Party wall soundproofing
I searched the forum and found a few posts on party wall soundproofing, but I’m looking for more specific advice, and I would really like to hear from people who did this. After we moved into our house, we realized that one of our party walls sounded surprisingly thin. We can hear music, TV, conversations,…
I searched the forum and found a few posts on party wall soundproofing, but I’m looking for more specific advice, and I would really like to hear from people who did this.
After we moved into our house, we realized that one of our party walls sounded surprisingly thin. We can hear music, TV, conversations, vacuum cleaner, etc. The neighbors are not particularly loud, and what we can hear appears to be a fairly normal noise level (and they can probably hear us). The wall is brick covered by the original plaster. I was surprised that brick and plaster could transmit so much noise, but it does. I’ve read on soundproofing and I’m getting familiar with the basic concepts (mass and standoff) and with the materials. But the more I read, the more I realize that there is no easy and perfect solution.
I’d like to hear from people who soundproofed their party walls. What did you use and what results did you get?
And where in Brooklyn or NYC can I find soundprooking materials? I was at Lowes and Home Depot recently. When I asked them about soundproofing materials they only had Homasote 440. They had never heard of Quietrock and Green Glue. I was suprised since I thought these thing would be in high demand in NYC.
thanks in advance!
conversations like these are why I read Brownstoner. Thank you everyone for an informative and civil thread!
quietrock is great. and that green glue is good too. you should be able to put both up yourself.
We have the exact situation in our brick row house. We can not hear normal conversations at all but can hear music. They recently refinished their floors and the smell filled our entire house as well. The masonry joist pockets are the entry point.
“Built in 1899” really means “1899 or prior”; there was a large fire that year which destroyed thousand of City records.
I have no idea whether the single wythe party wall scenario was common in Brooklyn for adjacent identical houses. Similarly to you, the house one side of mine is identical and the house the other side is different. I haven’t been in a position to, or had the need to, ascertain how thick the wall is between my house and the identical one, but I do know that sound transmission has never been a problem (if it was, I’m sure I be told, ’cause I sometimes let my music really blast).
Thanks Jonhife, you confirmed what I was thinking about the way the houses were built. And yes, I was thinking that the party wall is probably not fireproof since I realized that there are holes in the wall at the joists.
These are 3 story brick houses in Bed-Stuy, build in 1899 according to city records.
Is this common in Brooklyn?
anyone know how much it costs to hire a soundproofer to do green glue (in one room)? i contacted one who quoted me $500 for the consult, which made me think that a full soundproofing would be really expensive. i’m only looking to do one bedroom wall and a boiler room vent.
i guess i deserve neighbors with screaming babies, since i live in park slope…
“The sounds will still be passing through the joist/brick gaps, into the space between your ceiling and floor, and up through your floorboards or down through your ceiling. Whatever secondary soundproofing layer you chose will require the removal and later replacement of a swath of ceiling along the party wall line to allow the sound attenuation to smother the joist area.”
This is true–start by insulating/caulking these spaces and see if you get a reduction in sound. You should hear at least a small difference.
as long as you don’t expect soundproofing to work miracles (total absolute sound isolation) you can do a lot. Marjam contractor’s supply in east williamsburg carries quietrock and if money is no object their best stuff can be amazingly effective at muffling unwanted sound.
http://www.marjam.com/
Okay, Ibis, your 3:16 comment explains a lot. I suspect your house and the identical one next door were built together with a single wythe (one brick, or 4″ thick) party wall. The shallowness of such a wall would necessitate the ends of the floor joists to penetrate all the way through it (they need at least 4″ of bearing) assuming that joist hangers (which I don’t think were used much ’til beyond the ’40s or so) were not used. The sound is probably passing through whatever gaps there are between the brickwork and the joists. This, of course, would mean that putting a second, insulated, drywall wall extending between your floor and your ceiling would do next to nothing to solve your problem. The sounds will still be passing through the joist/brick gaps, into the space between your ceiling and floor, and up through your floorboards or down through your ceiling. Whatever secondary soundproofing layer you chose will require the removal and later replacement of a swath of ceiling along the party wall line to allow the sound attenuation to smother the joist area.
The fact that the house on the other side of you is different almost certainly means that it has its own party wall. thus, between you and it there is at least 8″ or so of masonry with the certainty that there are no joist penetrations between you and it.
Incidentally, I don’t want to unduly alarm you, but if sound can pass so easily through that masonry wall, fire could too, especially if my premise that there are wood joists passing through it is correct. When were the houses built. These days, for sure, such a wall would have to be 2 hour fire rated with fire-stopping material at its interfaces with other portions of the building.