Soundproofing basement remodel recommendations please

[JonT]

I'm in the middle of framing my basement--adding 1100 sq feet to my living space in my house and part of that area will be a bar/entertainment area and home theater. What should I use in-between floors as sound deadener to really keep the noise down. I like to crank up the home theater now and then. Anyone good recommendations?

[HardDrive]

You can always use thicker sheet rock on the ceiling, but the install will be a pain.

I can tell that can lights are a huge source of noise. The combination of the floors upstairs + sheet rock is actually pretty sound proof, but the cans break the seal. If those are in the plan, perhaps have enclosures of some kind (that won't overheat the lights).

Wait wait....I've got it. Spray the entire ceiling with 2-3 inches of shotcrete. Sure, the ceiling will weigh 4 tons, but boy will it be sound proof....

[Dantilla]

Rock wool insulation (not fiberglass), and Z-metal under the floor joists to screw the 5/8 sheetrock to, so that the sheetrock is not in direct contact with the joists.

[RoninLB]

I filled the canned ceiling with glass insulation spaced to text. Big difference from empty. The upper floor wall to wall carpet has quality thick fiber underlay. Big difference from reg fiber.

The outdoor facing walls are sealed with shot foam then 2x 1.5" spaced high density foam boards that are also sealed. Thick spaced double glass windows using heaver krypton gas [I think. Remember only that they're different than Anderson's.]

then there is audio studio do dads if you have the ceiling height & wall space to work with.

And if you can design I would suggest researching what Frank Loyd Wright did to his small theater at the museum in Arizona . The walls are slightly angled to permit listening to sounds from far off sounding like they're close up. I would guess a downsized room would have 6" difference wall angle from floor to ceiling.


party hearty

[RoninLB]

Originally posted by Dantilla
Rock wool insulation (not fiberglass), and Z-metal under the floor joists to screw the 5/8 sheetrock to, so that the sheetrock is not in direct contact with the joists.

great advise imo

[javadog]

If you have the ceiling height and are really serious about wanting to kill the transmission of noise between the floors, get a copy of a decent book on audio or acoustics. You'll find that they will tend to physically separate the ceiling of the lower room from the floor structure of the upper room.

If that seems overkill, I'd suggest at least two layers of 5/8th's inch sheetrock on the ceiling. The more layers, the better, and the more dense the material used, the better. I'd also look at the various materials that are on the market for sound absorption. These can be more effective than fiberglass or mineral wool.

JR

[schamp]

I would suggest Icynene. I used it in my house and can say it is great both on sound proofing and insulating. Check it out. Good luck.

[many944s]

Originally posted by Dantilla
Rock wool insulation (not fiberglass), and Z-metal under the floor joists to screw the 5/8 sheetrock to, so that the sheetrock is not in direct contact with the joists.

+1

This is exactly what I did when I was running a recording studio in my basement. Kept all of the upstairs noise upstairs, of course some noise still made its way upstairs out of the studio

-Nick

[fastpat]

Originally posted by Dantilla
Rock wool insulation (not fiberglass), and Z-metal under the floor joists to screw the 5/8 sheetrock to, so that the sheetrock is not in direct contact with the joists.

That's the only way that I know of, the same for soundproof walls. You need a ceiling frame separate from the floor joists to avoid transferance of sound from one wall to the other.

[kach22i]

Z-clips, hat channels, resilient furring, double layer drywall, double layer draywall with bond breaking clips and furring along with acoustic insulation all work.

However...........start with a clean sheet of paper. How would you do it if someone paid to to re-invent the wheel?

Remember that exhaust system on your car you messed with a while back? Did you notice the pipes and muffler were suspended? Did you notice that the hangers were broken with rubber connectors and connected together? Kind of like your engine mounts too, right?

If you are serious, real serious for a little more money you can get something twice as effective as resilient hat "z" channels.

http://www.pac-intl.com/rsic1_ext04.html


The RSIC-1 EXT04 is designed for use where an additional drop for HVAC, Plumbing, or Electrical Chases is needed. This clip gives you the flexibility to drop a ceiling as much as 4” from its original height. The RSIC-1 EXT04 is also used to level out uneven floor joists. This clip has proven to be very popular with the Home Theater industry. It creates a dropped ceiling, allowing an open chase for the new wires, all while retaining the superior acoustical performance of the RSIC clips.




Call or e-mail them, helpful people lots of local dealers too.

[turbo6bar]

The latest issue of Fine Homebuilding has an article about soundproofing.

[dad911]

Don't attach the ceiling to the floor joists. Run separate ceiling joists in between the floor joists, and you will only lose a few inches in ceiling height.

[Dave L]

Originally posted by Dantilla
Rock wool insulation (not fiberglass), and Z-metal under the floor joists to screw the 5/8 sheetrock to, so that the sheetrock is not in direct contact with the joists.

if you are going to do it do it all the way as Dantilla suggests. I put rockwool between the joists and installed a drop ceiling for my home office. Unfortunately my home office is right above our family room with hardwood floors. The insulation does drop the noise level but not to the levels that I had expected or hoped for. Talking and the TV noise disappear but toys with wheels drive me nuts.

[fastpat]

Originally posted by dad911
Don't attach the ceiling to the floor joists. Run separate ceiling joists in between the floor joists, and you will only lose a few inches in ceiling height.

That's the way you build soundproof walls, working to decouple the structure, but the rubber dampened metal suspended ceiling may work too, I wonder if there's a comparison online?

[Moneyguy1]

Jon:

Similar project described at the following site:

www.silcom.com/~aludwig/My_Music_Room.htm

[VINMAN]

I remember back in my old band days, we stapled a bunch of egg cartons to the basement ceiling to cut down the noise. Me and my buds hit up everyone we new to save all thier old cartons for us.

[fastpat]

Originally posted by VINMAN
I remember back in my old band days, we stapled a bunch of egg cartons to the basement ceiling to cut down the noise. Me and my buds hit up everyone we new to save all thier old cartons for us.

There were several things we were supposed to leave behind when we left youthful years. Air-head women, bean bag chairs, games involving the throwing of a ball, exhausts that dump in front of the rear axle, shoes with cleats, and equipment made from eggcrates.

[VINMAN]

Originally posted by fastpat
There were several things we were supposed to leave behind when we left youthful years. Air-head women, bean bag chairs, games involving the throwing of a ball, exhausts that dump in front of the rear axle, shoes with cleats, and equipment made from eggcrates.

The "air-head women" where our main reason for wanting to be in a band!

[fastpat]

Originally posted by VINMAN
The "air-head women" where our main reason for wanting to be in a band!

Yeah, that's true, and most left that behind when we crossed our 25th year. At least that's what we told the loan officers.

[Plum]

http://www.acoustiblok.com/products.html

Found this when I was looking for sound proofing materials.
Have not used it but looks good.