In the USAF we had to build sound isolated briefing rooms for ICBM missile crews. We used pairs of half walls that had their own studs arranged in an independent staggered arrangement with heavy insulation between. Worked very well!
I have seen people use something that I would describe as a “floating wall”, with risers and rubber dampers between the structural frame, and the sound barriers. Never got to see the finished product in person, so I really don't know how well they work.
Staggered 2x4 on 2x6 base plates work really well in isolating resonance. Doubling the sheetrock and using different thickness for each side helps too as each side has a different resonant frequency.
@@rjwinn1088depending on your construction standards and your desired STC rating, there are published schematics that detail what package assemblies you will need to implement. Adding a layer of 3/4in fire rock with green glue in between to your existing sheetrocked walls does a fairly good job. For those looking for better, there are metal resistant channels that you can use to create an air gap between sheetrock layers, results are pretty spectacular. Plus, assuming you have the strength to get it on the wall, you can add Mass Loaded Vinyl to the drywall sandwich to eliminate lower frequency sounds.
Oh, how times have changed. 30 years ago I happened to mention the insulation I was picking up at the builder's supply was going into the wall between the bedroom and living room. Those guys had some fun at my expense. It was unheard of to use insulation for anything other than exterior walls at that time. I knew at some point I would be trying to sleep while the TV on the opposite side of the wall was blasting.
Very correct my friend. Which is how I know that that drywall sealant thing is completely useless. It accounts for less than 1% of difference to the finished house
@@johnbergstrom2931 I don't think anyone would argue against that, but I'm not sure special caulking (Acoustic) is going to make that much of a difference. It's just like special low expansion foam for doors and windows. There have been a couple of contractors that have test that stuff and the expansion volume was identical in repeat testing. It's not unheard of manufacturers to change insignificant ingredient amounts by marginal bits, to call it a different product, to get consumers to buy a whole extra product because it's, "Special." Manufactures can make whatever claims on their products they want as long as it's not a regulated trait like fire rating. Now someone just got suckered into buying two tubes a caulk, one of which they will forget about, and if the manufacturer is lucky it's dried up so they have to buy another, "Special," caulking.
@@johnbergstrom2931 curious if caulking the end seams makes any difference? Makes some sense for gaps but I'd think doing the mudding correctly will do just as much good.
@@stillhavecommonsense6875 I see alot of disbelief on acoustic caulk, the wall need to be SEALED like a mf:er, dosn't matter if you put up 6 layers of 5/8 drywall with green glue in between all of them if you forget to seal any hole and i mean it, as little as a gap where you only can fit a sheet of A4 paper lower the STC rating.
Matt, 35 years in the industry here, the last 15 have been highly concentrated on acoustical construction. I sub out to the nation's oldest acoustical testing lab where I build to spec what clients want to test. Floors, ceilings, walls etc. If you are interested in how a product obtains it's STC or IIC rating, hit me up. I've seen a lot of snake oil and then crazy innovative ideas as well. Always enjoy your material.
@@matthewharaminac6348 I hope you’ve got a strong back and lots of help to lift it onto the wall! It’s a bear to work with. Borderline dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing. A 12 foot long strip (54 in wide) weighs over 100 pounds for high quality MLV. It works wonders, but the secret sauce is in the name, MASS loaded vinyl. You can kill sound with mass, you can isolate it with air. People look at soundproofing backwards. Instead of saying I want a quiet bedroom, what assembly do I need to use to accomplish this. Think, my bedroom is really close to these sources of sound pollution, (ie road noise, shared wall with a neighbor, the only bathroom in the house, a theater room) once you identify all the potential sources of unwanted noise, research the most effective way to limit that particular sound from being transmitted. Limiting street noise would call for a different assembly than limiting noise created by a massive theater setup in the next room. Also, I don't know if the garbage $2/sq ft quiet rock Matt was talking about really has a sheet of metal in it, but if it does, that would wreak havoc on most WiFi networks, just in case you might want to use the internet in your brand new top of the line sponsored space. I mean quiet space.
@@Nhfilz I've briefly worked with it before, and yes, it's HEAVY. I was recruited to help a friend of a friend with a home theater project and the MLV was part of the soundproofing. They put it in between two 2x4 walls and then each wall had Rockwool. I wasn't around for the Rockwool part, but the MLV seemed to make the space really quiet on its own. I was pretty impressed by the stuff, but I don't know if it's economical seeing as how it required a lot of labor.
I'm envious of your results. I showed my contractor your older videos on soundproofing, and he nodded and said he'd do all this. The end result was that I spent a lot of money on more expensive framing, better sheetrock, etc.. and the end result was really disappointing. You're right that you've got to be there and stay on top of everyone, or you won't get the impact you want.
I'm to the point that I would have to do this all myself. These details need to be done very well and the person would need patience. Two things that it seems 99% of contractors don't have or want to have. All about slapping something together and moving on to the next project.
@@chrisbabbitt4202 if you’re talking about using sealant between dry wall sheets, you should know he’s making a video for you, doesn’t mean it makes and difference. You should watch the episodes before drywall and see how sound deadening the Sheetrock insulation is to begin with. That has done the work already. The caulking (coming from someone with experience) makes no difference. Your contractor is not incompetent for not asking you to pay significantly extra to do that drywall caulking, cos guess what? You’re going to screed the drywall anyway! And that leaves no seams at all. Also this video has some building mistakes like installation of drywall panels from top down rather than from bottom up so as to ensure they’re stacked on one another by gravity and eliminate and gaps in between even before screeding
@@Timeculture - novice here but how does one install drywall bottom up and know the top most sheet will fit tightly against the ceiling? I can't imagine the extra work a short gap would require, or, for that matter, trying to reduce the height of a too long top drywall section. With my luck, I'd cut a too long drywall section into a too short section!
@@chrisbabbitt4202 In remodeling a house, the architect did 2x6 walls for around the bathroom so we could do soundproofing (don't really know what we were going to do, as I don't think either one of us knew anything about how to soundproof pre-TH-cam). At any rate, I checked in during construction to find the carpenter had built the walls with 2x4s. So, yeah, "slap it together and move on" was definitely their mindset.
@@mibz1117 Umm, I don't know what planet or decade you reside, but here on earth in 2021, the lie that girls were prim and proper was exposed a while back. Turns out it was never true, the girls were just smarter than us boys and thought far enough in advance to cover their tracks. I can assure you every time I go near my 7th grade daughter's room, I am reminded of this fallacy.
@@mibz1117 thats no reason to give one kid an entire room. Matt will be moving in 2 years or less once they have had enough of the military bunk accommodation nonsense.
Just in time, I'm doing a kitchen wall that I wanted to reduce the sound without going full recording studio / RC channel and multiple walls, you achieved really good results for not that much extra work, it is a TON of work and extra cost to get studio level isolation, this is a great idea for residential - affordable and excellent results! Thanks for sharing this Matt!
Hey Matt, side note what we've done in the past with really good results is frame wall with 2x6 plates and 2x4 studs separating one wall from other so there is no transmission of sound to other side, js
Best answer I’ve read on sound science. Decoupling and offsetting, along with insulation that must travel through pockets/paths that are fibers broken up, is the way to go.
The best thing for a great STC rating is to use a 2X8 wall and off-set the 2X4 studs. Do one side, place the sound attenuating batts and, then place the studs on the other side. The studs will transmit sound without an air gap and/or buffering insulation material. I recently spec'd this on a home between the great room and the bedrooms. Awesome result! :)
Yes, but Matt won't tell us about that because he only tells us about products that he is paid to promote. Quietrock wouldn't be happy if he takes their money and then tells us about alternatives. I wish Matt wasn't like that, but he doesn't follow the normal social media promo ethics.
The testing I saw said that while theoretically similar, offset stud walls that share a bottom & top plate are much less effective in practice than an airgap-separated double wall, much less an airgap-separated double wall with sheathing on one or both interior faces. What I would love to figure out is how to get a fire-code inspector to accept a buildable version of airgap-separated double walls, that doesn't throw the sequencing of construction off. I've also considered something like interior straw bale for mass, or perhaps a traditional exterior double-stud wall stuffed with cellulose, but indoors. Need more data.
Mike - novice here asking if you think an air gap is just as good as insulation (all other aspects being the same). Also, what do you mean by air gap and (or) insulation- how would you do both? Thanks
Sorry Matt, I don't know who you consulted with, but they missed a key detail of putting the caulking on the studs as well. The point of the caulk that you did is to eliminate sound cracks, but you could use _any_ caulk for that purpose. The quieting caulks are to eliminate sympathetic vibration from radiating from your facing wall to the opposing wall. Mounting the drywall to studs negates that, as it is a solid connection between two parallel panels. Last, I'd like to comment on one of your first comments: 'I think it's some sort of metal between the sheets' -regarding quietrock. No-its a polymer-base, like asphalt, that decouples the front of the panel from the back, although I think acoustic caulk and two sheets of 5/8" sheetrock is a better (definitely cheaper) solution. I think that you know your stuff when it comes to a tight house, but you have a bit to go when you want to be a quiet house expert.
Thanks for that clarification on Matt's 'some sort of metal between the sheets' mention. Otherwise the source of loud noise might be from his daughter's room with screams of: "Dad!! I can't get on WiFi!"
I researched this for our remodel last year to address terrible isolate Laundry room noise, and did most of the same things that Matt did (mineral wool, outlet putty, sound rock) with fantastic results. One of the things I decided NOT to bother with was to use soundproof caulking on the studs, due to the following FAQ I found on the Green Glue noise-proofing website: "Can I use Green Glue on studs or joists? We do not recommend using the Green Glue Noiseproofing Compound on the studs or joists. Green Glue must be used between two rigid layers to be effective and, as such, you will not achieve any measurable benefits by using the compound in this manner." If a company like Green Glue that makes money selling this premium stuff says that it's not worth bothering to put their product on studs, I tend to believe it. Maybe other caulk products work differently - dunno... M Fossum, you seem pretty confident -- where did you get your data from?
Selectively using the quiet rock with sad n sound by roxul, running a bead of the E90 on the studs decouples the board as an acoustic break same as a thermal break does for energy and is a godsend for shared walls of bathrooms, laundry rooms, common spaces and private spaces.
This is what I did except with thicker walls and more products from our theater room to the bedroom across the hall. We used 1lb mass loaded vinyl and SilentFX drywall. With R-30 in one wall and R-21 in the other wall. I don’t expect to hear anything from the theater. Also used staggered studs.
If I was going to that trouble I’d also put a bead on every stud to mitigate sound transmission, ensure outlets and switch on the other side are in different bays or use sound isolation channels to reduce the physical transfer of energy from rock to studs to rock.
My thoughts exactly. As long as your hitting all the corners might as well hit all the studs, it might take an extra 10 minutes but it's cheap and would probably make even more of a difference. Hadn't thought about offsetting the outlets on the other side but I like that idea
I did a double wall in my build recently. 2x4 with a 1 inch gap between each wall, then closed cell foam the wall. I went a little further by foaming the first drywall ceiling panel and the adjoining walls 4 ft in. On each side. Each room is 15x15 which includes a 4 ft deep closet that’s 10 ft long on the wall to hallway. From bedroom door to bedroom door, it’s about 24 ft. With the wife screaming on the other side, you cannot hear her except through the bedroom door. If you stuff a towel at the bottom of each door, you cannot hear anything from room to room.
People that are often disappointed about their soundproofing job ignore a door system that matches the wall rating. And not even STC, but low frequency too. The other two are windows that transmit sound not only from the outside but the wall that carries on to the other room. And flanking. flanking is the hardest by far in a home that isn't built for it in the first place. If you aren't doing room in a room or putting down proper underlay/floor system (Can include several layers of subfloor with green glue, acoustic joist tape, etc...) you might not want to spend a lot less and get 80% of the way there. That extra 10% or so will cost you more than the rest of the system and the last 10% is nearly impossible.
Tajima caulk guns are the best I've ever used. I finally got tired of using low quality guns and bought 2 of each size! That soundproofing looks like the way to go if quiet is necessary!
Most common acoustic control method I've used is mass loaded vinyl & rockwool insulation. From now on I'll include the putty pads & acoustic caulk, this combination is probably easiest method to achieve the most initial decibel reduction. Thanks for the video!!
Cheap way to reduce sound is to frame 2 completely separate walls with no connections between each other (parrallel to each other with a gap). No matter what one wall system will resonate sound through it. This along with Matt’s suggestions should be excellent.
Definitely don’t skip the bottom plate to subfloor joint - makes a big difference. Also any DIYers like myself who don’t want to spend $10/outlet for the Hilti putty pads, check out the HVAC putty (not mastic!). 1lb brick is like $3 and can do 2 outlets. Home Depot has them in the HVAC section but also over in the electric section, near the wire nuts and staples.
I insulated interior bedroom, office, and laundry room walls with Rockwool insulation and i can tell you it makes a HUGE difference in sound travel. Just standing next to rockwool installed in between joists you can tell hearing and sound doesn't travel very far. Not only great sound proofing qualities, primary reason i installed is for its extreme fire resistance. This stuff can be blow torched and still not burn. If/when there is a house fire it makes me much more comfortable knowing the bedrooms will have much greater protection.
I would use metal boxes in locations you're looking to do noise dampening. You can get a better seal between a mudring and sheetrock than you can between sheetrock and a blue box.
Hey matt!! I’m an inexperienced builder, but I love watching your content and absorbing any building techniques that I’ll be able to apply to my own projects! In an old project I used ZIP tape and silicone to seal an exterior light fixture in-front of the garage. I had no idea there was a putty to enclose outlets, though I felt I had good coverage from the tape. Awesome upload!!
@@johnbergstrom2931 I used the STI putty pads ~$4/each to soundproof boxes in a bedroom/bathroom, then took the rest of the pads and tore pieces off to seal the penetrations in all the boxes on exterior walls (I didn't wrap the whole box) so I got about 5-6 boxes per pad for air sealing. seemed to work well.
@@johnbergstrom2931 I don't think you understood what I typed. I fully covered the entire box on all the boxes on the interior walls that I prepped for sound proofing. I even used 2 pads to cover the 3 gang switch boxes... I had leftover pads from the box of pads that I bough, so I used these "leftovers" to air seal the wire penetrations on all my boxes that are in exterior walls. I am not worried about sound proofing exterior walls.
My childhood home built in the 71 had the double sliding door closets as a form of isolation between bedrooms. Only the entry and den's wall were in contact to mine and my sister's rooms. Now it been remodeled, the agency that was selling it torn down the den/living room wall, and the exterior brick courtyard wall facing the street. No doubt that'll raise noise levels in those 2 rooms now.
@@jimhendrix7776 yes only where I want sound proofing! I usually do it on bathrooms or toilet closets. Also on living room TV wall that's shares the same wall to a bedroom
I agree with you on the babysitting drywallers for sound details. I actually do a lot of the drywall myself (and I am the GC and the room designer Haha) I don’t do electrical receptacles in the wall cavities for studio’s. We do all surface mounted electrical and then build false walls for acoustic treatments. You can see more on my channel
Going back to the days of highschool and car sound systems: another product that could work well for wrapping your electrical boxes is DynaMat. It’s the peel and stick material used for soundproofing your car doors, trunk, firewall etc. Comes in larger rolls or sheets. Available at most car audio stores. Almost like an MLV (mass load Vinyl) peel and stick material. .
LOL. No matter the country, no matter the crew, no matter the how many professionals are paid to make sure things are done right, the details are only done pedantically when the guy signing the cheques is watching...
@@Timeculture I can't say, since I build almost entirely with brick, but I can say that when it comes to acoustics, a 1% opening causes a 10% problem. A 10% opening, and you might as well not even have a wall.
Unless you curate your crew. There are people who do right without being watched. Cameras are a great way to sort them out. Ask loose ended questions. Let them answer, then if they lied. Show the video and the door. Eventually you find the quality person or potentially help a bad thinker to be honest.
I could be completely wrong but I think pink sill sealer on the studs between the drywall might reduce sound travel from the next room. Loved the video - you should do the exact same test with a wall that doesn't have that same sound proofing.
Best way to describe soundproofing to a contractor is to tell them the room mad to hold water. Anywhere water would leak, sound gets through. Nice job wrapping the fire stop around the boxes. A common mistake I have seen is butting electrical boxes for different dudes of get wall in the same stud bay. Another great way to leak sound from one room to another.
Matt, as a carpenter myself I appreciate this content immensely! One might be surprised to learn that some others don’t want to or won’t teach the small details that can translate into important differences in build quality. This is incredibly valuable knowledge. Thank you very much. Best wishes to you and your family. The house looks amazing!
You should always use a bit right where your wires come through the side of the box also. This will help block sounds and cold air draw. It really is amazing how much air blows through the smallest holes. Caulk them all up!!!!!
Do you have a non-soundproofed wall to compare it to, like between the upstairs family room and the kids bedrooms? No comparison to a baseline seems a bit silly.
Run a little test yourself on one of your interior walls. If they're anything like mine (uninsulated) there may as well be nothing there, maybe a ~5-10 dB reduction at best for a vacuum cleaner.
Aw, Matt, you should have used independent framing for both sides of the wall with an air gap between (basically build two walls side by side without using drywall on the faces of these walls that face each other), and used some sort of foamy tape between all the stud faces that touch the drywall and the drywall. And of course eliminate any air penetrations in both these walls.
@@kapdolkim1914 Yup, anything that is available locally and fits the bill. The goal is to have some sort of an elastic dampenning interface between the wall frame and its sheathing. The effect isn't huge (a few dB maybe) and is dependent on the frequency of the vibration, but non the less - its there. And since its easy and cheap - why not use it? In sound deadening every little bit counts.
Uhhhh... Matt where is the control test of the vac through a wall that isn't sound deadoning?? Why not use a double offset wall. We have a job coming up where sound is an issue so were sacrificing 2" of floor space in order to disconnect the two sides of a couple walls in order to delete the telegraphing of resonation (sound transmission).
Like most of Matt's videos, he's not going to do any kind of real comparison because it's not an unbiased review video, it's a paid promotional video. Unfortunately you can't trust most of Matt's videos for that reason.
I get what you're saying, but 99% of houses have nothing other than 1/2inch drywall and 2x4 wall. So you can pretty easily check it yourself even without a decibel reader. 45 decibal is incredibly quiet (like a library). A regular wall assembly makes basically no difference to the original volume (I'd say maybe 5-10 decibel drop Max. So it's clear it makes a massive drop.
I know a builder that did his entire house including interior walls years ago. His house sounded like the inside of maybach. I always said i will do it on my build. I can barely hear myself talking in his house. Honestly your recording sounds different right now. I can hear the difference.
As a soon-to-be home buyer I want a "Zoom Room". And see it printed on my builder's floorplan "Bedroom 3/Zoomroom" - an acknowledgement that this room will be constructed differently from the others with attention to sound reduction techniques and materials.
@@johnbergstrom2931 In this day and age someone should invent sheetrock or some type of fabric that goes behind it and gives the room complete faraday cage protection as well.
Excellent video! Those are simple and effective tips. I'll be working them into my house designs from now on. I'm updating my typical detail sheets as I write this.
Isn’t QR more effective if you hang it vertically? I believe it eliminates the bead of sealant between seams since they land on a stud. I might need to check the manufacturer recommend installation one more time… I do love this product and also want to echo the comment about the ceiling…no pun intended 😂 Also the floor and adjacent walls... Sound will just radiate under, around or over the wall if this is ignored.
After the room is finished, corner dampers at the wall-celing junction will help too. You can just use a plush stuffed animal or something like that if you want to go as cheap as possible. It helps with keeping the sound that is already in the room from echoing. Not really to keep sound out, but to help keep the room's sound profile “softer”.
darrick steele - just to clarify, do you mean sticking a product or stuffed animal on the face of the finished drywall up in the 4 corners of the room?
couple of thoughts I would add. 1. When that closet is full of clothes, that will also cut down on noise. 2. when house is complete, Matt & his wife are going to get really tired of having to call there kids cell phone because the kids can't hear them when Mom or Dad calls out to them from another room
I've been thinking about this sort of thing for my upcoming garage-mahal build. Huge building that contains both an art studio and psychologist practice for my wife, but also contains an auto workshop for me to build unnecessarily powerful performance cars. Sound dampening is a major concern. Even in the main house with a two car garage, I don't want to worry about waking up my wife if I need to leave for work early. Like everything else, gonna be 'spensive.
I'd frame a core stud wall with no perforations using these techniques, and create an offset service layer on each side for any outlets that are required.
The best solution is to do a double stud 2x4 wall. Build one wall in front of the other, not touching each other, insulated, very little sound conduction happening because the drywall in one room is severed from the other. But that gives up 5 inches of interior square footage, which is something that you can’t always do. Sure the acoustic sealant and putty pads are good, better is no outlets at all on the wall. Build an mdf box for each outlet. Much better than the quiet rock is two layers of 5/8” drywall. Even better is two layers of dry wall with green glue in between.
“The major factor to consider in constructing walls to control sound transmission is the isolation of the gypsum board layers on each face of the wall. If at least one of the layers is not resiliently supported, or if the two faces of the wall are not isolated from each other, sound-absorbing material in the cavity is rendered ineffective. When the layers are isolated, sound transmission through the wall can be reduced by increasing the mass, the cavity depth and the amount of sound-absorbing material.” - Excerpt from the NRC publications archive for control of sound transmission through gypsum board walls
Try those rockwool exterior panels, and apply them directly to the studs after rockwool insulation in stud bays, or panels between layers of 5/8 " drywall.
I dont disagree that Matt is a nice guy or that he does quality work. He also has a crazy budget since he is a homebuilder / TH-camr and his wife is a doctor. I'm just not sure it's completely realistic for most people.
@@downwitakrowdy you are missing the point. It’s not about whether everyone can afford the details he shows. It’s about setting a standard everyone can look up to. People throw money into the most worthless areas of their lives. Maybe after watching this, a bunch of those people will ask ‘do I really need a newer car when I can put that money instead into my home and get it back in a few years?’.
I added a laundry room next to a living room. No fancy materials used. I built a 2x6 wall and used double 2x3s as studs - and essentially made 2 walls in one. Each side has 2x3s and they do not touch each other. I used some basic sound rated insulation. I caulked like crazy. And 1/2 inch drywalll on one side and 5/8 on other side. My drywall skills are... OK, they do not exist. So I again caulked like crazy to fill every gap before taping. The washing machine and dryer are against the wall and sofa and TV are on the other side. It is hard to hear them run. They are 1970s Maytags. Totally exceeded my expectation. All of the materials were just regular stuff from Home Depot, Lowes, etc. I do not think you need all of this pricy stuff unless you are building a sound studio. Keep in mind Matt doesn't pay for his stuff. Offsetting studs will do more than anything. Further, if you can't do a 6 inch wall you could do 2x4s turned sideways. It leaves 1/2 gap between. This with some regular sound insulation, caulking and 5/8 on one side and 1/2 on the other will probably be as good as Matt's wall. Another option I haven't tried - since I do not have such a project - is to use two layers of 1/4 sheetrock with some type of sound caulk in between. This is what QuietRock is. The problem with QuietRock is it is hard to find and very expensive. I bet you can make your own QuietRock that will be 90% as good for a fraction of the price.
You can use fiberglass as it has the same STC rating as rockwool and much cheaper.. 2 sheets of 5/8" drywall on each side is more cost effective and will provide great results.
Don't even really need two sheets. The room we just did recently with just the rockwool up in the walls and no drywall on it muffled sounds so much it was actually weird to stand in the room and talk. Rockwool's safe n sound or even just regular rockwool is CRAZY good at reducing sound transmission by itself. All the other little details might get you another db here or there in sound reduction.
@@robsp32As soon as you put drywall up it will echo again. Open walls with any insulation is going to sound quiet, like if you went outside in a snow storm.. Also Rockwool doesn't outperform fiberglass in STCs and if you did that same open wall test with unfaced fiberglass you would have had the exact same results.... Also you 100% need MASS to reduce low frequencies so, yes you do need double drywall... I would suggest you head over to AVS or another audio forum and look at the actual science and real world applications..
I could be wrong but I think the acoustic caulk goes on the face of the studs to dampen vibrations going through the wall, it's not really a seam sealer
What a lot of people don't understand about decibels is that it is a logarithmic scale. To understand just how much noise reduction that is... a 3 dB drop means you cut the sound in half. So a 30 dB drop means you cut the sound in half TEN TIMES. That's over 1,000 times quieter.
A 30db drop is really nice. A 5x cost difference in the boards is not. But I'd like to see a wall built with quietrock, versus a double wall built with 3/4 or one inch sheet rock on both sides to seevsome objective comparisons. And, loud radio or tv, not just a shopvac. I know that's trivial, but it would mean objective numbers.
@@MrCJHamill Damnino. There are of special ones like QuietRock that the big box chains won't carry. A pickup truck and a couple of hours may be needed. But two thinner sheets, bonded with acoustic glue, are quieter than one thicker sheet. The sheetrock that is lead lined, used for xray rooms, really dead quiet.
Good attention around the edges with soundproofing caulk. A lot of the sound is transmitted through the studs. Have any builders explored the use of an acoustic tape in similar detail spec or used a dBoard with better results?
In the late 1970's in Manhattan, I sound-proofed my 2000sq/ft loft space using 5/8 sheetrock on top of 1/2 inch sound-proof fiber-board after sealing the metal studs with caulking compound and filling the voids with fiberglass insulation. As a result, you could not hear conversations in adjoining rooms and hardly any music.
I don't there is much sound difference between the QuietRock drywall and a 5/8 Firecode Sheetrock with the preparation that you did. The insulation and the air gap sealing is doing 90 - 95% of the work, it doesn't justify 5x-6x the cost of the drywall.
I wish he showed an example of what the sound reduction would be without all those steps. Surely there’s a wall in his house where that wasn’t done that he could’ve tested and shown for us. Maybe one of you builders should have a channel that responds to Matt’s with more data, $-figures, and results to see whether this high-end Austin mindset is as useful as it is promoted to be, or simply leans towards pretentiousness. Keep in mind, I’m not knocking any of it. If folks want to and can afford to go to these lengths, I’m happy for them and God’s blessing on their life, but I’d rather see just how useful some of these techniques are.
It's easy to justify when you're getting everything for free or at a deep discount like Matt is. No one in their right mind who is paying market prices for materials will go this crazy.
I've done this method before and I personally don't like it because it's super messy and it shows on your video. You're kind of smearing Acoustic sealant all over the place and it's a mess for your sheetrockers too especially when you have to handle just a bulky object with a mess all over the edges. A lot of times this becomes a sub-gap installation where your rockers might not want to do it or they treat it as a sperate day's job. Your rockers hate it, and your finishers hate it. Really the best solution is to double sheetrock. You install your quietrock or standard sheetrock, then you run a bead of sealant around the edge, and the seams. Then you install a 2nd layer with green glue and you have an incredibly quiet assembly. That way your finishers don't have to deal with the mess your sealant leaves behind since it's behind a layer of clean sheetrock. Sheetrock is cheap, time and labor is expensive. I wouldn't want my subs to do it this way because it's costly and it doesn't make as much of a difference compared to doing it the right way.
He installed double sheetrock. He pointed that out. It's one of those things where the little gap of air between boards will leak sound. Mud won't do much. Fill the whole gap with more substantial material. Does a quality job all around. Sounds like your solution does make more sense for builders though. Hard to trust a crew to do a more picky job like this.
@@edgeofsins As a builder you need to respect your subs, don't ask to do work you wouldn't do yourself. Matt's installation is a huge mess, trust me I've done it before. It's a mess for the guys doing the job, and it's a mess for your tapers. That's why it's easier to install your rock, and seal the seam with sealant, then cover it with another layer. Even if you use 1/4" rock. It's cleaner, and you're not mudding over a sticky uncurbable substance. I'm used to homes with noise dampening. There's a lot better ways than troweling acoustic sealant everywhere.
Nice video, though I'm not convinced by your test at the end. It definitely was quieter in your daughter's room. However, the real question is not whether the noise was lower in your daughter's room, but what would the noise reduction have been if you had not taken your sound-proofing precautions. This, of course, is a lot more difficult to do! I suppose you could remove the QR, and install normal drywall, or build another, identical house, but without the QR between the two rooms. You get my point. In any case, despite the weakness of this experiment, I enjoyed the video.
@@johnbergstrom2931 Thanks for clarifying, John. However, I expected the sound to be lower in his daughter's room. I just can't appreciate from that part of his video how much of a difference the special sound proofing treatment made. You need a controlled experiment to do this: one measurement without the special drywall and another with it. It's not practical to do in this situation. However, I trust that you're right, and that the treatment makes a big difference in reducing sound transmission.
@@johnbergstrom2931 The Quiet Rock has a layer of something in the middle and Matt is using sound caulk everywhere else. Different density material layers transmit at different rates. These are minute changes that have a cumulative effect. Sure, bass sounds are hardest to prevent, but some reduction is better than no reduction. Maybe you are right, maybe not. This is still an evolving science.
It will be good if you perform the same test on a control room w/o the acoustic protection. I have absolutely no idea how much improvement the acoustic control provided
Your daughter will probably be happy about her room but the boys might not be so happy and hate each other after a short while almost laying in the same bed.. Do you have a plan for when you need 3 bedrooms instead of one?
Yeah I'm fuckin' baffled that he builds this giant state of the art mansion and doesn't even give each kid his own room. The giant gaps under the doors are also a puzzle, why not have ducted returns?
100 years ago you’d have 10 people sleeping in one room. 2021 three young boys sleeping in the same room is a injustice. Seriously? I can’t think of a singular reasons WHY these boys should have the same room. Cause they fight? It’s called parenting.
Sheetrock hanging went from 2500 install to 25,000 lol. I definitely do this for a game room though. But Spray foam and double sheet rock works wonders .
I’d love to know what full cost of the Real Rebuild project has come to?? I know that a lot of the products were sponsored, but what would it cost for average consumer paying for all this product? Maybe sq. ft. price?
Matt- you did good job on self fliming this video, the question ia will you let your kids paint their room?? I think they deserve to have some personalized room.
Question - when sheathing a house with OSB or plywood you leave a 1/8” gap. Should you tape those seams? If so what type and brand of tape? Does the same go for the roof too?
In the USAF we had to build sound isolated briefing rooms for ICBM missile crews. We used pairs of half walls that had their own studs arranged in an independent staggered arrangement with heavy insulation between. Worked very well!
I have seen people use something that I would describe as a “floating wall”, with risers and rubber dampers between the structural frame, and the sound barriers. Never got to see the finished product in person, so I really don't know how well they work.
Staggered 2x4 on 2x6 base plates work really well in isolating resonance.
Doubling the sheetrock and using different thickness for each side helps too as each side has a different resonant frequency.
@@rjwinn1088depending on your construction standards and your desired STC rating, there are published schematics that detail what package assemblies you will need to implement. Adding a layer of 3/4in fire rock with green glue in between to your existing sheetrocked walls does a fairly good job. For those looking for better, there are metal resistant channels that you can use to create an air gap between sheetrock layers, results are pretty spectacular. Plus, assuming you have the strength to get it on the wall, you can add Mass Loaded Vinyl to the drywall sandwich to eliminate lower frequency sounds.
Oh, how times have changed. 30 years ago I happened to mention the insulation I was picking up at the builder's supply was going into the wall between the bedroom and living room. Those guys had some fun at my expense. It was unheard of to use insulation for anything other than exterior walls at that time. I knew at some point I would be trying to sleep while the TV on the opposite side of the wall was blasting.
Very correct my friend. Which is how I know that that drywall sealant thing is completely useless. It accounts for less than 1% of difference to the finished house
@@johnbergstrom2931 I don't think anyone would argue against that, but I'm not sure special caulking (Acoustic) is going to make that much of a difference. It's just like special low expansion foam for doors and windows. There have been a couple of contractors that have test that stuff and the expansion volume was identical in repeat testing. It's not unheard of manufacturers to change insignificant ingredient amounts by marginal bits, to call it a different product, to get consumers to buy a whole extra product because it's, "Special." Manufactures can make whatever claims on their products they want as long as it's not a regulated trait like fire rating. Now someone just got suckered into buying two tubes a caulk, one of which they will forget about, and if the manufacturer is lucky it's dried up so they have to buy another, "Special," caulking.
@@johnbergstrom2931 curious if caulking the end seams makes any difference? Makes some sense for gaps but I'd think doing the mudding correctly will do just as much good.
@@stillhavecommonsense6875 I see alot of disbelief on acoustic caulk, the wall need to be SEALED like a mf:er, dosn't matter if you put up 6 layers of 5/8 drywall with green glue in between all of them if you forget to seal any hole and i mean it, as little as a gap where you only can fit a sheet of A4 paper lower the STC rating.
Matt, 35 years in the industry here, the last 15 have been highly concentrated on acoustical construction. I sub out to the nation's oldest acoustical testing lab where I build to spec what clients want to test. Floors, ceilings, walls etc. If you are interested in how a product obtains it's STC or IIC rating, hit me up. I've seen a lot of snake oil and then crazy innovative ideas as well. Always enjoy your material.
What's your take on mass-loaded vinyl?
@@matthewharaminac6348 I hope you’ve got a strong back and lots of help to lift it onto the wall! It’s a bear to work with. Borderline dangerous if you don’t know what you’re doing. A 12 foot long strip (54 in wide) weighs over 100 pounds for high quality MLV. It works wonders, but the secret sauce is in the name, MASS loaded vinyl. You can kill sound with mass, you can isolate it with air.
People look at soundproofing backwards. Instead of saying I want a quiet bedroom, what assembly do I need to use to accomplish this. Think, my bedroom is really close to these sources of sound pollution, (ie road noise, shared wall with a neighbor, the only bathroom in the house, a theater room) once you identify all the potential sources of unwanted noise, research the most effective way to limit that particular sound from being transmitted. Limiting street noise would call for a different assembly than limiting noise created by a massive theater setup in the next room.
Also, I don't know if the garbage $2/sq ft quiet rock Matt was talking about really has a sheet of metal in it, but if it does, that would wreak havoc on most WiFi networks, just in case you might want to use the internet in your brand new top of the line sponsored space. I mean quiet space.
@@Nhfilz I've briefly worked with it before, and yes, it's HEAVY. I was recruited to help a friend of a friend with a home theater project and the MLV was part of the soundproofing. They put it in between two 2x4 walls and then each wall had Rockwool. I wasn't around for the Rockwool part, but the MLV seemed to make the space really quiet on its own. I was pretty impressed by the stuff, but I don't know if it's economical seeing as how it required a lot of labor.
Please PM me Need advice 🙏
I'm envious of your results. I showed my contractor your older videos on soundproofing, and he nodded and said he'd do all this. The end result was that I spent a lot of money on more expensive framing, better sheetrock, etc.. and the end result was really disappointing. You're right that you've got to be there and stay on top of everyone, or you won't get the impact you want.
It’s a little more complicated than that but definitely true
I'm to the point that I would have to do this all myself. These details need to be done very well and the person would need patience. Two things that it seems 99% of contractors don't have or want to have. All about slapping something together and moving on to the next project.
@@chrisbabbitt4202 if you’re talking about using sealant between dry wall sheets, you should know he’s making a video for you, doesn’t mean it makes and difference. You should watch the episodes before drywall and see how sound deadening the Sheetrock insulation is to begin with. That has done the work already. The caulking (coming from someone with experience) makes no difference.
Your contractor is not incompetent for not asking you to pay significantly extra to do that drywall caulking, cos guess what? You’re going to screed the drywall anyway! And that leaves no seams at all.
Also this video has some building mistakes like installation of drywall panels from top down rather than from bottom up so as to ensure they’re stacked on one another by gravity and eliminate and gaps in between even before screeding
@@Timeculture - novice here but how does one install drywall bottom up and know the top most sheet will fit tightly against the ceiling? I can't imagine the extra work a short gap would require, or, for that matter, trying to reduce the height of a too long top drywall section. With my luck, I'd cut a too long drywall section into a too short section!
@@chrisbabbitt4202 In remodeling a house, the architect did 2x6 walls for around the bathroom so we could do soundproofing (don't really know what we were going to do, as I don't think either one of us knew anything about how to soundproof pre-TH-cam). At any rate, I checked in during construction to find the carpenter had built the walls with 2x4s. So, yeah, "slap it together and move on" was definitely their mindset.
Who's his favourite kid? 😂
Daughter - soundproof private bedroom w/ onsuite bath.
Sons - the three of you share a room w/ 3 single beds, hostel style.
Smart move by matt , maybe he knows the boys won't have the room tidy and the daughter will have her room spotless
That's a pro tip to get the boys out of the house faster and get them off of the family payroll.
And the boys were stoked they didn’t have to listen to their sister whine
@@mibz1117 Umm, I don't know what planet or decade you reside, but here on earth in 2021, the lie that girls were prim and proper was exposed a while back. Turns out it was never true, the girls were just smarter than us boys and thought far enough in advance to cover their tracks.
I can assure you every time I go near my 7th grade daughter's room, I am reminded of this fallacy.
@@mibz1117 thats no reason to give one kid an entire room. Matt will be moving in 2 years or less once they have had enough of the military bunk accommodation nonsense.
Just in time, I'm doing a kitchen wall that I wanted to reduce the sound without going full recording studio / RC channel and multiple walls, you achieved really good results for not that much extra work, it is a TON of work and extra cost to get studio level isolation, this is a great idea for residential - affordable and excellent results! Thanks for sharing this Matt!
Resilient channel is a really good bang for your buck to reduce sound transmission
Hey Matt, side note what we've done in the past with really good results is frame wall with 2x6 plates and 2x4 studs separating one wall from other so there is no transmission of sound to other side, js
That is the way we did it in the old dsys
@@raymondpeters9186 old but a goody
Yup. Still works. Just left a comment about a job coming up with that spec'd.
I assume the studs on one side of the wall are on different layouts than the other side? Makes sense though, good tip.
@@stgibson2810 yes sir
We also mount the drywall on rubber stand-offs to decouple the wall lineings with the frame
Best answer I’ve read on sound science. Decoupling and offsetting, along with insulation that must travel through pockets/paths that are fibers broken up, is the way to go.
The best thing for a great STC rating is to use a 2X8 wall and off-set the 2X4 studs. Do one side, place the sound attenuating batts and, then place the studs on the other side.
The studs will transmit sound without an air gap and/or buffering insulation material.
I recently spec'd this on a home between the great room and the bedrooms. Awesome result! :)
2x6 with offset works too.
Yes, but Matt won't tell us about that because he only tells us about products that he is paid to promote. Quietrock wouldn't be happy if he takes their money and then tells us about alternatives. I wish Matt wasn't like that, but he doesn't follow the normal social media promo ethics.
@@orrd sad, but appears very much to be the case.
The testing I saw said that while theoretically similar, offset stud walls that share a bottom & top plate are much less effective in practice than an airgap-separated double wall, much less an airgap-separated double wall with sheathing on one or both interior faces. What I would love to figure out is how to get a fire-code inspector to accept a buildable version of airgap-separated double walls, that doesn't throw the sequencing of construction off.
I've also considered something like interior straw bale for mass, or perhaps a traditional exterior double-stud wall stuffed with cellulose, but indoors. Need more data.
Mike - novice here asking if you think an air gap is just as good as insulation (all other aspects being the same). Also, what do you mean by air gap and (or) insulation- how would you do both? Thanks
Sorry Matt, I don't know who you consulted with, but they missed a key detail of putting the caulking on the studs as well. The point of the caulk that you did is to eliminate sound cracks, but you could use _any_ caulk for that purpose. The quieting caulks are to eliminate sympathetic vibration from radiating from your facing wall to the opposing wall. Mounting the drywall to studs negates that, as it is a solid connection between two parallel panels.
Last, I'd like to comment on one of your first comments: 'I think it's some sort of metal between the sheets' -regarding quietrock. No-its a polymer-base, like asphalt, that decouples the front of the panel from the back, although I think acoustic caulk and two sheets of 5/8" sheetrock is a better (definitely cheaper) solution. I think that you know your stuff when it comes to a tight house, but you have a bit to go when you want to be a quiet house expert.
Thanks for that clarification on Matt's 'some sort of metal between the sheets' mention. Otherwise the source of loud noise might be from his daughter's room with screams of: "Dad!! I can't get on WiFi!"
I researched this for our remodel last year to address terrible isolate Laundry room noise, and did most of the same things that Matt did (mineral wool, outlet putty, sound rock) with fantastic results. One of the things I decided NOT to bother with was to use soundproof caulking on the studs, due to the following FAQ I found on the Green Glue noise-proofing website:
"Can I use Green Glue on studs or joists?
We do not recommend using the Green Glue Noiseproofing Compound on the studs or joists. Green Glue must be used between two rigid layers to be effective and, as such, you will not achieve any measurable benefits by using the compound in this manner."
If a company like Green Glue that makes money selling this premium stuff says that it's not worth bothering to put their product on studs, I tend to believe it. Maybe other caulk products work differently - dunno...
M Fossum, you seem pretty confident -- where did you get your data from?
Selectively using the quiet rock with sad n sound by roxul, running a bead of the E90 on the studs decouples the board as an acoustic break same as a thermal break does for energy and is a godsend for shared walls of bathrooms, laundry rooms, common spaces and private spaces.
This is what I did except with thicker walls and more products from our theater room to the bedroom across the hall. We used 1lb mass loaded vinyl and SilentFX drywall. With R-30 in one wall and R-21 in the other wall. I don’t expect to hear anything from the theater. Also used staggered studs.
Some of my walls have 7 layers of plywood and drywall with room within a room construction lol
@@johnbergstrom2931 More mass = better, simple as that.
If I was going to that trouble I’d also put a bead on every stud to mitigate sound transmission, ensure outlets and switch on the other side are in different bays or use sound isolation channels to reduce the physical transfer of energy from rock to studs to rock.
I was about to say that too, makes the connection less ridgid
My thoughts exactly. As long as your hitting all the corners might as well hit all the studs, it might take an extra 10 minutes but it's cheap and would probably make even more of a difference. Hadn't thought about offsetting the outlets on the other side but I like that idea
I did a double wall in my build recently. 2x4 with a 1 inch gap between each wall, then closed cell foam the wall. I went a little further by foaming the first drywall ceiling panel and the adjoining walls 4 ft in. On each side.
Each room is 15x15 which includes a 4 ft deep closet that’s 10 ft long on the wall to hallway. From bedroom door to bedroom door, it’s about 24 ft. With the wife screaming on the other side, you cannot hear her except through the bedroom door. If you stuff a towel at the bottom of each door, you cannot hear anything from room to room.
People that are often disappointed about their soundproofing job ignore a door system that matches the wall rating. And not even STC, but low frequency too. The other two are windows that transmit sound not only from the outside but the wall that carries on to the other room. And flanking. flanking is the hardest by far in a home that isn't built for it in the first place. If you aren't doing room in a room or putting down proper underlay/floor system (Can include several layers of subfloor with green glue, acoustic joist tape, etc...) you might not want to spend a lot less and get 80% of the way there. That extra 10% or so will cost you more than the rest of the system and the last 10% is nearly impossible.
Tajima caulk guns are the best I've ever used. I finally got tired of using low quality guns and bought 2 of each size! That soundproofing looks like the way to go if quiet is necessary!
I like the before and after work videos.
Most common acoustic control method I've used is mass loaded vinyl & rockwool insulation. From now on I'll include the putty pads & acoustic caulk, this combination is probably easiest method to achieve the most initial decibel reduction. Thanks for the video!!
Seems there are many experts!
I enjoy your videos man.
Cheap way to reduce sound is to frame 2 completely separate walls with no connections between each other (parrallel to each other with a gap). No matter what one wall system will resonate sound through it. This along with Matt’s suggestions should be excellent.
Very timely and helpful. Working on this very issue at my home renovation right now. Thank you!
Matt! Thanks. Because of this video I will now add this to my media/sons room, also add this to my office. Just cleared my lot this week!
Definitely don’t skip the bottom plate to subfloor joint - makes a big difference. Also any DIYers like myself who don’t want to spend $10/outlet for the Hilti putty pads, check out the HVAC putty (not mastic!). 1lb brick is like $3 and can do 2 outlets. Home Depot has them in the HVAC section but also over in the electric section, near the wire nuts and staples.
I insulated interior bedroom, office, and laundry room walls with Rockwool insulation and i can tell you it makes a HUGE difference in sound travel. Just standing next to rockwool installed in between joists you can tell hearing and sound doesn't travel very far. Not only great sound proofing qualities, primary reason i installed is for its extreme fire resistance. This stuff can be blow torched and still not burn. If/when there is a house fire it makes me much more comfortable knowing the bedrooms will have much greater protection.
I would use metal boxes in locations you're looking to do noise dampening. You can get a better seal between a mudring and sheetrock than you can between sheetrock and a blue box.
Hey matt!! I’m an inexperienced builder, but I love watching your content and absorbing any building techniques that I’ll be able to apply to my own projects!
In an old project I used ZIP tape and silicone to seal an exterior light fixture in-front of the garage. I had no idea there was a putty to enclose outlets, though I felt I had good coverage from the tape.
Awesome upload!!
@@johnbergstrom2931 I used the STI putty pads ~$4/each to soundproof boxes in a bedroom/bathroom, then took the rest of the pads and tore pieces off to seal the penetrations in all the boxes on exterior walls (I didn't wrap the whole box) so I got about 5-6 boxes per pad for air sealing. seemed to work well.
@@johnbergstrom2931 I don't think you understood what I typed. I fully covered the entire box on all the boxes on the interior walls that I prepped for sound proofing. I even used 2 pads to cover the 3 gang switch boxes... I had leftover pads from the box of pads that I bough, so I used these "leftovers" to air seal the wire penetrations on all my boxes that are in exterior walls. I am not worried about sound proofing exterior walls.
My childhood home built in the 71 had the double sliding door closets as a form of isolation between bedrooms. Only the entry and den's wall were in contact to mine and my sister's rooms. Now it been remodeled, the agency that was selling it torn down the den/living room wall, and the exterior brick courtyard wall facing the street. No doubt that'll raise noise levels in those 2 rooms now.
Also, my father used a belt.....
904K Subs! Wow! Congratulation!
I used a 2x6 wall put 5/8" rock on one side then foamed it. It's very soundproof that way. I put 5/8" rock on the other side as well.
Interior wall?
@@jimhendrix7776 yes only where I want sound proofing! I usually do it on bathrooms or toilet closets. Also on living room TV wall that's shares the same wall to a bedroom
Don't forget the ceiling. that is the most over looked area for sound reduction.
HVAC too. Advantage to mini-splits.
Love your videos. You sold me on the Tajima caulking gun, I just bought one! Thank you!
Man you guys are such Pros. Some day I want to make videos like this.
Matt: Boys, I soundproofed the wall between you and your sister.
Boys: Challenge accepted.
I agree with you on the babysitting drywallers for sound details. I actually do a lot of the drywall myself (and I am the GC and the room designer Haha) I don’t do electrical receptacles in the wall cavities for studio’s. We do all surface mounted electrical and then build false walls for acoustic treatments. You can see more on my channel
Going back to the days of highschool and car sound systems: another product that could work well for wrapping your electrical boxes is DynaMat. It’s the peel and stick material used for soundproofing your car doors, trunk, firewall etc. Comes in larger rolls or sheets. Available at most car audio stores. Almost like an MLV (mass load Vinyl) peel and stick material. .
LOL. No matter the country, no matter the crew, no matter the how many professionals are paid to make sure things are done right, the details are only done pedantically when the guy signing the cheques is watching...
Agreed! However this is completely unnecessary given the density of his Sheetrock insulation.
Haha. 100%
@@Timeculture I can't say, since I build almost entirely with brick, but I can say that when it comes to acoustics, a 1% opening causes a 10% problem. A 10% opening, and you might as well not even have a wall.
Unless you curate your crew. There are people who do right without being watched. Cameras are a great way to sort them out. Ask loose ended questions. Let them answer, then if they lied. Show the video and the door. Eventually you find the quality person or potentially help a bad thinker to be honest.
Or, when “the guy” is actually doing it himself.
I could be completely wrong but I think pink sill sealer on the studs between the drywall might reduce sound travel from the next room. Loved the video - you should do the exact same test with a wall that doesn't have that same sound proofing.
Best way to describe soundproofing to a contractor is to tell them the room mad to hold water. Anywhere water would leak, sound gets through. Nice job wrapping the fire stop around the boxes. A common mistake I have seen is butting electrical boxes for different dudes of get wall in the same stud bay. Another great way to leak sound from one room to another.
Matt, as a carpenter myself I appreciate this content immensely! One might be surprised to learn that some others don’t want to or won’t teach the small details that can translate into important differences in build quality. This is incredibly valuable knowledge. Thank you very much. Best wishes to you and your family. The house looks amazing!
You should always use a bit right where your wires come through the side of the box also. This will help block sounds and cold air draw.
It really is amazing how much air blows through the smallest holes. Caulk them all up!!!!!
Do you have a non-soundproofed wall to compare it to, like between the upstairs family room and the kids bedrooms? No comparison to a baseline seems a bit silly.
Run a little test yourself on one of your interior walls. If they're anything like mine (uninsulated) there may as well be nothing there, maybe a ~5-10 dB reduction at best for a vacuum cleaner.
@@samdelucia5074 Unfortunately my current home's walls are all concrete, but thanks for sharing the info from your home!
I love your videos. I learn so much. Thank you for what you do.
Aw, Matt, you should have used independent framing for both sides of the wall with an air gap between (basically build two walls side by side without using drywall on the faces of these walls that face each other), and used some sort of foamy tape between all the stud faces that touch the drywall and the drywall. And of course eliminate any air penetrations in both these walls.
in that airgap, put a sheet of foam or fabric to absorb noise, much cheaper than using overprice drywall
So correct. What kind of foamy tape do you use? Just anything?
@@kapdolkim1914 Owens Corning makes 1/4 inch foam insulation board, apply that to one side in the air gap in between the 2 walls
@@kapdolkim1914 Yup, anything that is available locally and fits the bill. The goal is to have some sort of an elastic dampenning interface between the wall frame and its sheathing. The effect isn't huge (a few dB maybe) and is dependent on the frequency of the vibration, but non the less - its there. And since its easy and cheap - why not use it? In sound deadening every little bit counts.
2nd sheet of 5/8 on top of the first one. Looks great 👍👌!!!!
Uhhhh... Matt where is the control test of the vac through a wall that isn't sound deadoning?? Why not use a double offset wall. We have a job coming up where sound is an issue so were sacrificing 2" of floor space in order to disconnect the two sides of a couple walls in order to delete the telegraphing of resonation (sound transmission).
Like most of Matt's videos, he's not going to do any kind of real comparison because it's not an unbiased review video, it's a paid promotional video. Unfortunately you can't trust most of Matt's videos for that reason.
@@orrd back in the day he did have some that were pretty decent though
I get what you're saying, but 99% of houses have nothing other than 1/2inch drywall and 2x4 wall. So you can pretty easily check it yourself even without a decibel reader. 45 decibal is incredibly quiet (like a library). A regular wall assembly makes basically no difference to the original volume (I'd say maybe 5-10 decibel drop Max. So it's clear it makes a massive drop.
@@frostman9661 Facts are facts. Lack of facts is heresay. The point is that isnt a very good experiment.
I know a builder that did his entire house including interior walls years ago. His house sounded like the inside of maybach. I always said i will do it on my build. I can barely hear myself talking in his house. Honestly your recording sounds different right now. I can hear the difference.
As a soon-to-be home buyer I want a "Zoom Room". And see it printed on my builder's floorplan "Bedroom 3/Zoomroom" - an acknowledgement that this room will be constructed differently from the others with attention to sound reduction techniques and materials.
@@bradgaeth im more disturbed u want a zoom room
@@johnbergstrom2931 In this day and age someone should invent sheetrock or some type of fabric that goes behind it and gives the room complete faraday cage protection as well.
Cool idea. I wouldn't thought about sealants. 👍👍
Excellent video! Those are simple and effective tips. I'll be working them into my house designs from now on. I'm updating my typical detail sheets as I write this.
Isn’t QR more effective if you hang it vertically? I believe it eliminates the bead of sealant between seams since they land on a stud. I might need to check the manufacturer recommend installation one more time…
I do love this product and also want to echo the comment about the ceiling…no pun intended 😂
Also the floor and adjacent walls... Sound will just radiate under, around or over the wall if this is ignored.
You would probably like that remote vacuum switch from fast cap so you're not crawling around on the floor. I like it. It saves steps and time.
Just built a builders personal house. Wall between master and greatroom was 2x6 plates but 2x4 studs offset and insulated with rock wool
Tajima caulk gun. Excellent.
I have never spent $30 on a better tool.
After the room is finished, corner dampers at the wall-celing junction will help too. You can just use a plush stuffed animal or something like that if you want to go as cheap as possible. It helps with keeping the sound that is already in the room from echoing. Not really to keep sound out, but to help keep the room's sound profile “softer”.
darrick steele - just to clarify, do you mean sticking a product or stuffed animal on the face of the finished drywall up in the 4 corners of the room?
Those Tajima guns are nice. Worth the price
Why don't you caulk the studs acoustic bridging additional caulk is cheap insurance
Wtf? No studio builder does that
One very easy additional detail is running acoustic sealant on the studs. The screws from each side of the wall transmit a lot of vibration.
Matt got his knees dusty. You're a bit more hands on working on your own house. Good for you man. Impressive work.
couple of thoughts I would add. 1. When that closet is full of clothes, that will also cut down on noise. 2. when house is complete, Matt & his wife are going to get really tired of having to call there kids cell phone because the kids can't hear them when Mom or Dad calls out to them from another room
Well it seems he only sound-insulated that one wall
don't forget the door in front of the closet, which would normally be closed
I've been thinking about this sort of thing for my upcoming garage-mahal build. Huge building that contains both an art studio and psychologist practice for my wife, but also contains an auto workshop for me to build unnecessarily powerful performance cars. Sound dampening is a major concern. Even in the main house with a two car garage, I don't want to worry about waking up my wife if I need to leave for work early. Like everything else, gonna be 'spensive.
Use duct seal putty instead of the putty pads. Cost about $3/lbs, much cheaper product works great for air sealing.
I'd frame a core stud wall with no perforations using these techniques, and create an offset service layer on each side for any outlets that are required.
Sounds like what I was thinking to ask why not do other than cost and loss of floor space.
8:26 “we’re gonna do our best” while literally caulking the rest!
The best solution is to do a double stud 2x4 wall. Build one wall in front of the other, not touching each other, insulated, very little sound conduction happening because the drywall in one room is severed from the other. But that gives up 5 inches of interior square footage, which is something that you can’t always do. Sure the acoustic sealant and putty pads are good, better is no outlets at all on the wall. Build an mdf box for each outlet. Much better than the quiet rock is two layers of 5/8” drywall. Even better is two layers of dry wall with green glue in between.
Mass Loaded Vinyl backed by cotton batts is what I used. Amazing results.
Why cotton?
Insulation, Sealing and Isolation combined work the best. Breaking the tie between planes makes a tremendous difference. Double stud wall.
@@johnbergstrom2931 With regards to sound proofing, Double stud performs better than staggered.
@@johnbergstrom2931 those stats are for one layer on each side? Or you mean 2 per side? But thanks for sharing
Thanks for sharing!
“The major factor to consider in constructing walls to control sound transmission is the isolation of the gypsum board layers on each face of the wall. If at least one of the layers is not resiliently supported, or if the two faces of the wall are not isolated from each other, sound-absorbing material in the cavity is rendered ineffective. When the layers are isolated, sound transmission through the wall can be reduced by increasing the mass, the cavity depth and the amount of sound-absorbing material.” - Excerpt from the NRC publications archive for control of sound transmission through gypsum board walls
Cut the silicone tube nozzel closer to the tip and at a 45 degree, this looks so amature :P
Try those rockwool exterior panels, and apply them directly to the studs after rockwool insulation in stud bays, or panels between layers of 5/8 " drywall.
The problem with Matt is he is a real nice guy who supports true craftsmanship. It makes trolls look quite bad when they try to tear him down.
I dont disagree that Matt is a nice guy or that he does quality work. He also has a crazy budget since he is a homebuilder / TH-camr and his wife is a doctor. I'm just not sure it's completely realistic for most people.
@@downwitakrowdy you are missing the point. It’s not about whether everyone can afford the details he shows. It’s about setting a standard everyone can look up to. People throw money into the most worthless areas of their lives. Maybe after watching this, a bunch of those people will ask ‘do I really need a newer car when I can put that money instead into my home and get it back in a few years?’.
Good video, good application!
I added a laundry room next to a living room. No fancy materials used.
I built a 2x6 wall and used double 2x3s as studs - and essentially made 2 walls in one. Each side has 2x3s and they do not touch each other.
I used some basic sound rated insulation. I caulked like crazy. And 1/2 inch drywalll on one side and 5/8 on other side. My drywall skills are... OK, they do not exist. So I again caulked like crazy to fill every gap before taping.
The washing machine and dryer are against the wall and sofa and TV are on the other side. It is hard to hear them run. They are 1970s Maytags. Totally exceeded my expectation.
All of the materials were just regular stuff from Home Depot, Lowes, etc.
I do not think you need all of this pricy stuff unless you are building a sound studio. Keep in mind Matt doesn't pay for his stuff. Offsetting studs will do more than anything.
Further, if you can't do a 6 inch wall you could do 2x4s turned sideways. It leaves 1/2 gap between. This with some regular sound insulation, caulking and 5/8 on one side and 1/2 on the other will probably be as good as Matt's wall.
Another option I haven't tried - since I do not have such a project - is to use two layers of 1/4 sheetrock with some type of sound caulk in between. This is what QuietRock is. The problem with QuietRock is it is hard to find and very expensive. I bet you can make your own QuietRock that will be 90% as good for a fraction of the price.
Great video. Did you do the soundproofing on both sides of the wall or is one side all it takes?
You can use fiberglass as it has the same STC rating as rockwool and much cheaper..
2 sheets of 5/8" drywall on each side is more cost effective and will provide great results.
Don't even really need two sheets. The room we just did recently with just the rockwool up in the walls and no drywall on it muffled sounds so much it was actually weird to stand in the room and talk. Rockwool's safe n sound or even just regular rockwool is CRAZY good at reducing sound transmission by itself. All the other little details might get you another db here or there in sound reduction.
@@robsp32As soon as you put drywall up it will echo again. Open walls with any insulation is going to sound quiet, like if you went outside in a snow storm.. Also Rockwool doesn't outperform fiberglass in STCs and if you did that same open wall test with unfaced fiberglass you would have had the exact same results.... Also you 100% need MASS to reduce low frequencies so, yes you do need double drywall... I would suggest you head over to AVS or another audio forum and look at the actual science and real world applications..
Would love to see a comparison between a magnesium oxide board like Huberwood's Exacor MgO panels. Great content as always Matt!
I could be wrong but I think the acoustic caulk goes on the face of the studs to dampen vibrations going through the wall, it's not really a seam sealer
What a lot of people don't understand about decibels is that it is a logarithmic scale. To understand just how much noise reduction that is... a 3 dB drop means you cut the sound in half. So a 30 dB drop means you cut the sound in half TEN TIMES. That's over 1,000 times quieter.
A 30db drop is really nice. A 5x cost difference in the boards is not. But I'd like to see a wall built with quietrock, versus a double wall built with 3/4 or one inch sheet rock on both sides to seevsome objective comparisons. And, loud radio or tv, not just a shopvac.
I know that's trivial, but it would mean objective numbers.
Is 1" sheetrock available? I know 3/4" is (Pabco Flame Curb X).
@@MrCJHamill Damnino. There are of special ones like QuietRock that the big box chains won't carry. A pickup truck and a couple of hours may be needed. But two thinner sheets, bonded with acoustic glue, are quieter than one thicker sheet. The sheetrock that is lead lined, used for xray rooms, really dead quiet.
30db is nice. Did you do the noise test with a non insulated wall? If so, what was the db drop? Thank you.
Without a measurement before, his 'after' measurement is pretty meaningless.
Good attention around the edges with soundproofing caulk. A lot of the sound is transmitted through the studs. Have any builders explored the use of an acoustic tape in similar detail spec or used a dBoard with better results?
Every new building in Europe uses acoustic tape. Much easier and cheaper with better and more consistent results.
In the late 1970's in Manhattan, I sound-proofed my 2000sq/ft loft space using 5/8 sheetrock on top of 1/2 inch sound-proof fiber-board after sealing the metal studs with caulking compound and filling the voids with fiberglass insulation. As a result, you could not hear conversations in adjoining rooms and hardly any music.
Any tips on how to cut down on thunderous echo in an office? Drop ceiling over drywall, plants, etc?
I don't there is much sound difference between the QuietRock drywall and a 5/8 Firecode Sheetrock with the preparation that you did. The insulation and the air gap sealing is doing 90 - 95% of the work, it doesn't justify 5x-6x the cost of the drywall.
I wish he showed an example of what the sound reduction would be without all those steps. Surely there’s a wall in his house where that wasn’t done that he could’ve tested and shown for us. Maybe one of you builders should have a channel that responds to Matt’s with more data, $-figures, and results to see whether this high-end Austin mindset is as useful as it is promoted to be, or simply leans towards pretentiousness.
Keep in mind, I’m not knocking any of it. If folks want to and can afford to go to these lengths, I’m happy for them and God’s blessing on their life, but I’d rather see just how useful some of these techniques are.
There is data on that exact topic, not 'bro-science'.
It's easy to justify when you're getting everything for free or at a deep discount like Matt is. No one in their right mind who is paying market prices for materials will go this crazy.
QuietRock will outperform against lower frequency. There are also manufacturers stc ratings if you want to see data
I've done this method before and I personally don't like it because it's super messy and it shows on your video. You're kind of smearing Acoustic sealant all over the place and it's a mess for your sheetrockers too especially when you have to handle just a bulky object with a mess all over the edges. A lot of times this becomes a sub-gap installation where your rockers might not want to do it or they treat it as a sperate day's job. Your rockers hate it, and your finishers hate it. Really the best solution is to double sheetrock. You install your quietrock or standard sheetrock, then you run a bead of sealant around the edge, and the seams. Then you install a 2nd layer with green glue and you have an incredibly quiet assembly. That way your finishers don't have to deal with the mess your sealant leaves behind since it's behind a layer of clean sheetrock.
Sheetrock is cheap, time and labor is expensive. I wouldn't want my subs to do it this way because it's costly and it doesn't make as much of a difference compared to doing it the right way.
He installed double sheetrock. He pointed that out. It's one of those things where the little gap of air between boards will leak sound. Mud won't do much. Fill the whole gap with more substantial material. Does a quality job all around.
Sounds like your solution does make more sense for builders though. Hard to trust a crew to do a more picky job like this.
@@edgeofsins As a builder you need to respect your subs, don't ask to do work you wouldn't do yourself. Matt's installation is a huge mess, trust me I've done it before. It's a mess for the guys doing the job, and it's a mess for your tapers. That's why it's easier to install your rock, and seal the seam with sealant, then cover it with another layer. Even if you use 1/4" rock. It's cleaner, and you're not mudding over a sticky uncurbable substance. I'm used to homes with noise dampening. There's a lot better ways than troweling acoustic sealant everywhere.
Double drywall works well.
Nice video, though I'm not convinced by your test at the end. It definitely was quieter in your daughter's room. However, the real question is not whether the noise was lower in your daughter's room, but what would the noise reduction have been if you had not taken your sound-proofing precautions. This, of course, is a lot more difficult to do! I suppose you could remove the QR, and install normal drywall, or build another, identical house, but without the QR between the two rooms. You get my point. In any case, despite the weakness of this experiment, I enjoyed the video.
@@johnbergstrom2931 Thanks for clarifying, John. However, I expected the sound to be lower in his daughter's room. I just can't appreciate from that part of his video how much of a difference the special sound proofing treatment made. You need a controlled experiment to do this: one measurement without the special drywall and another with it. It's not practical to do in this situation. However, I trust that you're right, and that the treatment makes a big difference in reducing sound transmission.
Why not caulk each stud, not just the top and bottom? Maybe a layer of tar paper on the studs before the sheetrock?
@@johnbergstrom2931 The Quiet Rock has a layer of something in the middle and Matt is using sound caulk everywhere else. Different density material layers transmit at different rates. These are minute changes that have a cumulative effect. Sure, bass sounds are hardest to prevent, but some reduction is better than no reduction. Maybe you are right, maybe not. This is still an evolving science.
This was great..
Good information 👍
Very nice. But what about the rooms like living or kitchen. The resonance is crazy. Lots of hard surfaces?
I have never found a place that sells that acoustic caulk. Though I've found the best one is made by USG that comes in a huge tube and is super cheap
What is the difference between that method and other methods? Comparing the cost to the benefits of each method would be helpful.
The drywall companies have detailed guides for what sort of assembly is needed to produce a certain STC or a certain fire rating.
It will be good if you perform the same test on a control room w/o the acoustic protection. I have absolutely no idea how much improvement the acoustic control provided
Your daughter will probably be happy about her room but the boys might not be so happy and hate each other after a short while almost laying in the same bed..
Do you have a plan for when you need 3 bedrooms instead of one?
Yeah I'm fuckin' baffled that he builds this giant state of the art mansion and doesn't even give each kid his own room. The giant gaps under the doors are also a puzzle, why not have ducted returns?
100 years ago you’d have 10 people sleeping in one room. 2021 three young boys sleeping in the same room is a injustice. Seriously? I can’t think of a singular reasons WHY these boys should have the same room.
Cause they fight? It’s called parenting.
@@ssl3546 not really massive mansion...I think he's said 2800 sq ft. Smaller than most custom builds for sure.
Matt is super super religious. He did it so that his kids can’t jackoff or do any sinful things. It’s a feature, not a bug.
@@mpers yeah right
Sheetrock hanging went from 2500 install to 25,000 lol. I definitely do this for a game room though. But Spray foam and double sheet rock works wonders .
Just a bit of trim makes all the difference in a house. I can't imagine it being too expensive, especially if you do it yourself.
I’d love to know what full cost of the Real Rebuild project has come to?? I know that a lot of the products were sponsored, but what would it cost for average consumer paying for all this product? Maybe sq. ft. price?
Matt- you did good job on self fliming this video, the question ia will you let your kids paint their room?? I think they deserve to have some personalized room.
Question - when sheathing a house with OSB or plywood you leave a 1/8” gap. Should you tape those seams? If so what type and brand of tape? Does the same go for the roof too?
Think using SCIF concepts would cut done labor by using double drywall over joints and segregate wall studs from drywall.