I and installing ceiling tiles in a basement, which is located under a well traveled room with a wood floor. Currently when walkers pass over it is rather loud. What is the most cost effective material (on a budget)to baffle this sound? I know the tiles will be an improvement but I’m not sure if it will be enough.
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Replies
Well, the best bet, for cheap, would be to put drywall on the ceiling first, but that probably would interfere with access to mechanicals up there.
You could lay, eg, fiberglass batts above the suspended ceiling, but it likely wouldn't help much.
Probably you can find special types of suspended ceiling that are better at muffling sound from above (likely expensive), or you could cut squares of drywall to fit above each suspended ceiling tile.
Or use the Click and Clack solution: Turn the radio up.
Put a rug on the floor above.
If it were me I'd staple up
If it were me I'd staple up reinforced 6mil poly to the bottoms of the joists and blow in celulose insulation. The sound reduction is instantly observable above and below the floor. It litterally gives a hardwood floor a more solid feel and the sound reduction seems twice what fiberglass would provide. My partner did this when we put a new foundation under his personal house and it was an eye opener.
Having said that I don't know what the long-term survival of the poly would be if everything is simply dependant on the staples to hold it indefinately. Typically this is done then the space is sheetrocked.
I did a basement remodel with a similar noise issue. I ended up using R19 insulation in between the floor joists because we were trying to deaden the sound coming from the downstairs (opposite from your situation). Roxul would have been overkill for me but I believe it will work for you. Instead or sheetrock above the drop ceiling, try using 1/2" - 1" foam board.
http://www.roxul.com/stone+wool/sound-absorbent
Good luck.
You can roll out fiberglass batts.
They come in rolls that are a certain distance long when unrolled. Let's say 10'
So you instal the tiles to 10' out form the wall.
Then you take a roll up on top roll them out.
You can take a stick and move them around so they cover and are tight to each other.
It will muffle the sound. Not as well as other methods but I have seen it done in a doctors practice above the exam rooms.
You said you were on a budget.
Submitted by popawheelie on Mon, 01/04/2010 - 01:06.
You can roll out fiberglass batts
Pop, Usually rolling out on top of a drop ceiling and under the floor joists with the hanger wires etc is nigh impossible.
However, from a commercial ceiling supply (around here-a dedicated drywall supplier) you can get 4'batts of 4" and 6" that are 4' long. Perfect for on top of a ceiling.
I did a basement remodel recently with same problem. What I did was put 1" foem board between floor joist against bottom of floor and then R-19 insulation stapled to the flor joist. Then I used a suspened cieling to cover it.
It worked out better then I thought it would.
GaryS
Is this ceiling truly suspende or are you just putting the tile on the bottom of the joists? I learned something about sound transmission when I went to make a basement apartment and ran into code requirements for both sound and for fire separation.
What I learned was there are generally two components of sound ... physical separation and installation of mass to absorb sound. A suspended ceiling will help the separation. They may make special sound deadening suspension hardware (I don't know this for a fact, but I wouldn't be surprised that there is such a product out there).
A 'normal' install for a ceiling done in drywall would be 'hat channels' run perpendicular to the joists and two layers of drywall applied to that.
In your case you have another item that is potentially problematic ... joints between ceiling tile will allow some sound transmission. Insulations like batt/cellulose will definately help. An exposed joist will still tend to transmit sound.
Conceptually speaking a poured concrete floor base above would do a fair amount of deadening of sound. Use some of the principals of sound deadening to guide what you do. Rigid insulation won't do as well as soft stuff. They do make sound batt insulation (using rock wool I believe).