insulating/decoupling a single, street-facing wall?

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ecx
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Joined: Tue Sep 14, 2021 8:31 am
Location: Chicago, IL

insulating/decoupling a single, street-facing wall?

Post by ecx »

Hi all. Long story short: My wife and I just bought a new place, and the majority of the first floor will be a room used for recording music, as well as movie nights, small dance parties, and so on. The building is made of concrete block, and the first floor room will be directly on the concrete slab. (Ground/polished concrete floor.) It's a corner lot, with another concrete building to the west, and residential streets to the north and east. (See images)
Sound isolation is relatively good already, and will improve when I get a chance to fix the main door and properly seal it, and eventually acoustic window inserts or some other way to shore up the large windows.

We have to redo the east wall anyway. My question is, is there any benefit you see to adding mass/insulation to that wall while we're at it? It's a single wall, and obviously flanking will be the major issue in terms of outside noise, but I'm wondering if beefing up that wall will prevent some transmission directionally through it to the street, like a giant gobo? Would it force outside noise from that direction to take a different route to get into the room?

Thanks---I'm having a hard time conceptualizing how the deadening effect of extra mass/decoupling will interact with flanking in this case. (Like, if flanking were the only relevant issue, gobos would be useless within a room, right?) This isn't a commercial studio, and we're not out for extreme isolation, I realize the isolation will be imperfect.

If there are prior posts (or parts of RG's book) that explain what I'm asking, please feel free to refer me to them.
gullfo
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Re: insulating/decoupling a single, street-facing wall?

Post by gullfo »

welcome!

if the exterior wall is the block, and interior will be frame + gwb, then add mass to it can't hurt - however - the mass should at least equal the window mass (or vice versa). same for doors. the ceiling will be a place to increase mass and also ducts, plumbing, wiring etc which could result in gaps or structural transfers to the exterior.
Glenn
ecx
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Joined: Tue Sep 14, 2021 8:31 am
Location: Chicago, IL

Re: insulating/decoupling a single, street-facing wall?

Post by ecx »

Great, thanks---especially for the tip re: window and door masses. Will let y'all know how it goes!
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