Contractors and drywallers in the building trade are often presented with the task of isolating sound of one room’s noise from the next. The art of soundproofing a common wall or a common floor or ceiling assembly can bring a mix of opinions and strategies as to what might work best. Too often the answer centers around insulation techniques that will stuff or blow batting into the cavity spaces between the studs in a wall or the joists in a ceiling. Unfortunate to most, while the treatment separates rooms thermally, it does little to separate them acoustically. Noise will continue to travel from room to room.
The key to combating sound bleed to deliver luxury grade STC ratings of 55 or greater is to understand how noise bleeds through the common surface better. Much like a string pulled tight between two coffee cans, it is the actual framing within the wall or ceiling assembly that is connecting rooms together. These structural connection points, if left connected, combine to serve the same function as the string. Vibrations will carry back and forth structurally between the rooms, regardless of what is stuffed in between the studs. The stuffing ignores the path.