Accoustic underlay Advice needed

u2thepale

Hi,

Shortly I'll be ripping up the old "glue stiled laminate on our three storey Corpo House" and replacing the laminate with new laminate possibly Balterio 9mm.
At the moment the impact nosie from own floors above is quite bad and am really looking to dampen this... Am looking for some good advice and possible solutions that don't cost a fortune and a DIY job if possible...

The current laminate is on a ply floorboard and then below that are the joists which I think must be empty cavities considering the impact noise vibarting around.

Has anyone any recommendations for both the underlay and possible should I fill the empty cavities aswell ...??

Any help a great help!!

Buford T Justice

Its a laminated floor on a timber subfloor. There's little you can do to reduce the noise tbh.

AckwelFoley

This accoustic underlay you speak of is made from cork.

Ive used it before and found it rather effective when cut into strips and used on the floorjoists prior to screwing the plywood and then in the roll form on top of the plywood and under the laminate floor.

u2thepale

Thanks for the replies guys,

Having looked at the timber sub-floor its 20mm thick and then there's a gap of 200mm to the ceiling below. The timber subfloor is nailed down with old style flat head timber nails as such and this could be a real nightmare getting up then back down again so I might look for a really good acoustic laminate
underlay...

Surely a good acoustic underlay as fingers said would be an improvement on the thin piece of underlay that's down and dampen some of the impact noise..

Cheers

u2thepale

HI, have gone with 5mm accoustic underlay however I have one other question...

IS it ok to lay the new laminate over the existing laminate ??

The existing laminate is in good condition but is just dated and hence why I 'm replacing it .
Obviously I'll have to plain the doors etc but I'm thinking if I leave th existing floors down, lay the accoustic underlay on top then the new floor it will first of all will give meless work to do but also help with the impact noise ..

Regardless I'll have to plain the doors as the new laminate is thicker than the current old one

Has anyone done this before or is it advisable..?

Cheers

writhen

You really should put some absorptive material between those joists. Otherwise you'll have a lot of reverberant sound in that cavity.