How to Soundproof an Apartment to Muffle Your Wife's Drumming
NEW YORK -- Last year, when my wife and I had to beg permission from our co-op board in Jackson Heights, Queens, to swap our one-bedroom apartment for a two-bedroom unit, only one thing stood between us and our dream of getting our one-year-old son into his own room.
Noise.
My wife is a professional percussionist. After three years of hearing her play marimba, djembe and conga in our living room -- and hearing me fumble around on our upright piano -- our neighbors wanted assurances that we would keep things quiet in our new home.
One resident, a kindly old man who had always greeted us warmly in the hall, told us that he and his wife would never have voted us into the building in the first place if they'd known how loud we would be. Others told us we had to guarantee their peace and quiet.
Determined to be good neighbors and to get that extra room, we volunteered to do some soundproofing. That's when things got complicated.
The measures that my wife and I took -- spending thousands of dollars (and countless hours) on consultants, contractors, materials and gadgets in order to turn our new dining room into a professional-caliber music studio -- might go beyond the needs of many people.
But the lessons we learned would benefit anyone who entertains thoughts of soundproofing their home.
Noise problems are typically complex and multifaceted, and as our acoustic consultant told us, sound is like water: block it from traveling along one path, and it will simply find another.
To make matters worse, applying almost any soundproofing measure is harder in practice than it seems in theory.
Soundproofing materials can be difficult to work with, contractors aren't always familiar with them, and the quirks of existing construction can derail even the best-laid plans.
http://www.wired.com/culture/lifestyle/news/2007/06/soundproofing
