Rubber Underlay for Flooring Assists in Soundproofing

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If you’re planning to upgrade the flooring in your home, you’ve got to realize that there’s more to floor quality than what you see. It’s also about what you hear. Every time an old carpet gets ripped up in favour of laminate, engineered wood floor, bamboo plank or ceramic tiles, there’s a pretty good chance that the homeowners involved are in for a disappointing lesson in the physics of sound transmission. Hard floors teach hard lessons.

Today’s hard flooring options may be popular for their good looks, but they also transmit sound with disappointing clarity. That’s why you’d be wise to invest in quality underneath your floor as well as what you see on top. And one of the most effective places to put your soundproofing dollar is a type of product that begins as a massive heap of old rubber tires.

When it comes to floors, the main acoustic challenge isn’t just about keeping the sound of voices, television and music from spilling over into other levels of your home or neighbouring condos. An added task is halting the transmission of medium frequency thuds caused by people walking around, children dropping toys or the movement of heavy objects on floors above. In fact, this can be the most difficult acoustic hurdle to clear, especially if you’re committed to a hard surface floor.

Sound engineers measure the transmission of impact noises like these on a scale called Impact Insulation Class (IIC). A good rating for a residential floor is around 50 IIC, though it’s quite common for unprotected hard surface floors to only reach the high 20s or low 30 IIC. Even if you’re separated from your upstairs condo neighbours by 8 inches of reinforced concrete, the moment they switch from carpet to ceramics, you’ll know exactly when they get up to go to the bathroom at night. The solution to both these problems is found in the application of a dense, rubber underlay. Typically about 3mm thick, think of it as high performance shock absorbers for your floors. 

A handful of different brands of sound-reducing rubber underlay are on the market, but one of the most innovative is manufactured by a Canadian company called NRI Industries. It turns more than a million old tires each year into products for automotive and industrial applications, as well as an acoustic rubber floor underlay called Sound Down (800-387-8501; nriindustries.com).

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