Sound Deadening at Home

Many people live in apartments that are above businesses. Such apartments might be above businesses such as bowling alleys, quickie marts, laundry mats, or taverns just to name a few examples. A common complaint about living in such apartments is the commercial noise that comes with the property. Even though such apartments can be rented really cheap because of the known noise factor. The tenant, in some cases can reduce the amount of noise from the business downstairs.

In such cases look at the apartment in question, … the first thing and most important is the apartment floors. Does the apartment have bare floors, or are they carpeted? Next, … how do you have the apartment furnished? Do the windows use shades or blinds, … or do they have curtains? Lastly, … are there any wall hangings?

I’d like to point out that large, hard, flat surfaces can be very good sound reflectors; Example being bare floors, walls and ceilings. A good example of this is walking through a concrete parking structure or empty warehouse, … noticing every step you take can be heard throughout the area. This is because the sound is contained and bouncing around off the hard surfaces creating a mild echo in some situations. The same can hold true with a apartment that has bare floors and walls. In a home, some of these noises can be greatly reduced if not eliminated (echoing for sure).

If the home doesn’t already have carpeting, get the building owners permission to put some in, and reap the benefits of having it when it’s installed.

If installing carpeting to control noise from the floor below you as well as dampen sound that is generated within your home, … consider the following. Assuming the building owner gave permission to do carpeting, don’t just throw a layer of wall to wall carpeting across your floors. First of all show your appreciation for the permission by having your carpeting installed by carpet installers. Now, … your choice of carpet should include the installation of a good sound deadening carpet under pad. Then the carpet of your choice gets installed over the carpet pad. This single project alone will show the biggest difference in how sound is heard in your home. Any echo effects you may have had in your home should be drastically reduced if not eliminated totally. Sound experienced from downstairs should also be greatly reduced or muffled.

A couple more steps you can take to reduce noise in your home is to make sure you are using curtains on your windows. Curtains being made of fabric rather than a hard material will absorb sound rather than reflect it. Curtains can do this not only by the material they are made of, but the design of curtains also assist in doing this. Curtains are not flat, … they have a wavy design to them. Believe it or not, this too can play a roll in how sound carries in a area.

Wall hangings, … remember what I said about large flat hard surfaces being a reflector of sound? If your home has large sections of wall space that aren’t being used, … you can put up some wall hangings of any kind to break up that flat surface. This can be almost anything to do this, … picture frames, wall figurines, candle holders or if you really want to kill some sound, put up a fancy decorative wall rug (again, fabric absorbs sound, it doesn’t reflect it). Of coarse for anyone who doesn’t know what a wall rug is, I should point out that even though the word rug is used, it’s not something you would put on your floor. Wall rugs are made the same way as throw rugs, but meant to be hung on a wall. Wall rugs come in all different sizes and themes, … and very in price quite drastically depending on what quality and size you get. I saw one on the internet that I’m thinking about getting. It was a 5’ x 3’ and had a black background with a gold border that had tassels on the gold border. The theme was a picture of a knight holding a sword. A little pricey at three figures, but I have a feeling I’ll be buying it.

Finally, … cloth furniture over vinyl or leather furniture is another option. Of coarse this is something you wouldn’t do unless you planned on replacing your furniture anyway or haven’t yet purchased furniture. Otherwise this would be a pretty expensive project.

Reporter Joseph Toth

Washington Micro Bank BBS