Knightfly! Floating floor questions
Posted: Tue Nov 09, 2004 4:44 am
Greetings! Couple questions about floating floors. I read thru the sticky about floated floors, and paid special attention to the waterproofing thing, so while I may have missed something (I spent 2 weeks worth of lunchbreaks reading this stuff) I think I have the basics down. Didn't want to add this stuff to a 20-post thread, but I can re-type the answers to this thread over there to add to it... Just a couple things still pop up in my mind.
First- I don't mean to be questioning your knowledge of physics, but what you say about a "spring not acting as a spring near the ends of it's travel" don't apply to a compressive load, at least not in my mind. I understand the effect of over-compressing the load and having sound transmit straight into the structure if the rubber is overloaded, but on the other end of the spectrum, having the rubber far over-designed doesn't seem like it'd hurt the effectiveness of the floated floor. If the rubber is close to the TOP end of it's travel (impossible for it to be exactly at it with any sort of load) how would it lose it's springiness? Looked at in slo-motion, the floor's vibration would translate to vertical motion; as the floor moved downward, the rubber would compress to absorb this motion (presuming it didn't over-compress), and as the floor moved upward, it may or may not lose contact with the rubber and bounce, but the resulting downward impact that followed would again be absorbed by the rubber.
The only thing I can think of that would be a bad side-effect is that your entire room has the potential of vibrating across the concrete floor beneath. There would need to be some kind of bumpers to keep it from wandering off on you, and perhaps having the inner walls contact the outer walls, making a structural bridge for the sound that way.
Like I said, I don't want to sound argumentative: I just don't see the physics behind the floated floor being ineffective from over-designing the rubber.
The second question builds off of the first one. Working as an architect, I know a dozen roofing companies off the top of my head that use EPDM rubber for flat roof systems, and throw away scraps all the time. Getting that stuff would be as close to free as I could get. EPDM has much greater compressive strength than Neoprene, so overdesigning wouldn't be all that hard.
Thanks in advance for all the help- our offer to purchase a new house was accepted, and the new basement has about 3 times the space that I currently have... you all have been a big help in my study of studio construction, so I'm sure the new rooms will do the place justice!
Kase
www.minemusic.net
First- I don't mean to be questioning your knowledge of physics, but what you say about a "spring not acting as a spring near the ends of it's travel" don't apply to a compressive load, at least not in my mind. I understand the effect of over-compressing the load and having sound transmit straight into the structure if the rubber is overloaded, but on the other end of the spectrum, having the rubber far over-designed doesn't seem like it'd hurt the effectiveness of the floated floor. If the rubber is close to the TOP end of it's travel (impossible for it to be exactly at it with any sort of load) how would it lose it's springiness? Looked at in slo-motion, the floor's vibration would translate to vertical motion; as the floor moved downward, the rubber would compress to absorb this motion (presuming it didn't over-compress), and as the floor moved upward, it may or may not lose contact with the rubber and bounce, but the resulting downward impact that followed would again be absorbed by the rubber.
The only thing I can think of that would be a bad side-effect is that your entire room has the potential of vibrating across the concrete floor beneath. There would need to be some kind of bumpers to keep it from wandering off on you, and perhaps having the inner walls contact the outer walls, making a structural bridge for the sound that way.
Like I said, I don't want to sound argumentative: I just don't see the physics behind the floated floor being ineffective from over-designing the rubber.
The second question builds off of the first one. Working as an architect, I know a dozen roofing companies off the top of my head that use EPDM rubber for flat roof systems, and throw away scraps all the time. Getting that stuff would be as close to free as I could get. EPDM has much greater compressive strength than Neoprene, so overdesigning wouldn't be all that hard.
Thanks in advance for all the help- our offer to purchase a new house was accepted, and the new basement has about 3 times the space that I currently have... you all have been a big help in my study of studio construction, so I'm sure the new rooms will do the place justice!
Kase
www.minemusic.net