Advice needed with building soundproofing plasterboard wall

[zetty]

Dear DIYers!

I really need some advice on soundproofing as the situation at home is unbearable and there's no solution in sight.

3 months ago we signed a tenancy contract for a warehouse conversion. The external wall was there but everything else represented a blank canvas the landlord was supposed to tailor inside to our needs. Unfortunately the deadlines were agreed verbally, and the landlord turned out to be the most unreliable person I've ever had business with. Dealing with him, no matter what tactics I chose, was just driving me crazy. We pressured him into building a couple of internal walls, and the bathroom (still no functioning shower though), but that's about it.

The story is long and sad but getting to the point, the biggest problem at the moment is the noise from our neighbours, a 15-strong hip-hop crew. They are using adjacent unit as a sound studio, and it has a reasonably thick wall and floating floor, yet the main problem is they just won't keep their double doors closed, also there's always constant traffic in and out, and chatter by the door with so many people going smoking or to toilet which is outside their unit. They are obviously very loud, shouting, laughing and banging doors, and no joke, this happens 24/7.

Here's the floorplan for the area in question, with the affected wall in red:

View media item 48410
It is a single plaster wall with big open holes at the ceiling (as you can see we've stuffed them with towels but that didn't help a bit), no wonder all the noise made by the door feels like coming from inside our unit.

View media item 48412
Here is how it looks like from inside of our unit alongside some measurements:

View media item 48413
What I need to do is to finish the existing wall by adding a second layer of plasterboard and filling the cavity with insulation, as well as closing the holes at the ceiling, and then I need to make another double-plaster wall next to it.


So how would you recommend me dealing with this? What materials, and insulation in particular, do you propose? Please name brands and sources in London if that's not against forum rules. Since this wasn't planned in our budget, it must be as cheap as possible, I'm hoping to fit within £100.


Two more questions I have:

1) What's the best way to deal with doors? How to insulate the gap around the edges, and what material is best to soften the banging issue?

2) We have holes left in the floor and ceiling where the plumbing pipes go up/down. What's the best material to close them with?


Thanks in advance, I have never been performing any construction work so I need some help to get this moving.

 

[zetty]

Err, last try to get some advice here..

Unfortunately still didn't have time to do any reasonable research myself, hopefully next weekend!

 

[joe-90]

The reason you aren't getting any advice is that the problem isn't solvable. You will have to move or live with it.

 

[zetty]

Well, that *is* an advice too!

However, even if it is impossible to seal ourselves off the noise completely, it must certainly be possible to reduce it greatly. I mean, single plaster wall, no insulation, loose door, huge gaps by the ceiling.. Whatever we put on top of that should make a difference.

We can't move again right away, and probably won't for 3-4 months at least, so the aim is to improve things as much as possible. If 2-3 days of work and 100-200 quid can save us some stress over the course of our stay, why not go for it?

 

[^woody^]

Effective sound insulation is based on preventing sound getting out [from a room] and trying to stop it getting in to other rooms in a building is always difficult

There are many posts on here about stopping sound from neighbours, so I don't really want to go into it all. But basically, you need to plug all gaps with as dense a material as possible, and use dense insulating material with isolation from the structure

I think your best bet, is to involve your council to check if the noise would be deemed a nuisance (EPA 1990 if you want to google), and if so, serve an abatement notice on your landlord and/or the dance studio. THis will give them 21 days to abate any nuisance

 

[Deluks]

Why not hire Aerosmith to smash the wall down for you?

Then you can build something more appropriate, involving double fire doors, staggered studwork, lots of rockwool and multiple layers of plasterboard

 

[joinerjohn]

Why not hire Aerosmith to smash the wall down for you?

Then you can build something more appropriate, involving double fire doors, staggered studwork, lots of rockwool and multiple layers of plasterboard

Personally, I'd get the Rolling Stones to smash the wall down, and throw the hip hop studio's equipment out of the windows.