money on useless ideas, materials and techniques. Good luck to you and welcome to the bbs. We are here if you need more info in the future.
fitZ:)
 
Right now Im recording just for the hobby. I don't feel like I have enough experience to charge people (and people can't complain if its free :) ). As of now I've only really recorded myself track by track. About the drums. If I was to mike drums, it would be extremely simple. Probably a large diaphram mic in front, and a dynamic on the bass drum (maybe one on the snare) Also one of my friends dad stores some equiptment for the Philidelphia Folk Song Society and is interested in the work Im doing, so he can help me out with some sound advice and microphones. I have used some drum loops in the past, but its so hard to find the right beat for the song you made. Then again, nothings perfect. Again, thanks for the help.
 
Instead of trying to find "canned" beats, get software that lets you program everything. Will be as quiet as it gets for the neighbors, and you can get a pretty good sound from them.

I use Fruity Loops and if you spend the time to learn the program properly, you can create a great sounding kit and beats.

Space
 
Hiya!

I just finished building a studio and it was a lot more than I really expected (materials and work-wise), but the effort really paid-off. However, this was basically new constuction in a previously-unfinished basement. Unless your townhouse is has an unfinished area in which to build (and you're good with carpentry, etc., and have extra $$ to make it right) there's only so much you can do. One thing that would help, and would not put unsightly carpet, eggcrates, etc on the wall (and would probably make Mom happier) would be to do a double layer of drywall with an acoustic dampener in-between. It would increase your STC rating, but by how much? That, at least, could be painted to match the room. Carpet, etc, will mostly deaden the room to your ears, but I doubt will do much to isolate it from your neighbors.

In my application, I did the room-within-a-room thing, with double layers of insulation, and the acoustic dampening/drywall sandwich. I can crank-up my 150W amps in stereo and my wife can sleep just one floor up. Bass from Subwoofers tend to bleed a little, so I've created foam risers for everything that could transmit vibration to the rest of the house.

I looked into several options, all of which were pricey, for the drywall/dampener sandwich. One option is SheetBlok from Auralex (www.auralex.com). The other was NK-311 from QuietSolutiion (www.quietsolution.com). I chose the latter because of ease of use and no neccesity for other products (like Resilient Channel) that increased the cost. Plus, it was 'cheaper' to begin with. Both sites have demos of what their products can do and the STC rating they provide. Auralex has a page called "Bothering Your Neighbors" that speaks to your issue directly (http://www.auralexuniversity.com/NeighborsReal.html). It's got an excellent example of what each STC rating means in real-world isolation of rock music. Check Out their link (www.acoustics101.com). It's a great overview of how to best build what you're attempting.

Hope this helps,

CraigarS
 
Actually, if you go with reslient channel over the existing walls and ceiling with one layer of 5/8 drywall, that would do quite a bit, and is not too costly. You need to make sure the existing drywall is not sitting on something other than the bare studs allready though. The floor is another story but depending on what is below, you might do allright. I've been looking into gaining a bit more isolation mainly to keep my family sane with my home studio. Resilient channel looks like the best option to gain a bit more quiet, at least in my application. Not silent in the least with full blown drums, bass and guitar amps, etc., but for vocals and studio monitoring it might do just enough to gain a few more precious hours of studio time.
 
Be advised that it is very easy to spend lots of money and time on soundproofing only to find that very little abatement has been achieved.

If the cookie idea is a bit much, I would at least talk to the neighbors ahead of time and let them know that you value their peace of mind. You might even do a little testing with their cooperation. Even if you get some bleed through, they will probably be a lot cooler about it knowing you are trying to be considerate.

Bass and drums are going to be your big challenge.

Good Luck!
 
Hey Tod, you get the "Common Sense" award for the week!! Great reply.
Cheers
fitZ:)
 
Thank you everyone for the help. I have a HiZ input which I can use for the bass and I suppose I could program drums or play keyboard drums, my speciality(sort of)... Maybe there is a vst-instrument or something which I can use for drums. I can always use the tamborine or bongos for some percussion.
 
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