Walls and Soundproofing

[Mojooo]

Lets say all the walls in your house are going to be knocked down and you can now choose a new layour for all the rooms and choose where the walls will go.

Do you make the wall from bricks/blocks or do you opt for a drywall? Is there big difference in cost?


Also which is easier to soundproof? Drywall will obviously have lots of space to stuff in foamy stuff. How does a brick wall compare?

They will both require plastering. With a drywall this is done with boards and then plastering over right? How do you do it over brick? Can you just plaster straight on and does this save money (over a whole house)

[Driller]

If acoustic isolation (soundproofing is not really possible) is your priority then mass, mass, mass all the way. Either the thickest solid wall you can do, blocks, bricks, poured concrete, doesn't matter or if this not practical then a double leaf layer of plasterboard (each of the two layers can have multiple layers of plasterboard glued together for greater effect) spaced as far apart as possible with mineral wool between the two.

Note that a triple leaf (or more) system will perform less well than a double leaf system.

If you are serious about acoustic isolation then you need to read up and get it abnsolutely right. Anything less than the totally correct technical structure will result in failure and a waste of money.

[singlecoil]

Mojooo said:

They will both require plastering. With a drywall this is done with boards and then plastering over right? How do you do it over brick? Can you just plaster straight on and does this save money (over a whole house)

The usual way, as I understand it, is to place dabs of plaster onto the brick/blockwork, then use those to stick plasterboard to the walls. Then the joints are taped over and the whole given a skim coat. This will definitely be the cheapest way.

[herbialfa]

Starting from the face of 1 wall.

3mm plaster skim onto 12.5mm RIGIDUR H plasterboard onto 12.5mm SOUNDBLOC plasterboard.

Stagger all joints.

75x50mm timber studs then mirror the above process.

Use 25mm ISOVER APR 1200 in the cavity.

You may also want to think about the floor & ceiling.

[Mr GrimNasty]

http://www.greengluecompany.com/fivePrinciplesOfSo...

[Mojooo]

In terms of soundproofing I am not looking for complete soundproofing due to loud music or anything

But if I am losing my brick walls I dont wnat to be left with worse sound proofing and I want to take the opportunity to improve soundproofing

But amazing level soundproofing isn't required.

[tobeee]

Driller said:

Note that a triple leaf (or more) system will perform less well than a double leaf system.

Why is that? I had an extension last year, and the builder put triple leaf between us and our neighbours, which I thought would be impenetrable, but we can still hear them chattering! Sound-proofing wasn't really on my mind at the time as I assumed 'normal' construction would be sufficient, but I am a bit disappointed (and they will be too when I get my neaw amp and speakers set up!). Could I have the cavity on our side injected with anything to improve the sound-proofing?

[Si 330]

If in a cavity wall you can use acoustic wall ties.