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Sound insulation - cork. Need advise.

Question for those in the know... I have a small basement studio room - about 15ft x 11ft. I constantly have to hear from my woman about noise coming from basement, so I plan to stick a cork in it. Literally.

I heard from several different sources that using cork wall tiles can result in pretty decent sound isolation. Not that I blast my music all the time but there are times when I do want to be able to use my monitors instead of headphones, when others are already asleep.

I've looked into different cork products and looks like I may have to go with a 12mm cork tiles to accomplish what I'm seeking.

Just looking for some advise - should I do it? What kind of results can I expect? Is it just a bunch of baloney?

Also, how would it change the room acoustics? Would it deaden the sound? I'm currently using Auralex foam pads/bass traps on parts of the wall - would I still need to continue with it?

Yay/Nay/What you say?

Well, if you put an absorbing material on all the walls, basically you're going to kill the natural reverb entirely. Some people like that sound, most don't.

That said, I doubt this will do that much in terms of isolation. Consider the density of a brick wall, then think about the density of these cork tiles. If a brick wall can't keep the sound in, how is a piece of cork meant to?

quote:

Originally posted by echosystm That said, I doubt this will do that much in terms of isolation. Consider the density of a brick wall, then think about the density of these cork tiles. If a brick wall can't keep the sound in, how is a piece of cork meant to?

Well, I'm not a sound expert, but I'll throw out this "theory", which seems to be a recurring theme at most sound insulation sites:

The sound isolation is controlled not only through density of material but its capability to absorb and disburse the acoustic energy. While brick may seem like a dense material, but its ability to absorb acoustic energy is diminished because of its rigidity. The sound energy would resonate through it, most would be reflected and it wouldn't work well for sound insulation. Now, placing sand bags in front of brick would deaden the sound. Cork works by having lots of air pockets which serve as sound dampening mechanism. Over 50% of corkboard is air.

Using cork produces sound deadening by about 14dB for 6mm thick layer, which is not bad. If you slap it as a sound deadening sandwich as cork -> sound insulating dry wall ->cork - that would reduce it even more, however, I'm not going to be arsed with it. I figure adding some cork could do the trick to the point where it will still be audible but not noticeable. I don't need to get the sound levels equivalent to a mosquito fart.

I didn't mean a brick wall would absorb anything, I mean a brick wall would just bounce the sound back at you

Its difficult to tell whether it will work really. In order for it to work you'll have to cover all walls and the roof (especially the roof, since it is a basement). Also consider leaving an air gap between the cork and the wall; doing so increases absorption alot, but i'm not sure about how that affects isolation.

This isn't really the forum for it, people here more interested in making music than technicalities like this. Try Ethan Winners forum, loads of accoustics guys on there that dont make music at all and are only interested in technicalities haha.

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