We recently moved my son into his own room. His room is next to the master bathroom. I’m in the shower by 5:30 AM, and the water noise wakes him up. What are the options to better soundproof this wall?
I just redid everything in his room; fresh paint, new baseboard molding, new carpet, etc. If necessary, I’ll open this wall up down to the studs (which are wood 2X4s BTW), but you can understand that I’d rather not have to go that far. Is there a loose fill-type of insulation that the stud cavities near the shower wcould be filled with? I could add another layer of drywall over the existing wall, but I’d hate to do that and then find that it wasn’t enough.
Thanks.
Replies
Camouflage it with some type of white noise generator. Here is one that purifies air and sounds like ocean waves.
http://www.loudfrog.com/itemdetail.aspx?detailID=24965
Thanks, but I think I need to decrease the noise, not camouflage it. The shower noise is waking him up. And no, I'm not the source of the noise in the shower. :)Another thing I'd considered is replacing the shower water control with something quieter, but I'm not sure how or where to look for one, or if that would be enough.
Reducing your water pressure might be an option. The sound of the water going through the piopes at high pressure is what's most likely making the noise.
If it weren't for you I'd be a completely different person. Maybe even happy.
Its not the pressure, but the velocity of the water moving through the pipe that creates the friction and therefore the noise. Short of upsizing the pipes and making all attachements with resiliant types pf mounts, not a whole lot you can do for water noise, unless lower flow rates are acceptable. Insulating the pipes and the wall helps a little and should be done as a matter of good practice. This is one of the reasons plumbing walls are preferably located adjacent to less sensitive spaces.
just a question... is one type pipe more quite than another?..ie copper vs pex?
does anyone put the refrigeration type foam on pipes for noise control?
i'm in the stage on a project where I can do this cheap if it'd make a difference... is the noise more in the shower valve or in the pipe?
thanks..
p
PEX will muffle sound where copper will not, but the sound due to velocity is not affected so much by the material as by the smoothness, an plastis is typically smooter than copper. Copper, rigidly mounted to the structure does an excellent job of transmitting sound. PEX, mounted via plastic clips, is much less effective at ransmitting sound and will overall be a lot quieter. Closed cell foam (armaflex) is a semi-effective muffler for some sound, however it does nothing about the sound transmitted through pipe supports to the plates, studs and/or joists.
My experience is that for water flowing to a low flow shower head in 1/2 copper pipes, most of the noise is in the piping and fittings, less so in the shower valve. For the same shower feed by 3/4 copper pipes, most of the noise will be in the valve, but overall the noise will lessened. The amount of time it takes for hot water to reach the fixture will be increased, as will the cost. In smaller diameters, long sweeps make for quieter pipe runs, run tees, quieter thna branch tees and much quieter than bullhead tees (always bad practice).
thanks for take'n the time to respond.... seems common sense and mass... pay'n attention to details all the little stuff adds up when you are working with sound...
p
cant ya just send the kid to military school? I gota say, a little noise from a shower shouldnt be a problem for a kid. They adjust for gods sake! If its a problem send the kid to bed an hour earlier.
Thanks, everyone. Although there's some dissension, there's a lot of good ideas here.Because time and money are not unlimited, I need to do this once. If I fill the stud bays with cellulose and find it doesn't work well enough, it's gonna be messy to open the wall to do something more extensive.I do think the hollow acrylic floor pan is a big source of the noise, and this noise problem would be far less if it was made of something more substantial. Am I correct in thinking that the entire shower stall would need to be demolished to replace it? If so, this isn't an option right now. The shower was rebuilt about six years ago with 4" glazed ceramic tiles. At that time, I was thinking about replacing the pan, but it took ten freakin' months to get someone willing to do a small job like rebuilding a shower, so at that point, the priority was just to get it done.I'm pretty sure I can access the underside of the pan from two sides, but I won't know how far under it I can reach to pump in some foam or mortar until I open the walls. IF I can do this, especially with mortar, I think the noise will be greatly decreased.After that, I will fill the stud bays with cellulose (or with whatever the consensus is), and then I'll add a few layers to the wall. If I can find a local source for the Quiet Rock, I'll use that. Otherwise, I'll install a layer of Homosote and a layer of sheet rock.Although a white noise generator may help, personally, I don't like the idea of adding noise to hide noise, so this is not something I'd consider at this point.Robteed, he hasn't adjusted to it in the year he's been in this room. It was my hope he would, but it hasn't happened. Ya gotta do what ya gotta do. All kids are different.Thanks again, everyone. Keep the suggestions coming.
Earplugs for your son?
Maybe some heavy curtains or draperies on the wall in question.Also, I saw a decorating technique a year or so ago in a fancy home where foam was attached to the wall and cloth or material was installed to make the room wall look "upholstered"..++++++++++++++++
-Do the thing you fear and the death of fear is certain-
The biggest problem is your approach. You don't really know the predominant source of the sound and therefore you will be playing lottery with any of the approaches suggested. Unless you like gambling, go hire a local expert to come, listen and take some sound readings. Then he/she will suggest the solution most appropriate for your conditions and budget. An ounce of analysis is worth many pounds of the wrong cure.
DG/Builder
You can deal with the problem in steps. Do the easy/cheap ones first and observe the results before moving to the next step.
Quiet Rock on Wall
Quiet Rock on the bedroom wall may be a good approach for you. It should be quick and fairly easy; a little expensive for the panels but low in labor cost and it only adds 1/2 inch or so to your walls. Attach it using polyurethane construction adhesive, but some home theater types swear by a sound absorbing damping adhesive called "Green Glue." Good website below.http://audioalloy.com/index.htmlhttp://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=green+glue
Replace Shower Pan
You can remove the acrylic shower pan without destroying your walls and install a mud and tile shower base. You will need to be careful but it can be done. You can find step by step instructions and pictures here from someone who did exactly that:http://johnbridge.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=19195&page=1&pp=15
Other
If you open the wall try putting foam insulation on the water pipes. You can also insulate the wall, but I suspect the Quiet Rock may do more good.
Do you close the bathroom door when you shower? Is there a big air gap under the door? Is your son's door closed? You can address all these issues easily, and it could greatly reduce the sound from the bathroom into his bedroom.
Billy
Edited 2/11/2006 9:39 pm ET by Billy
Thanks, everyone. The wall with the shower plumbing is actually perpendicular to the common bathroom-bedroom wall, so the water friction noise being transmitted through the framing theory holds water (sorry, I couldn't resist the pun...). The bedroom and bathroom are on the second floor with an accessible unfinished attic above, so yes, the top plates can be reached. His bed is on the other side of the room from the shared wall. I don't know what my water pressure is offhand, but I have no reason to believe that it's excessively high. My shower valve can vary the flow, and I keep the flow pretty low when I shower; I doubt I'm using much more than 1 GPM, if that.
Even though I got a little pissed on, I would still say the fastest/easiest thing to do is crawl up there - make some holes - spray or drop some insul in and see if it works.
Let's be realistic, all you want to do is not wake your kid.
I'm thinking you have nothing to lose by trying the simple solution - without building a frickin sound studio out of a residential bath.
It would seem to me that insulation has some effect on sound transmition or else multi-million dollar companies who make that claim would have been litigated out of trying to state otherwise.
Remodeling Contractor just on the other side of the Glass City
I agree. I'm just trying to find out what works the best. If I have to, I'll remove the bedroom drywall behind the shower to insulate it, but pouring some loose insulation down into the stud spaces from the attic is certainly easier and neater.Thanks.
What kind of shower? If it is a fiberglass enclosure get rid of it and put in tile with a cement mud base, and cement backerboard or mud on the walls. Otherwise you may want to try a white noise sound machine -- they really do work to mask other sounds. It's cheap enough that you may want to try it first.
Billy
Good point. The bathroom walls are green drywall covered with ceramic tile. The shower pan is acrylic. I'm sure if the pan was more solid, the shower would be quieter, but replacing that would entail redoing the whole shower, which isn't in the cards right now.You're the second to suggest a white noise generator. If I were to try one, either my son would have to sleep with it on or I'd have to put it on a timer so it would turn on when I went into the shower.Thanks.
Is the top plate of the wall accesible ?
I can't see where dropping in cellulose would hurt any thing.
It won't make it sound "proof" but it may take enough of the edge off.Remodeling Contractor just on the other side of the Glass City
why not just relocate his bed..?to another wall, within the same room, of course...LOL
"His room is next to the master bathroom "......
take your morning shower in a diffrent bathroom ?
Loose fill in the wall stud spaces is essentially worthless for sound deadning. I suspect it is not noise from splashing water on the shower floor that causing the problem, but contact of the water pipes to the framing structure that then transmit the sound to the wall, floor, ceiling surfaces that act like drum faces to put the sound into the adjacent room.
The first thing I would check is the water pressure and lower it if it is too high. Some fawcett fixtures make lots of noise with high pressure water supply. Experienced plumbers could suggest low noise fixture brands.
Put your ear on a water glass pressed to the walls and listen. You would be amazed at what sounds are in your house structure.
Finding and fixing the source of the noise is priority because other abative measures are more than an afternoon project.
http://www.quietsolution.com This company claims one layer of their Quiet Rock = 8 layers of regular sheetrock(acoustically.)
The Quiet Solutions web site should be required reading for all who ever have a need to know about sound in their buildings. Reading and understanding the information they have to offer will result in much fewer misunderstandings about sound transmission in buildings.I like your approach....now lets see your departure
Resiliant channel. This stuff has been standard practice in hotel construction for decades. You fasten the channel to the studs, and hang the drywall on the channel. The channel has a very small cross-section, and greatly reduces the noise conducted from one side of the wall to the other. Any real drywall supply place will have it. There are now other kinds of hangers which have similar properties, but which have other shapes, and somewhat better isolation performance.
Get the kid some earplugs. Or tell him to get used to it.
Yeesh. Do you hold his hand on the way to school, too ?
;o)
Rudeness is the weak man's imitation of strength. ~~ Eric Hoffer
No, Luka, he's already too cool for that. :)But I still need to do something. His teachers are always asking if he gets to bed early enough, because on the mornings he wakes up at 5:30 AM, he's sleepy in class.
I did a studio once for a guy who did mastering of CD's for recording artists and converted a three car garage that was attached to his house into the studio. He was super particular that there was no sound transmission into his house as he played the music loudly in order to get it right. He taught me alot about sound transmission and sound deadening and the simplest way may be to install a sheet of 1/2" sound deadening board over the existing wall in his room and then hang another sheet of drywall over that. What he taught me was that the best way to eliminate sound transmission was to eliminate any hollow areas within the wall cavities by putting in blocking at different levels within different bays, & then insulating. The sound deadening board over that & then drywall made it pretty difficult to hear in his house. The other idea someone else had about filling the wall with insulation from above through the top plate, if accessible, sounds like a good idea as well, and may be less work for you in this case. The sound deadening board is usually available at any good drywall supplier
Edited 2/4/2006 8:41 pm ET by VT.lab
What is "sound deadening board"? Is this like the Quiet Rock huntsab suggested?Would Homosote be effective for sound deadening?Thanks.
Get some fiber soundboard and glue it to the wall. Paint targets on it and its a huge dart board.
Uhhh, sounds like fun, but I'm not sure if DW would go for this...
Ah ! And trying to learn while sleepy is no picnic.You could just open the stud bay where the shower plumbing is, and spray foam all over the plumbing.Of course it would be a bear to remove if the plumbing went bad. LOLAlthough...I have seen spray foam used to form around products to be sent through the mail. You could do the same sort of thing. Line the stud bay with plastic. Cover all the plumbing really well with saran wrap. Then as you spray the foam, provide seams here and there with more plastic.That way, the problem is dealt with, and when it comes time to remove all that, it isn't quite as difficult to do.
Rudeness is the weak man's imitation of strength. ~~ Eric Hoffer
Easier, take a shower before retiring. Keeps the sheets clean longer too.
Billy and Luka have given me an idea. I think the biggest source of the noise is the water hitting the hollow acrylic floor pan. I bet one of those solid composite pans would be much quieter, but I'd have to tear out the whole shower to replace it, right?What if I removed the bedroom wall so I could access the underneath the pan and filled the space with expanding foam? I'd probably have to do this slowly or in stages; pump the foam into there too fast and I'd lift it off of the floor.I could then insulate the stud bays, and then add another layer of drywall, or better yet, Quiet Rock. Sound like a plan?
Sounds like work. But it's your house. I thought the acrylic pans were supposed to be set in morter. The other problem is that I dont think there is any way to get the foam under the pan because it will have lot of closed in areas, most likely it is solid around the perimeter.
My thought if you would want to put in a new wall would be to leave the existing one alone, mount noise abatement (hat) channel to the wall and cover with the noise reducing drywall, or 5/8. Insulation makes only a minimal noise reduction.
Another thing that might help would be heavy curtains along the walls. They really reduce noise. Also a decorative heavy turkish style rug hung on the wall would work.
Give serious consideration to the noise generator. As your son gets used to the noise, I think the shower would not wake him because it would be masked out.
Before you go tearing up the bathroom be sure of the source of the sound. Water hitting the shower pan sounds very different from the sound of the water running through the pipes.
I say that 'cause we have loud plumbing - more of a roaring sound than a water pounding sound. You can hear it just about anywhere in the house, especially when bath, shower and washing machine are running. We are slightly below the pressure where a regulator is recommended (70 psi, IIRC - don't quote me, ya gotta look it up!).
So, although we aren't at the point of risking damage to irrigation & washing machine valves, etc. and don't have much of a water hammer issue, it is loud. You can get a low-cost water pressure guage at the big boxes. It attaches to a hose bib and will very quickly rule out water pressure or indicate that it's a potential source.
I am not qualified to suggest solutions if that's your source.
Be a real drag to replace the pan and still have the noise :-(
Unfortuneately I think your only solution to really solving the problem is to redo the wall. I also built a sound studio for a professional. Sound will vibrate through the screrws. And it will travel wherever air can travel. To really solve your problem you will probably have to build a second wall. Make sure it doesn't touch the other one. Hold the drywall a half inch short all the way around all four sides and then caulk the gap. Insulate between the studs.
The interior wall of the double wall we built for the studio was as follows.
2 sheets drywall on the inside of the wall
2 sheets of drywall on the outside of the wall
3 layers of roll roofing on the outside of the wall
Fiberglass insulation within the stud cavities.
I don't expect you to go to these extremes but this is an example of a system that really stopped the sound.
You're right, I'm not going to do all of this. But what you and others are suggesting is that building up the wall and adding insulation may be the most bang for the buck. Thanks for this info.
buy a new house lol
If you have hollow core door change to solid. Second wall idea is best to kil sound alltogether. Good Luck
The only thing I have had success with is to open the wall, put in some insulation, then build another wall 1/4" away from the first and insulate that as well ( I also staggered the studes so as not to line up). You could try this in conjunction with the drywall channel discussed also.
I am facinated with the variety of answers you are getting..... the comments about lack of contact between the two room walls is the most correct direction.... reducing the amount of sound generated by the plumbing is a hit and miss, trial and error situation and requires getting into the plumbing wall to insulate pipes, cushion the mounting points, etc., etc.
filling the viod between the walls merely makes it easier for the sound to move across the space!!!
basic high school physics tells us there are only two ways to prevent sound transmission ------ vacumn or mass.... the emptier the space the harder for sound waves to propagate.... or make the mass to be moved by the sound waves greater than the sound energy available in those waves.......
two approaches that are reasonable for normal residential construction----- one -- (as used in townhouse/condo common walls) remove wallboard on one side, then add a 2x2 on floor and ceiling plates, then put studs in flush with new plate edges, and install new wallboard.... now the two walls virtually do not touch each other..... two --- add a layer of 5/8 firecode wallboard to the bedroom side. this is enough mass to make a huge change....
( I will have to investigate the isolation channels mentioned above --- had not run into them --- they might be a logical addition to either approach...)
don't let people try to make light of your problem --- its real and in a few years you won't want the sound generated in the kids room to get out either!!!!!
cvjxn
you can minimize the sound with soundbars and 5/8 drywall if you go over the old wall (bedroomside) I would rather tear the drywall off (board is not that expensive) and fill all wall cavities with rigid insulation.
Keep in mind unless you seal ALL openings from the bathroom (including the gap under the door) the whole exercise will be fruitless.
i haven't been directly involved but in a few cased during remodeling HOs have expressed a desire to increase the soundproofing between rooms. A GC we sub out to quite a bit usually starts by gaining access to the stud bays between the adjoining rooms and blowing in cellulose using nothing more complicated than the machine available at the big box and a length of plumbers snake to help work the fill in a bit tighter than the machine would do on its own. Likely he gets, at best, a little less than 'dense pack'.
he tends to favor gaining access by simply using a 2" hole saw on the drywall as close to the ceiling as possible. He has a good drywall man who does a good job making the patches nearly invisible but he has also resorted to installing a crown molding to cover rougher patches.
So far the cellulose has served the purpose for the majority of the cases. In one case, a home theater next to a bedroom, he added a layer of Homosote, a layer of 5/8" drywall over that directly, MR-1 run horizontally and another layer of 5/8" over that. A key to their job was they made great efforts to make each layer airtight. This assembly was repeated on two walls and the ceiling. The result wasn't perfect as the deep bass was still audible at high volume but the wife was happy enough and, as long as he kept the sub-woofer turned down, the husband got to enjoy his movies.
Whatever you do, stay away from using white noise in your kids room. While that is a possible solution, it also creates a mess of new problems:
1. Kid can't sleep without that sound.
2. Kid must think to bring that piece of equipmen on EVERY sleepover.
3. Kid must think to bring that piece of equipmen BACK from sleepover.
4. On every travel outing, you must allocate space for that equipment.
My wife can't sleep without background sound, now I can't either. I'd rather my kids waited awhile before they picked up a curse like that.
Rebuilding my home in Cypress, CA
Also a CRX fanatic!
Wow what a lot of of ideas and comments. Short of tearing things apart go with the easy plan. Get to the top plates (you said you had access) drill 1 1/2 - 2" holes into each stud bay can't be too many bays 2 or 4 for the shower. Have some blow in insulation blown in you can do this yourself. Also add some acoustic panels to his room, this is just a panel anysize 2x3',3x6' that is covered with fabric. These can also be made real easy use some colors of a football team or school colors to add to his decor. This should be rather inexpensive and not take more than a day to get done.
If that doesn't help then look into building a false wall in front of his side of the bedroom or tear in the wall. Your last plan of spraying foam under the shower is fine but to do that you need to tear into the wall. So if your going to do that then go the whole way. I would try easy and cheap first then go from there.
Jeff
I'm definitely not an expert, but i'll throw in my recent experience...
I recently redid the master bathroom and wanted to keep bathroom noises in the bathroom:) Didn't have enough real estate for double walls, or money for "professional" products, so I used two layers of dense rigid foam board insulation in between the 2x4 stud walls. Purpose being to add "mass" (within reason) to add resistance to sound wave transmission. Second step was to staple a layer of rubber sheeting (same kind used in flat roofing) on top of the studs, before hanging drywall. I believe this helped to isolate and dampen vibrations from sound waves even more, in addition to adding another layer of dense mass. I believe rubber sheet was about .060" thick. I was experimenting the whole time, but it worked out fairly well. Although not a sound studio, this bath is A LOT QUIETER than other bathroom. Only weak point i didn't address properly was the door.
Hope you find it helpful.
"...staple a layer of rubber sheeting..."
Dang, that's creative! They also make that stuff in 2" wide peel&stick rolls - for deck joists. Would give the same results of isolating the SR fromt he studs but a lot easier to work with.
The stuff ya learn here - gotta love it!
We just redid a master bath next to the baby's room and had exactly these concerns. We used a certified sound engineer to bless the wall system (sort of; he wanted to use RC, but we sold him on another approach).
Based on the fact that we can now use electric toothbrushes, shower, talk as parents and flush toilets against the same wall that the crib is on WITHOUT waking the little girl, I would offer the following advice:
1) Go to Radio Shack; buy the $89 decibel meter. Go into the kid's room with the shower running cold water and both doors closed and point the directional sensor at the wall, the seams and the air gap under the door; figure out where the noise is really coming in from.
2) If it's the airgap under the door, figure out how to either seal it with nylon pile and but a new, acoustically superior air make up/vent into the wall (usually, a vent high in a bay on one wall and then low in a bay on the other wall, with anechoic foam lining on the inside of the vent if you want to get fancy)
3) If it's the "whoosh" and rattle of the water coming straight through the sheetrock, then go directly to the http://www.quietsolutions.com website. Pull up the MSDS on the newest product, the THX certified Quietrock---this will kill about 56 dbs of A weighted noise without RC, without rubber, without anything. Order it, put it on your kid's bedroom wall, reprime and paint and be highly amused.
We went the Quietrock route, because even the best sheetrock crew will eventually acoustically sort and RC installation (or, your wife will when she hangs a painting)---and we couldn't be happier.
Skeptical? We were too; so was the General Contractor, the acoustical engineer and the drywall installer. They all ended up with architectural books from Quietsolution and they all appear to believe now.
Saved our sanity; we've had to installed a wired baby monitor system to hear what's going on in the kid's room. Happy to do it, given the alternative.
Drawbacks?
1) Cost; each 4X8 sheet costs between $80 and $140! Not Cheap; but figure out the labor and the cost of the interior floor space to build a double wall and it pencils out
2) Except for one line, most of the Quietrock stuff has to be Makita'd rather than scored and snapped; each sheet has a sheetrock/polymer/steel/polymer/sheetrock sandwich that sort of laughs off normal knives
3) See the part about a wired baby monitor system? the steel degraded the transmission of the consumer grade baby monitor system we had; our cell phones still work fine, as do the 900 mghz and 5.8 mghz cordless phones; but hte 2.4 system had problems (just the right frequency to get zapped by the steel layer?)
4) People think you're crazy until they see what it can do.
Enjoy!
NotaClue
Thanks, everyone. Dgbldr, you're right, I'm not sure where the biggest bang for the buck is. I was going to ask who a "local expert" in shower noise would be, but NotaClue's suggestion of the sound meter might help point me towards the right areas to concentrate on.However, instead of spending $89.00 on something I don't see further use for, I might do better with trying to correct each problem area. If money was no object and I called a pro in to do this, I'd imagine they'd replace the pan with a heavy composite unit, they'd add insulation between the stud bays, they'd try to isolate the bedroom wall from the drywall, they'd add mass to the bedroom wall, and they might change the valve for something known to be quiet.There's nothing to be gained by changing doors, because there are three doors between the bathroom and the bedroom. Doors are definitely not the problem.NotaClue, do you feel the money spent on the decibel meter was worthwhile? Also, your sound engineer wanted to use "RC"? What's RC?Thanks, everyone.
Hmmm.
yes, I thought the $89 on the dB meter was worth it, but that's because I was interested in finding out the noise level of a number of other things as well (the hum level of an HVAC system, how loud the car stereo was over the top of the wind noise in the car, etc).
Ebay might have it cheaper.RC is resilient channel; that is, flexible "C" or "U" shaped metal strips that you attach to the studs, then, very, very precisely, attach drywall to. In theory, RC decouples the wall from the studs; like a shock absorber system on a car decouples the car from the bumps that hit the wheels. In practice, no one installs drywall that carefully and even if they do, eventually, someone does something that couples the drywall to the studs again (for example, hanging a picture and driving through the drywall into a stud; or putting in a bookshelf; or attaching trim that is secured through into a header; or any one of a thousand things that can go wrong).In a perfect world, with a perfect drywall crew, RC works very, very well.
Everyone on our job agreed we don't live in a perfect world.NotaClue
Edited 2/13/2006 3:32 am by NotaClue
One other thought;
A cheap doctor's stethescope might help you too; particularly with locating the particular source of the sound travel.
NotaClue
Can you move his bed to the wall opposite the bathroom wall?
You could shower in the evening before bed and just wash up in the morning.
You mentioned master bathroom -- shower in the other bathroom?
If you've another bedroom that's not adjacent to the master bath, try moving him to that one.
Sounds pretty simplistic, but it's cheaper than re-building a wall.
Thanks, Leon. He's already against the opposite wall. For me, a shower is the best way to wake up, and I just don't feel clean during the day without a shower in the morning. The other bathroom is also next to his room, and the shower there is even louder because it's a full steel bathtub. Finally, there's not another room he can be moved to.All good suggestions, though.
Eh, worth a try, anyhow.Good luck, let us know how you fix it.Leon
I really think the easiest and least messy way is just to build another wall. I wouldn't touch the existing wall except to take off the baseboard. You can use some steel studs that are less narrow than wood studs and I wouldn't even nail the wall to the cieling, floor or other walls. Just caulk it in place. People are right about mass. Put as much drywall,roll roofing, EPDM or any product you can get your hands on.
Tearing up a wall or shower pan sounds like too much work and I don't think the results are guarranteed.
DIY'er here that lurks most of the time ....
NotaClue is giving you good advice. I spend most of my time in the Home Theater and entertainment system forums. There is a good industry out there for the soundproofing of these rooms and some expert advice. When you have over $20k in "TV and sound system", you don't need to hear the washer and dryer.
There are several threads over in this forum (more pages then you care to read) that have excellent advice. On the construction of a theater rooms, soundproofing what you already have, and the application of Green Glue. And most of us are nuts - like my spending an entire weekend finding the perfect place for my subwoofer.
Grab some food and drink, sit by the computer, and start reading at:
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/forumdisplay.php?f=19
Interesting site, TMT. I'll need to spend a little more time here.Thanks.