SOUNDPROOFING A TWIN

[deester108]

I live in a twin house (apartment exactly same floor plan, same floors). No insulation between living rooms/dining rooms/kitchn etc. Neighbors have children who run, jump and stomp through the house and it sounds like they are upstairs in my part of the house, and when they watcfh tv, or I watch tv, it resounds in the other's apartment.

Landlord will not let me tear out existing wall or construct a new wall over existing wall. If I applied MLV like a curtain (and or with a fabric wall covering) on the wall between us, would that help soundproof that area.

The living room and dining room both have 12 x 8 wall. Do rolls come in white? Or just black? They can be stapled together?

[Mark Davies]

To get any decent soundproofing you would need to increase the mass of the wall by 4 or 5 times so if the mass is 20 kg/msq then you would need to get it Up to 80 kg/msq which means 8 or more layers of mlv which would be expensive and difficult to fix in place. You could add 6 layers of drywall which would have the same effect or cheapest just make a concrete block/brick wall which has lots of mass. Adding four times mass would get you about 10 stc points which would reduce the noise by about half which is not perfect but very good.
Also note only the airborne noise will be affected and any impact noise will not be decreased much - you need to build a room within a room or use shock absorbers to stop impact noise which cause walls and objects to shake.
Further note that doing four walls may not be enough as the noise may just come through your roof or floor if there is not enough mass per unit there.

[joel]

Living in an apartment like this is difficult, at best.  Lots of people have used a form of "Portable Panels" that have helped.  For info here's a quote:
"Portable panels: If you plan on moving but still want some immediate relief from sound  annoyances, make some portable panels you can take with you. Buy 4'X8' wall paneling (also called "Panel-board".  "Homasote" and ordinary "Soundboard" also works well.) from the hardware store and attach Super Soundproofing Mat to the backside with contact cement.   Use at least 1" thick material. (PN 09-42730).  (Well, OK, 1/2" may work pretty good, too).  Push the panels up into place on your wall using a long finishing nail here and there to hold them in place.  (Tip: seal the edges of your panels with our acoustical caulk for best results).  A noticeable sound level reduction will be made and you can take your panels with you!  For even more reduction, buy low-cost acoustical ceiling tiles and attach them to your walls first.  You can leave them behind because they are so inexpensive.  (So is a material called "Wonderboard" Also Duroc,  which is made of concrete!).  Caulking around the edges of your panels as mentioned above is essential."

And here's a link to info on the SSP Mat (see first product discussed)
http://www.soundproofing.org/sales/prices.html

You will still have the structure-born noise problem caused by all the running and juming children.  This is because structure-born noise is caused by impact events or mechanical vibrations.  The acoustic energy of these vibrations is transmitted through solid structures (floors. walls, cielings, studs, joists, pipes, etc.) and then released as air-born sound somewhere else in the building.  It can only be directly solved using some form of de-coupling at the source.