Sound Insulation

BUILDING

CONSTRUCTION

-V

Sound Insulation
Sound insulation is the measure by which transmission on
sound/noise from inside to outside or vice versa or from one room to
the other is prevented.
Unwanted sound reaching the ears is called noise. It may be due to
frequency of sound or the intensity of sound or both. Noise due to high
frequency sound is more unpleasant than the noise due to low
frequency sounds. Noisy conditions not only result in uncomfortable
living conditions, fatigue, inefficiency and mental strain, but prolonged
exposure to such conditions may cause temporary deafness or
nervous breakdown.

EFFECTS OF NOISE

It creates discomfort
It has adverse effects on blood pressure, muscular strain and on sleep.
It leads to fatigue and decreases the efficiency of persons.
It takes away the essence of music and speech.
It disturbs concentration.
Prolonged exposure to noise may result in temporary deafness of nervous
breakdowns.
Reduction in noise increases output of labour

Noise Classification
Outdoor Noises:
They are caused by road traffic, railways, airplanes, lifts, moving machinery,
machines in nearby factories or buildings etc.

Indoor Noises:
They are those which are caused either in the same room or in the adjacent room.
These are due to conversations between people, movement of people or furniture,
crying of babies. Playing of radios or other musical instruments, operations of cisterns
and water closets, noise of type writer, banging of doors etc.

Alternative Classifications of noise

Air borne sounds are sounds which are generated in air and which is transmitted in
air directly to the human ear. Such a sound travels from one part of the building to the
other or from outside of the building to the inside by openings like doors, windows,
ventilators, key holes etc. also by forced vibrations set up in ceilings, walls etc.

Air borne noises posses less power, continues for a long duration and is
confined to places near its origin.

Structure borne sounds or impact sounds are those which originate and progress on
the building structure. These are caused by structural vibrations originated due to
impact.

The common sources of this sound are footsteps, furniture movement, dropping of
utensils on floor, hammering, drilling, operation of machinery etc. These are more
powerful, propagate over long distances and persist for a very short duration. The
difference between the air borne noise and impact noise is related to the origin of
noise in relation to the receiver room only. In a three storey building washing of
clothes in the 2nd floor will be heard as an impact sound in the floor below it and as
an air borne sound in the room above it.

Transmission of Noise
Through Air
By vibrations of structural members
Through structural members
Transmission of sound/noise though air s more common. In this sound waves
travel through openings of doors, windows, ventilators, key holes, cracks in the
walls etc.
When the source of sound is very near, sound waves impinge or strike on the thin
structural members such as doors, partition walls, membrane walls etc.

These structural members vibrate and in turn set up secondary waves to the other
side.
The third type of transmission takes place when elastic wave motions consisting of
compressions and rarefactions of sound are transmitted from particle to particle of
the structural member in the form of pressure impulses. Such a mode is prevalent
where mechanical vibrations are caused like in factories, work shops etc.

Transmission Losses
When sound is transmitted from source or origin, to the adjoining room, reduction in
sound intensity takes place.
This is known as transmission loss and is numerically equivalent to the loss in the
intensity of the sound expressed in decibels.

Transmission Loss depends on the following factors

It is expressed in terms of loss of sound
The efficiency of sound insulation of barrier is expressed in terms of transmission
loss of air borne sound passing through the barrier.
The transmission loss offered by a structure depends on the material used and the
method of construction
It also depends on the frequency of sound

Acceptable Noise Levels

They are noise levels which will neither cause uncomfortable conditions nor
damage the acoustics of the building.

Acceptable Noise Level depends on:

Nature and type of sound
Time of fluctuations of noise
Background noise
Type and use of the building

TABLE SHOWING ACCEPTABLE INDOR NOICE LEVELS

Sound Insulation

Sound insulation or sound proofing is the measure used to reduce the level of sound
when it passes through the insulating building component.
It has different functions when compared to sound absorption.

The function of a sound-absorbent material is to absorb and thus reduce the sound
reflected from a surface, while the function of sound insulating construction is to
reduce sound passing through it.

Sound absorbers, mostly of porous materials, are poor sound insulators, while hard
materials, used for sound insulation are poor absorbers.

SOUND INSULATION BETWEEN INDIVIDUAL ROOMS

The floor of a room immediately above the bedroom or the living room
should have impact insulation

Concrete floors:
In the case of houses and flats, these floors should be insulated so as to reduce the
average loudness of impact sound by about 15 dB above that provided by a bare
concrete floor of normal thickness.

Timber floors:
In the case of houses and flats, these floors should be insulated so as to reduce the
average loudness of impact sound by about 20 dB as compared with a normal floor
construction of a wooden board joint floor with lath and plaster ceiling.
Reduction of impact noise requires the use of discontinuous or non homogeneous
materials in the construction of the structure.

Sound Insulating Materials

Non Porous rigid partition
Porous rigid materials
Non-rigid or flexible porous materials

Non Porous rigid partition:

The sound insulation of non porous, homogeneous rigid constructions, such as
plastered solid brick masonry walls varies as the logarithms of the weight per
unit area. There is thus, a limit beyond which it requires excessive increase on
thickness to produce only a small increase in sound insulation. The relation
between the weight of a rigid partition and its sound insulation is approximately
such that every time the weight is doubled there is an increase in sound
insulation of about 4 to 5 dB.

Porous rigid materials:

The values in the table 28.10 do not apply in the case of porous rigid such as
porous concrete masonry, cinder concrete etc; because of their sound absorptive
properties which provide about 10 percent higher insulation than the non-porous
variety of the sane weight. In order to secure the best insulation from such porous
materials, it is recommended that porous partitions should be plastered at least on
one side, and if possible on both sides.

Non-rigid or flexible porous materials:

These consist of felt, mineral wool and quilt etc. They by themselves provide
low sound insulation as compared to rigid materials and therefore they are not
generally used for the purpose of noise reduction and isolation. However, a
composite construction employing a combination of rigid materials and porous
absorbers may be adopted where weight is an important factor. Such a
construction produces better insulation per unit weight of partition.

Wall Insulation: Vertical barriers

Walls and partitions are the vertical barriers to noise. Their proper design and
construction may insulate the sound to the desired level. Wall construction, used
for sound insulation, may be of three types : Rigid and massive homogeneous
walls,(b) Partitions of porous materials, (c) Double wall partition, and (d) Cavity
wall type construction.

Rigid homogeneous walls:

A rigid wall consists of stone, brick or concrete masonry construction, well plastered
on one or both the sides. The sound insulation offered by these rigid walls depends
upon their weight per unit area, as indicated in table 28.1.The sound insulation thus
increases with the increase of the wall. Because of the logarithmic variation between
weight and transmission loss, such a construction (i.e. solid wall) becomes highly
uneconomical and bulky after certain limit. As can be seen from table 28.11, the
transmission loss (sound insulation) of a one-brick wall is 50 dB while that of a 1
brick thick wall is 53. On the other hand, a half-brick wall with 13mm thick plaster on
both the sides as TL of 45 dB.

Partition walls of porous materials:

As indicated earlier, porous materials may be rigid or non-rigid. Rigid porous
materials (such as porous concrete masonry, cinder concrete etc.), the insulation
increases about 10% higher than the non-porous rigid material. However, partition
walls of non-rigid porous materials (such as felt, mineral wool etc.) offer very low
sound insulation, though they can be used in combination with rigid materials with
added advantage.

Double wall partition:

A double wall partition, shown in fig.28.9, consists of plaster boards or fibre boards
or plaster on laths on both the faces, with sound absorbing blanket in between.
Staggered wooden studs are provided as support, though their number should be
a minimum. A double wall construction is thus a partition wall of rigid and non-rigid
porous materials.

Cavity wall construction:

This is an ideal construction from the point of view of sound
proofing. The gap between the two leafs of the wall may be left
air-filled or else filled with some resilient material, like quilt etc.,
well suspended in the gap. The two faces of the wall may be
fixed with Celotex or other insulating board. The width of cavity
should be at least 5 cm, and the two wall leaves should be tied
by use of only light butterfly wall ties.

Floors and ceilings insulations: Horizontal Barriers

Insulation of floors and ceilings act as horizontal barriers to both
airborne as well as impact sounds. Normally, the rigid
construction material that is RCC, stones etc used for floors and
ceilings offer excellent insulation against air borne noise, but
they do not function well for impact or structure borne sound.
Hence the objective of sound proofed floors and ceiling is aimed
at offering good insulation against impact sounds, and this can
be achieved by the following constructional features.
1. Use of resilient surface material on floors.
This consist of providing thin concrete screed as the RCC floor slab and then
providing soft floor finish or covering of resilient materials such as linoleum
insulation board, asphalt, cork, carpet. This provision helps to damp the impact
noise but has no appreciable effect on airborne sound. An insulation of 5 10
decibel over a base concrete floor is obtained with such a material.

2. Concrete floor floating construction.

Resilient material like quilted mineral or glass wool is laid over the RCC floor/ roof.
A waterproof paper is then laid over it and then 5 cm thick concrete screed is
provided. It is important that both the quilt and waterproof paper are lapped so as to
prevent concrete from getting through. Such a construction provides good insulation
against impact sounds.

3. Timber floor floating construction.

In case of floors constructed of wooden joists, the problem of sound
insulation becomes more difficult particularly in the presence of heavy
mechanical impact sounds. Resilent mounting may be used to obtain even
more satisfactory results.
A further improvement in the insulation of such floors is achieved
by employing a pugging or deadening material in the air space between the
wood joists. Either sound absorbent material like mineral wool of other
material like sand or ashes may be used the latter are more effective of the
fact that the efficiency of pugging depends on the weight of the material used.
In order to achieve useful improvement at least 100 kg/m2 of sand pugging is
usually employed. Mineral wool pugging is used mainly in conjunction with
the thin walls of 10cms thickness or less.

4. Timber floor with suspended ceiling and airspace.

This type of construction helps to improve the insulation of airborne and
structure borne sounds by attenuating and isolating them from room below. For
solid floors metal hangers of acoustic clips may be used to support the ceiling
below. The extend of improvement effected depend upon the weight of the
ceiling as well as on the structural rigidity with which it is connected to the solid
or wooden floor. Thus the highest insulation could be achieved by using a very
heavy ceiling which is arranged to be independent of the floor by supporting it
on resilient mountings.

Skirting
The type of skirting fixed will affect the insulation of the floor a great deal. The
larger the contact area it provides between the floor and the walls, the lower
would be the insulation. A typical a typical method of fixing skirting is shown. An
air gap or a resilient material between the skirting and the floor is used in this
method, or the lower edge is chamfered to reduce the contact area again, most
of the inner portion or the skirting is scooped out to minimize contact with the
walls.