Reducing noise passing through the floor of an apartment building?

[inthecorner]

Hi all,

I have a very strange and funny question to ask some of you folk out there. I recently bought an Xbox360 game for my wife called "Dancing stage universe", you know the one with the dancing mat? ( Dancing Stage Universe - Konami )

The game is played by jumping on this dancing mat in a variety of steps and sequences, which is exactly the problem. We live on the top floor of an apartment building and the neighbours below us seem to find this thumping of musical feet quite disturbing.

So I was wondering do any of you guys have advice on the construction of some kind of noise reduction floorboard that would enable my wife and family to use the dancing mat without any real noise passing through the floor to the neigbours?

I realize this is not a question that relates much to recording studios but non the less who better to ask than you guys, appreciate any advice. Thanks.

[jwl]

Something like a drum riser should help. You need to decouple the dancing surface from the floor. You might be able to use 703 or 705, sandwiched between layers of plywood or MDF for this.

A lot of dance studios use floating wood floors for exactly this reason. You may want to research how those are constructed.

[Glenn Kuras]

Originally Posted by jwl

Something like a drum riser should help. You need to decouple the dancing surface from the floor. You might be able to use 703 or 705, sandwiched between layers of plywood or MDF for this.

A lot of dance studios use floating wood floors for exactly this reason. You may want to research how those are constructed.

Either that or invite the people from down stairs to play...

Glenn

[auvarov]

Hello,

what you may want to try is this; depending on your budget of course. There is a product to float a floor that you can look at here: Wood Floating Floor - Model RIM (Roll-out Isolation Material) System
You'd probably need a small section of it. Roll it out, put a sheet of plywood on top, maybe another one, and finish it with carpet/hardwood. The great thing about it is that it comes in variety of thicknesses (obviously, the thicker the better), and it decouples the floor quite nicely. Something to look into. Or... as Glenn suggested, just have the people from downstairs come over and play with you

[inthecorner]

Thank all you guys for your very helpful advice.

[Glenn Kuras]

I would highly recommend you go down stairs and have the wife jump up and down so you can hear how bad it is. If SUPER bad I would do more research on the matter as you don't want to install something that might only help a little.

Not saying that the ideas you have gotten will not work/help, but it might not work good enough for the people downstairs.

Glenn

[Uncle GroOve]

What about a piano?
A friend of mine has opened a music school in a high rise (not a very brilliant idea).
There will be no less than 3 (three) pianos within the facility, one being a full coda.
I was thinking of decoupling the pianos from the structural floor via some sort of limp mass sheet + gypsum board and plywood combo.

Do you think that could eventually work even if applied *only* to the piano area - i.e. without resorting to covering the whole floor of each room? As you might have understood, there are, ahem, budget constraints....

Thx!!