As homeowners spend more time at home during the COVID pandemic, they have begun taking notice of all aspects of their environment – including acoustics – which will have an effectful influence on their wellbeing. Good acoustics is seen as important factor to overall wellness.
SH Acoustics conducts a comprehensive acoustical survey tailored specifically to any homeowner’s space or home plans, surveying both them and the homeowner to ascertain their acoustical goals, similar to how designers may gather client preferences for design projects.
Sound absorption
Homeowners have become more mindful of their overall wellness and are becoming aware of every element of their home including its acoustics. This increased focus is being driven by pandemic-driven changes to households spending significantly more time at home and looking for ways to make them healthier, more comfortable spaces to reside in.
Soft acoustic surfaces are better at absorbing sound waves and deadening them more quickly, such as heavy duty rugs and carpets on floors, curtains or thick bed drapes on walls, or Lily lamps on ceilings which can easily be hidden behind furniture.
Introducing an acoustic treatment into your home can be challenging, so the main rule for effective implementation should be placing absorbers at first reflection points of all walls and ceilings (except on the rear wall where a diffuser should be used ). This will prevent reverberation while giving your space a more natural sound quality; especially important in smaller rooms with speakers close to where people listen to audiobooks or videos.
Noise absorption
Noise pollution in your home can create stress, which has detrimental long-term repercussions. Effective sound absorption dampens echoes and reverberations to promote overall wellbeing in the home environment. Absorbent materials are soft to touch and easily integrated into design schemes as acoustic foam wall liners or fabric curtains; perfect for home theaters, music rooms or noisy kitchens/recreation areas alike – or as beautiful wall art pieces themselves!
Reverberation control
Sound-absorbing materials can help to reduce reverberation in any space, often seen in living rooms with exposed walls and ceilings, by dissipating sound waves bouncing off surfaces before congregating again to form echos that cause intelligibility issues and make watching movies or listening to music difficult. Reverberation often happens in large, open rooms without enough furniture and soft fabrics on furniture such as couches to absorb sound, such as an auditorium; furnishings with absorbent fabric solutions or installing absorbent acoustic solutions on walls, ceilings or individual elements can help alleviate its effects.
Reverberation Time (RT60) measures the amount of reverberation over 60 seconds. To create an ideal space, aim for an RT60 of less than 0.6 seconds for whisper-quiet conversations or an energetic background buzz in reception areas.
Reducing reverberation alone won’t control airborne transmission; to effectively address it, we need to mitigate sound transfer between spaces – including indoor to outdoor. Based on your project layout and desired results, we can determine the most suitable solution. Contact us to discuss your needs – our specialists are on hand with a wide range of acoustic products designed for homes and businesses and ready to offer expert advice and assistance!
Soundproofing
No matter if you are trying to silence noisy neighbors in an apartment, condo, townhome, or house – or improve its acoustics – soundproofing offers many solutions for reducing unwanted noise. Absorbing and blocking noise also help block transmission between rooms while blocking prevents outside noise entering your home.
Soundproofing is especially essential in homes with open floor plans or multiple rooms used for entertainment purposes, such as a home theater or recording studio. Installing sound absorbing insulation into walls and ceilings helps block outside noise to provide more peace in your personal space.
Homeowners can purchase soundproofing products at home improvement stores or online, and hire professional acoustic designers like SH Acoustics to assess their needs and design acoustically optimized spaces that match up with existing spaces or new home designs. SH Acoustics’ extensive acoustic consulting services cover existing spaces or new home designs while targeting specific acoustical issues, similarly to how an architect might assess a client’s priorities.
Building design plays a huge part in how loud a room can be, as conventional walls and ceilings tend to be constructed inefficiently for soundproofing purposes. Walls and ceilings usually consist of surfaces (usually drywall) attached to an internal framework of wall studs or ceiling joists that reflect sound waves back onto themselves creating echo effects; hard or uneven surfaces may even reflect back causing long lasting echo effects that reflect back into the room again and again. To effectively block sound, walls must have lots of mass and be constructed so as to form dense barriers against sound transference – these must be designed so as to reduce sound transference between rooms.
One of the easiest and most reliable ways to soundproof a room is with acoustic insulation, typically found in batt or blanket form and installed during construction or remodeling projects. Proper installation adds thickness to walls and ceilings while Z-shaped strips help decouple structures to reduce sound transmission between joists and studs.
Other soundproofing methods involve limiting the amount of outside noise that enters a room, such as caulking gaps around doors and windows and installing heavy curtains or window inserts that absorb and dampen noise. Soft materials with reduced reverberation such as plush rugs or upholstered furniture may also help control noise levels.