Calgary is a big city, and with its size comes a whole lot of noise. Vancouver, Edmonton, Saskatoon & Winnipeg are all in the same boat; the sounds of daily life are practically unavoidable in public, but your home should be your haven, no matter where you live. The only problem is, many of the units in Western Canada’s bigger metropolis’, most popular living accommodation – apartment buildings and condos – aren’t soundproof…
Shared walls and ceilings allow noise to travel through a building – both airborne, and structure-borne noise, plus noise from flanking paths. With today’s quick construction, developers seldom build noise-impenetrable walls. So, if you want some peace and quiet, how do you go about it?
The first option is to decouple your ceiling from the upper level’s floor by separating the ceiling joists from your drywall. You can do so with our Resilmount Sound Isolation Clip’s that separate the floor and ceiling, and then utilize a resilient channel. Or if your building a drop ceiling with our Resilmount Isolation Hanger’s that allow a loose, hanging attachment between the ceiling joist’s and your newly installed drop ceiling. In both scenario’s we recommend stuffing your walls/ceilings with Roxul Safe’n’Sound insulation for added soundproofing and warmth.
If the noise comes mainly from the walls, you can decouple them – meaning mechanically separate two adjacent walls to make it harder for sound to pass through. Again, Resilmount clips can achieve this – but greater results will be achieved with the clips, and two layers of drywall with Green Glue Soundproofing Damping Compound in between, as well as a layer of our Noise Blok MLV (Mass Loaded Vinyl) to help with the lower frequencies such as bass from a subwoofer or deeper voices. Full coverage means no sound can get through!
One of our top selling products is our bQuiet Soundproof Windows, which is a secondary window that gets installed in front of or behind you existing window and mitigates sound by 75-90%. We have the bQuiet Windows customized to fit your existing window, so it doesn’t take away any of the functionality your current window has, whether it slides side-to-side, up & down or pushes outwards, we ensure that you can still open the window when needed.
The BIGGEST complaint we get about soundproofing, or rather the lack-there-of, especially from customers who live in a multi-family buildings such as a condo or townhouse is from “footfall” or “impact” noise. The only way to mitigate impact noise is by adding a sound control floor underlayment under your existing carpet, tile or hardwood floors. The underlayments we carry range in both IIC ratings as well as thickness, so be sure to contact a Hush City Soundproofing product specialist before choosing the correct sound control floor underlayment.
Lastly, there is a very sneaky culprit when it comes to flanking noise, and that is sound transmission through your pipes and/or ducts in your home. We carry a few products to help with this, but the most commonly used is our Anti-Vibe Liquid Damping Paste. This easy to use product can be either sprayed or rolled onto the exterior of your pipes and ducts, and it deadens the sound from vibrating through to another room or floor.
Other, less invasive options include, 2 layers of drywall and using Green Glue damping compound in between, as well as installing our Decorative Acoustic Panels specifically designed to absorb noise. For a lesser racket reduction effect, any soft, malleable furniture or pictures hung on the wall will soak up the sound to some extent.
With dozens of products to choose from at Hush City Soundproofing, whichever way you choose to soundproof your apartment or condo, make sure it’s done correctly – doing so means you’ll achieve your goal of peace and quiet!
Share blog:
Sharing is caring!