Sound Abatement with Flooring, Underlayments, and Adhesives

You can increase sound abatement in your home by choosing the right sound deadening flooring, underlayments, and adhesives, which will reduce overall sound transmissions and unwanted noise.

What is Sound Abatement

Sound abatement is term that means suppression of sound or noise. Sound deadening is another common term used to describe products that provide good sound abatement.

There are two main types of sound – airborne sound transmissions and impact sound transmissions. The ability to “abate” airborne sound transmissions, like voices and noise from a TV, radio, or car, is measured by the Sound Transmission Class (STC) rating. Ability to abate sound transmission from impact sounds like walking or dropping an object on the floor is measured by the Impact Insulation Class (IIC) rating.

Using floor coverings that provide good sound abatement (like carpet, rubber, vinyl, and cork) helps to improve both IIC ratings and STC ratings. Overall, this means a more peaceful home for you and your family.

Ways to Use Flooring to Improve Sound Abatement

With many floor coverings, such as ceramic tile, porcelain tile, stone tile, and some vinyl tiles, you can use adhesives called sound abatement membranes that work as a three–in–one acoustic barrier, crack–suppression membrane (a.k.a. anti–fracture membrane), and waterproof membrane.

Many floor coverings can also be installed with sound deadening underlayments to increase sound abatement in a room. These underlayments can be made of a number of different materials such as cork, recycled rubber, and cotton fiber, and are commonly called acoustical underlayments or sound barriers. For more about different types of flooring underlayments that can be used to increase sound abatement in your home, visit my blog titled Sound Abatement and Floor Underlayments – Cork, Rubber, and Fiber.