For some people living in panel houses, repairs in the apartment of neighbors located a floor above may turn into a continuous torment. And even at the end of construction work using perforators and drills, you can clearly hear the steps in the upper apartment, although there was nothing like that before the repair. Let’s try to figure out what is the secret of the “new” noise effect.
Reinforced concrete slabs in panel houses have a significant thickness and mass. They well isolate the sounds of speech or music, but due to the high density of the material, they perfectly convey the so-called shock and structural noises. By the way, after the repair, it will not be superfluous to find out how to make a brick brick with your own hands.
To deal with this phenomenon, in buildings of this type at the construction stage, floating floor screeds are necessarily cast, under which a layer of material with a low elastic modulus (fiberboard, mats made of porous rubber, etc. p.) about 20 mm thick. SNiP 23-03-2003 “Protection from noise” orders to separate the layer of concrete from walls and partitions with the same material, but the builders began to implement this recommendation in practice relatively recently.
According to the problem situation, it turns out that during the repair, the neighbor from above completely or partially dismantled the floor screed along with a layer of soundproofing (it is possible to slightly increase the ceiling height), and then laid directly on a concrete stove, without a damping layer, ceramic tiles, a parquet board or another firm and thin coating. His fault is obvious: the housing inspection will never agree on such a reconstruction.
However, it should be said that it would be much easier to prevent this trouble than cope with it post -fact. The fact is that it is possible to effectively deal with shock noise only from the side of its source. Protective ceiling structures are most often useless. In order to at least slightly reduce the volume of the sound, they must have a significant (not less than200 mm) thickness, and it is necessary to use special installation methods and fasteners. All this makes the struggle for silence unreasonably expensive and laborious, also associated with a significant decrease in the height of the premises.
Sound -insulating structures based on mineral wool mats or fiberglass canvas reduce the shock noise by a maximum of 10 dB, and only on condition that the protection will be installed not only on the ceiling, but also on the walls. One layer of mats from stone wool on the floor of neighbors on top is able to provide soundproofing 40-60 dB. And the cork canvas is used as a soundproof substrate for a laminate or parquet board.
Now it remains only to file a lawsuit in court and try to force the neighbor to restore the soundproof screed. Meanwhile, it is likely that it would be much easier to agree with him at the initial stage of repairs. Most likely, the initiator of the destruction of the screed did not even think about the possible consequences or did not assume that they would be so serious.