Boxing out my bedroom bay window.

[chris2922]

My bedroom faces a main road, and its quite noisy at about 5am when the early starters drive past on their way to work. A few particularly keen people ride motorbikes with race cans past really fast and wake me up without fail every morning! The one guy is so loud i can have my head under the pillow by the time he actually reaches my house.

The window facing the main road is a bay. It sticks out of my house and has a small lead-lined flat roof over it.

Under the window, concrete tiles are hung bridging the gap beyween the bedroom bay window and the lounge window below. To ensure the tiles arent leeting too much heat out/sound in, i have had a roffer remove them, replace the laffs and line the gaps with foam insulation. From myperspective its made no diffrence at all but it seemed a good thing to do anyway.

Earlier this year i had new double glazed windows, but when the fitters removed the old windows they found my bay had 'sunk' a bit. So much so that when they put the new windows in I could see outside through a long 2" deep gap underneath the centre window. They assured my this wouldnt get any worse and would cost a bomb to correct, so they put plastic trim around the inside to cover the gap, and outside they pointed up underneath the sill.

Although this filled the gap and my 'mystery bedroom draft' has gone, i am worried that sound is transmitting through it as its clearly a bit thin.

Heres my plan to try and reduce the amount of sound coming through my bedroom wall:

Get the plaster and the plastic trim off the wall under the window.

Using a bit of MDF, create a box-out around the bay window. It currently has no window sill, so in effect i'll be creating one right the way around.

At this point im more concerned with sound proofing than insulation. If i go ahead and create the box around the wall under the window, what is the most effective way of keeping sound at bay?

Or am i going about this all wrong?

Hope someone can help.

 

[foxhole]

Injecting foam in gap would give better sound insulation, was the gap right across the bay?

 

[chris2922]

The gap was almost all the way across the main front facing window. The angled side windows didn't have an obvious gap i could see.

When i remove the plastic capping and plaster from around the bay ill make sure i get some foam in there if they fitters didnt do that already.

I am more concerned at this point with getting the 'box' put together. I suspect that even without the gap under the window it would still be quite noisy when the traffic starts picking up.

Id like to keep some sound from travelling through that bay wall if at all possible.

 

[StephenW]

You'll never get it quiet unless you triple glaze and treat the whole wall but hopefully you'll improve it a bit.
Have you tried the interim 50p solution? - it really works unless you need to hear the alarm clock/phone/etc.

 

[CortinaV8]

I did similar when renovating my bedroom.

I removed the old lath and plaster under the window, filled with insulation board, built a frame out of 2x4" filled this with insulation board also, made sure any gaps around the window were filled with expanding foam, covered the framework with soundblock plasterboard.

The external noise level is reduced, as is heat loss (which was the main reason for the job) and I gained a window sill for the cat to sleep on during the day.

The photo shows the finished article, sadly no before or during photos.

 

[foxhole]

The gap was almost all the way across the main front facing window. The angled side windows didn't have an obvious gap i could see.

That is a concern, your window frame should be part of the support for above.

 

[chris2922]

I was concerned too. The bedroom frame hadn't sunk though, just the tiled wall between it and the window below. The window frame below was fine too - i just think the wall separating them is a bit crap.

Im hoping that by doing something similar to CortinaV8's picture i can reduce the noise coming in from the road outside.

I have read that soundproofing uses an air gap to reduce sound rather than tightly packed insulation which allows sound waves to permeate through.

Anyone have any experience of sound-proofing in a situation like this?

 

[lalwanis]

Hi,
I have got a similar scenario as that being discussed here. lot of noise through the window though i have replaced with Everest's noise reduction double glazing. It is still noisy in the morning or late night when speeding vehicle pass by.
I am looking for some one who can do the similar work as you have mentioned, can you please suggest me which tradesman would do this work for me?
I am not sure even after sorting out all this how much noise I would still hear.
TA

I did similar when renovating my bedroom.

I removed the old lath and plaster under the window, filled with insulation board, built a frame out of 2x4" filled this with insulation board also, made sure any gaps around the window were filled with expanding foam, covered the framework with soundblock plasterboard.

The external noise level is reduced, as is heat loss (which was the main reason for the job) and I gained a window sill for the cat to sleep on during the day.

The photo shows the finished article, sadly no before or during photos.

 

[mointainwalker]

1) Air-gaps are much less efficient than sound-deadening material.
2) Compressed fibre-wool is much better than stiff insulation-boards which will transmit the sound (like a vibrating membrane)