Noise Reduction Results
The Science of Sound Reduction Made Easy
Noise levels are measured as sound pressure levels, expressed as decibels (dB) 0 dB being the lowest threshold of human hearing up to 140dB resulting in inner ear damage and pain.
Continuous exposure at 90 dB (a heavy truck at 40km/h at a distance of 7m) or above is hazardous to human hearing.
The internationally used rating of Sound Transmission Class (STC) is used to evaluate the acoustical integrity of various building elements such as windows, doors, walls, floors and ceilings.
The STC rating of some of the most common building elements are detailed below
270mm thick double-skin (cavity) brick wall
Conventional brick veneer STC 39
Pitched roof clad with tiles over 10mm plasterboard STC 33
3mm glass in a typical non acoustic window STC 20
Ordinary hollow core door STC 15
You can now see that the weakest acoustic link in a typical building is the windows and doors.
Through utilisation of the Sound Barrier System inside existing noise-affected windows and doors the STC rating will increase to STC 42-44 (dependant on configuration and glass thickness) resulting in the windows/doors performing at an equal or better STC rating than the walls. In most cases completely solving your noise problem.
A 10 dB(A) improvement in the STC rating equates to halving the perceived noise level. Therefore, installation of Sound Barrier windows and doors inside your existing windows and doors will provide an improvement from STC 20 to STC 42-44. Or, in other words, better than halving and halving again current noise transmission through the window or door opening. NOISE REDUCTION OF GREATER THAN 75%.
Replacement windows and doors ranging from STC 30 to STC 50+ are also available. Please contact us to discuss your specific requirements.
Here are a selection of our CSIRO test results:
