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Hi. We have opened the ceiling in our living room which had previously the ceiling in 2.4m height, with a normal plasterboard and 10cm mineral/glass fibre mix. The outside noise was less, but still noticeable. We now want to use the full space of the pitched roof to create a vaulted ceiling. At the moment the rafters have been strengthened and extended to 20cm depth, from which we have left a 5cm void below the felt under the concrete tiles for air ration and added 15 cm celotex insulation. I understand that celotex is great for the heat insulation and that we overreach building specs with the 15 cm, but that it does not do much against outside noise. As we live on a very busy road we wonder what would be the best way to insulate now the roof sound wise the best / economical way? Our builder wants to put additional 2cm wooden batons now under the rafters to account for uneven areas, not filled with anything and attach the sound plasterboard to them? Will this work, or just create an sound problem? Currently I am looking into two different thickness sized acoustic boards, depending on what is available on the market currently. I read about mass loaded vinyl which is quite expensive, and which seems to be often recommended to add in-between the 2 soundboard plasterboards. And in addition I read about resilient bars, where I wonder if they are ok with the weight of two heavy soundboards, and in addition if they are actually helpful against street noise, as this is rather an airborne noise instead of ground-born, , or am I wrong? Or are they rather for ceilings where a room is used above, and so not what I need? What would you recommend to keep out the road noise please? Kind regards Manfred

Any recommendations for decent sound insulation between stud wall partitions? Or are they all about the same? Any tips most gratefully appreciated. Already planning to use soundbloc 15mm plasterboard everywhere. Would anyone recommend sticking 20mm PIR on one side of the stud walls as well or is that overkill?

Sorry if this is repeating a common thread. We have recently purchased a new build detached house and noticing airborn noise between the upstairs and downstairs rooms. We also have a lot of joist movement noise, but the builders are coming back in a few weeks to remedy this by installing noggings. The ceiling / floor joists are engineered timber joists with chipboard above and 15mm regular plasterboard below. Nothing inbetween, just air. As they are going to be ripping up the upstairs floors, we have an opportunity to install some acoustic insulation. I am thinking just some acoustic slabs at 100mm and 60kg/m^3 (RS60 or RW3). My question is does anyone have any experience on doing this and how much effect it actually will make. I am nervous we do this at quite a bit of cost and lots of trouble and in the end the result is minimal. Is it worth the effort? I am surprised that the part E regs do not cover detached builds at all....surely they still require airborn noise regs. Thanks.

Hi all Sorry another question from me! We need to choose our windows, the planners seem open to both timber and aluminium. So the issue is we are on a budget, spanking 25k on some quality wooden windows isn’t going to happen, it seems we can get some okay soft wood windows for about 7k which is approximately what we were quoted for some aluminium windows. Now, I prefer the wooden windows, but I’m worried they will let more noise in. Are windows rated? Is there a standard they must adhere to?