Quietrock

Ron Resnick · Oct 28, 2017

Please tell me about your actual experiences with Quietrock.

In your particular the listening room, what did you use it for? What were you trying to accomplish and did Quietrock achieve your goal? What other products or techniques did you consider?

Did you use it to prevent sound from leaking from your listening room into other areas of your house? Or did you use it to prevent the walls of your listening room from resonating with the music?

What was your method of installing the Quietrock? Did you ever glue Quietrock to any underlying surface material?

Did you ever mix Quietrock with Green Glue?

Did you ever directly compare Quietrock with mass-loaded vinyl?

If I do not care at all about sound escaping the listening room into other areas of the house, is Quietrock justified solely for the purpose of having a constrained layer damping product on the walls of the listening room so that the walls of the listening room are less likely to resonate with the music?

What wall treatment product do you think has the greatest efficacy for preventing the walls from vibrating in response to music playing from the loudspeakers?

Thank you!

Mike Lavigne · Oct 28, 2017

yes, I have Quietrock.....to be specific.....I have Quietrock 545. which is the 1" and 3/8th thick affair with a 1/4" layer of aluminum.

in 2010 I found I had uneven and overdamped bass response side to side due to excessive bass trapping and uneven loading of the walls; one side was an outside wall, the other inside (this was our best guess of causes and effects). so the goal was to establish consistent room boundaries in the front sides and front window wall. we already had the whole room (all walls and ceilings) cocooned in a double layer of 5/8" sheetrock, and my cabinetry was built out from that. so that was the base layer on top of the studs.

so we ripped out the huge designed in 10' x 15' front and side bass traps.

we considered multiple layers of more sheetrock, but then came across Quietrock 545 (at that time it was also called 'THX' 545 in reference to the Home Theatre application). 545 was more effective than 6 stacked sheets of 5/8" sheetrock, and would take up as much less space. and it's aluminum layer suggested it would really help to establish clear room boundaries. so we did install something like 12-16 sheets of Quietrock 545 on the front half of the sidewalls and the window wall. it was glued and screwed to the sheetrock cocoon, then 3/4" finish grade maple plywood was screwed and glued to that. we also made window inserts of the same sandwich and those are in use (which is a separate story in itself).

so.....I have the---studwall (insulated with 702 corning)-> 2 sheets of 5/8" sheetrock -> Quietrock 545 -> 3/4" plywood.....all glued and screwed.

and we have room boundaries that are super solid and....well....amazing bass authority and articulation. and with the barn being a separate building I don't have noise issues to deal with; but even if there are chain saws or other heavy equipment being used in my neighborhood I hear nothing.

your contractor will hate you since it's so heavy to deal with and it will tear up saw blades with that aluminum layer so it's a real pain to work with. but that part is over quick, and you have your solid walls. and it's the time and labor that is the expense; using the right materials has minimal cost differences.

as far as vinyl as your acoustic treatment; it has it's attributes....but if you are chasing ultimate sound.....it's a big bass trap (lots of loose mass) and will deaden the sound since it's mushy and absorbs at an unpredictable rate and can react to changes in temp and humidity. I think at the listening end it's a good choice, but not at the 'business'-speaker end. but that is just my opinion, I've not had Lp lined shelves around the speaker end......could be just right in certain situations.

Steve Williams · Oct 28, 2017

I use Quiet Rock as well in my room Ron, same as Mike

Ron Resnick · Oct 28, 2017

Steve Williams said:
I use Quiet Rock as well in my room Ron, same as Mike

That is interesting, Steve! So your Quietrock is screwed to the wood framing?

Did Bonnie prescribe Quietrock to prevent sound from escaping your room or to prevent the walls of your room from resonating with the music?

That is good Bonnie uses that in her acoustic treatment arsenal! Now that I have taken everyone's advice to back away from a fully-built out room treatment solution from the get-go, and to move slowly and to experiment along the way, and now that I have researched a lot on the alternative in-wall treatment techniques, I fear I might be a very annoying client for Bonnie!

Ron Resnick · Oct 28, 2017

Mike Lavigne said:
yes, I have Quietrock.....to be specific.....I have Quietrock 545. which is the 1" and 3/8th thick affair with a 1/4" layer of aluminum.

in 2010 I found I had uneven and overdamped bass response side to side due to excessive bass trapping and uneven loading of the walls; one side was an outside wall, the other inside (this was our best guess of causes and effects). so the goal was to establish consistent room boundaries in the front sides and front window wall. we already had the whole room (all walls and ceilings) cocooned in a double layer of 5/8" sheetrock, and my cabinetry was built out from that. so that was the base layer on top of the studs.

so we ripped out the huge designed in 10' x 15' front and side bass traps.

we considered multiple layers of more sheetrock, but then came across Quietrock 545 (at that time it was also called 'THX' 545 in reference to the Home Theatre application). 545 was more effective than 6 stacked sheets of 5/8" sheetrock, and would take up as much less space. and it's aluminum layer suggested it would really help to establish clear room boundaries. so we did install something like 12-16 sheets of Quietrock 545 on the front half of the sidewalls and the window wall. it was glued and screwed to the sheetrock cocoon, then 3/4" finish grade maple plywood was screwed and glued to that. we also made window inserts of the same sandwich and those are in use (which is a separate story in itself).

so.....I have the---studwall (insulated with 702 corning)-> 2 sheets of 5/8" sheetrock -> Quietrock 545 -> 3/4" plywood.....all glued and screwed.

and we have room boundaries that are super solid and....well....amazing bass authority and articulation. and with the barn being a separate building I don't have noise issues to deal with; but even if there are chain saws or other heavy equipment being used in my neighborhood I hear nothing.

your contractor will hate you since it's so heavy to deal with and it will tear up saw blades with that aluminum layer so it's a real pain to work with. but that part is over quick, and you have your solid walls. and it's the time and labor that is the expense; using the right materials has minimal cost differences.

as far as vinyl as your acoustic treatment; it has it's attributes....but if you are chasing ultimate sound.....it's a big bass trap (lots of loose mass) and will deaden the sound since it's mushy and absorbs at an unpredictable rate and can react to changes in temp and humidity. I think at the listening end it's a good choice, but not at the 'business'-speaker end. but that is just my opinion, I've not had Lp lined shelves around the speaker end......could be just right in certain situations.

Thank you , Mike, for reciting your history with Quietrock. Since you obviously were not using the Quietrock to prevent sound from escaping the barn, what was the theory behind using the Quietrock? What, exactly, were you trying to achieve sonically?

And why did you use the product with the aluminum layer in the middle of the sandwich rather than the product with the ciscco-elastic layer in the middle of the sandwich?

(I know the product you used is much thicker, but an alternative would've been to use two layers of the standard 5/8" board with the standard layer in the middle. Why did you choose the aluminum middle layer?)

Steve Williams · Oct 28, 2017

Ron Resnick said:
That is interesting, Steve! So your Quietrock is screwed to the wood framing?

Did Bonnie prescribe Quietrock to prevent sound from escaping your room or to prevent the walls of your room from resonating with the music?

That is good Bonnie uses that in her acoustic treatment arsenal! Now that I have taken everyone's advice to back away from a fully-built out room treatment solution from the get-go, and to move slowly and to experiment along the way, and now that I have researched a lot on the alternative in-wall treatment techniques, I fear I might be a very annoying client for Bonnie!

Glued and screwed to the underlying drywall and wood frame. She also has special treatments in the corner of each room

Mike Lavigne · Oct 28, 2017

Ron Resnick said:
Thank you , Mike, for reciting your history with Quietrock. Since you obviously were not using the Quietrock to prevent sound from escaping the barn, what was the theory behind using the Quietrock? What, exactly, were you trying to achieve sonically?

from my post....

the goal was to establish consistent room boundaries in the front sides and front window wall.

measurements showed lack of bass decay. too much damping, and uneven side to side. (using an RTA and trying to adjust the MM3 bass to be even side to side it was clear they were radically different). so making both sides extremely stout, and absolutely the same, was important. and the 545 allowed for that most efficiently.

Ron Resnick said:
And why did you use the product with the aluminum layer in the middle of the sandwich rather than the product with the ciscco-elastic layer in the middle of the sandwich?

from my post....

we considered multiple layers of more sheetrock, but then came across Quietrock 545 (at that time it was also called 'THX' 545 in reference to the Home Theatre application). 545 was more effective than 6 stacked sheets of 5/8" sheetrock, and would take up as much less space. and it's aluminum layer suggested it would really help to establish clear room boundaries.

I did not need de-coupling promoted by the cisco-elastic layer, I needed hook up.

Ron Resnick said:
(I know the product you used is much thicker, but an alternative would've been to use two layers of the standard 5/8" board with the standard layer in the middle. Why did you choose the aliminum middle layer?)

cause it kicks ass as a room boundary for max leverage for BIG BASS!!!

and I wanted my room to be armor plated.

Mike Lavigne · Oct 28, 2017

Steve Williams said:
Glued and screwed to the underlying drywall and wood frame. She also has special treatments in the corner of each room

I don't have any actual 90 degree corners......my room is oval shaped.

microstrip · Oct 28, 2017

Ron Resnick said:
Thank you , Mike, for reciting your history with Quietrock. Since you obviously were not using the Quietrock to prevent sound from escaping the barn, what was the theory behind using the Quietrock? What, exactly, were you trying to achieve sonically?

And why did you use the product with the aluminum layer in the middle of the sandwich rather than the product with the ciscco-elastic layer in the middle of the sandwich?

(I know the product you used is much thicker, but an alternative would've been to use two layers of the standard 5/8" board with the standard layer in the middle. Why did you choose the aliminum middle layer?)

In his room Jacob Helibrunn used plywood and seetrock with green glue (from TAS):

"These walls consist of a layer of plywood and two layers of 5/8" sheetrock, with the "green glue" compound applied between each layer. As Jacob pointed out, this amount of mass on the walls and ceiling was designed to aid bass response while minimizing room nodes. And remember it’s not only a room within a room but it’s also mostly beneath street level. Finally the floor is a 6" concrete slab on 6" of gravel. The dedicated lines are supplied by an Equi=Tech 10kW wall isolation transformer that outputs balanced power."

jeff1225 · Oct 28, 2017

Hi Ron,
I also have Quite Rock in my music room. Here's how my walls are worked out:

-Double pads of R 30 insulation stuffed into the wall
-Sound insulation board made up of wood fiber and glue
-Silicone glue
-Quite Rock II

Ron Resnick · Oct 29, 2017

Thank you, Jeff.

Is there a particular reason you glued the Quietrock to the installation board rather than using screws to attach it?

jeff1225 · Oct 29, 2017

Ron Resnick said:
Thank you, Jeff.

Is there a particular reason you glued the Quietrock to the installation board rather than using screws to attach it?

No they are screwed to the studs as well. The glue is supposed to create an addition air gap.

Pb Blimp · Oct 30, 2017

Ron,

Hello, I am new here. Nyal from Acoustic Frontier designed my room. I used double layer Quiet Rock with Green Glue, suspended on KNC Iso Max and Wave Hangers. These are essential for Bass management. Behind this is a second wall off Roxul sound insulation. I can play at very loud levels with no disturbance in the rest of the house. Much more importantly, I have an extremely low noise floor as result. I have double sealed doors and when I close them it is absolutely silent inside the room. Nyal is pretty good at this stuff. I have been reading about you room. Nyal was a good investment from my perspective. He designed all the custom Helmholtz traps and RPG stuff. Imaging and dynamics in my room are startling.

Ron Resnick · Oct 30, 2017

Thank you very much for posting!

However, in my particular case, I do not care at all about sound or noise escaping the listening room to the rest of the house. I care only about making sure that the walls cannot resonate from the sound coming out of the speakers.

Quietrock, the company, actually advises that Quietrock is much more effective at making sure noise does not escape the room than it is at absorbing vibrations emanating from within the room generated by the speakers.

It has been suggested to me that mass loaded vinyl is the better solution if I care only about dampening vibrations generated from within the listening room.

Mark Seaton · Oct 30, 2017

Ron Resnick said:
Please tell me about your actual experiences with Quietrock.

In your particular the listening room, what did you use it for? What were you trying to accomplish and did Quietrock achieve your goal? What other products or techniques did you consider?

Did you use it to prevent sound from leaking from your listening room into other areas of your house? Or did you use it to prevent the walls of your listening room from resonating with the music?

What was your method of installing the Quietrock? Did you ever glue Quietrock to any underlying surface material?

Did you ever mix Quietrock with Green Glue?

Did you ever directly compare Quietrock with mass-loaded vinyl?

If I do not care at all about sound escaping the listening room into other areas of the house, is Quietrock justified solely for the purpose of having a constrained layer damping product on the walls of the listening room so that the walls of the listening room are less likely to resonate with the music?

What wall treatment product do you think has the greatest efficacy for preventing the walls from vibrating in response to music playing from the loudspeakers?

Thank you!

As detailed in Mike's response, the problem to solve, and restrictions of the application are huge considerations in determining if one material makes more sense vs. others:

Mike Lavigne said:
in 2010 I found I had uneven and overdamped bass response side to side due to excessive bass trapping and uneven loading of the walls; one side was an outside wall, the other inside (this was our best guess of causes and effects). so the goal was to establish consistent room boundaries in the front sides and front window wall. we already had the whole room (all walls and ceilings) cocooned in a double layer of 5/8" sheetrock, and my cabinetry was built out from that. so that was the base layer on top of the studs.

we considered multiple layers of more sheetrock, but then came across Quietrock 545 (at that time it was also called 'THX' 545 in reference to the Home Theatre application). 545 was more effective than 6 stacked sheets of 5/8" sheetrock, and would take up as much less space...

your contractor will hate you since it's so heavy to deal with and it will tear up saw blades with that aluminum layer so it's a real pain to work with. but that part is over quick, and you have your solid walls. and it's the time and labor that is the expense; using the right materials has minimal cost differences.

The key to understand here is the equivalence of the 1 3/8" thick Quietrock 545 to just under 6 sheets of 5/8" drywall, which makes for 3.5" thick. That ~2.5x thinner factor comes from the density per area difference of about 2.6 lb/ft2 for 5/8" drywall, vs 6.7 lbs/ft2 for the QR 545 (I see the PDF datasheet contradicts noting 6.25 lb/ft2). Of course some quick math indicates each 4x8' sheet will be 200-215 lbs.

Hence the last note about the contractor. The lamination of the Quietrock 545 also affords some additional damping, but similar can certainly be achieved with multiple, equal thickness layers of drywall and green glue with a good contractor adding up to the same mass/area.

For the issue Mike was trying to address, this was absolutely an appropriate selection. At the same time, you can see that the 510 & 530 products don't offer much advantage beyond using 2 layers of common drywall. For those starting from scratch, my preference would be to see a heavy and rigid outer shell using Baltic Birch ply and/or MDF with wood or steel stud framing with isolation of some form to the flexible, but damped mass of the inner walls, more commonly 2-3 layers of drywall with green-glue. This gives the outer layer of isolation, but then allows the inner layer to eat up some energy from low frequency modes reducing their intensity (less difference peak to valley in level).

In what I've seen of your space, your biggest focus should be on maintaining any degree of left to right symmetry where you can. In cases like yours that might often come by NOT trying to make things overly rigid when you have a weaker boundary on the opposing surface, or beefing up the areas which do have matching rigid boundaries.

Pb Blimp · Oct 30, 2017

Ron, That is correct about Quietrock but if you want a real low noise floor, keeping outside noise from getting in is definitely improved. I forgot to mention that Nyal also included mass loaded vinyl (I believe it was 1lb per square foot) in the mix. If you want to manage the wall vibration I think you should definitely look at the KNC Isomax Clips and Wave Hangers. They float the walls. My room is Roxul=> Mass Loaded Vinyl=> KNC Hangers and Clips => first sheet Quietrock => Green Glue => second sheet of Quietrock => RPG Treatments and Helmholtz's.

Ron Resnick · Oct 30, 2017

Thank you for clarifying, Paul.

How much lateral space does the clips and hangers method take up?

In other words if you are starting with wood framing and you add 5/8" sheetrock to it, if you instead hang the drywall with the clips and hangers, what is the final protrusion from the wall? How much thicker have you built out beyond the original 5/8" drywall?

Ron Resnick · Oct 30, 2017

Mark Seaton said:
As detailed in Mike's response, the problem to solve, and restrictions of the application are huge considerations in determining if one material makes more sense vs. others:

The key to understand here is the equivalence of the 1 3/8" thick Quietrock 545 to just under 6 sheets of 5/8" drywall, which makes for 3.5" thick. That ~2.5x thinner factor comes from the density per area difference of about 2.6 lb/ft2 for 5/8" drywall, vs 6.7 lbs/ft2 for the QR 545 (I see the PDF datasheet contradicts noting 6.25 lb/ft2). Of course some quick math indicates each 4x8' sheet will be 200-215 lbs. Hence the last note about the contractor. The lamination of the Quietrock 545 also affords some additional damping, but similar can certainly be achieved with multiple, equal thickness layers of drywall and green glue with a good contractor adding up to the same mass/area.

For the issue Mike was trying to address, this was absolutely an appropriate selection. At the same time, you can see that the 510 & 530 products don't offer much advantage beyond using 2 layers of common drywall. For those starting from scratch, my preference would be to see a heavy and rigid outer shell using Baltic Birch ply and/or MDF with wood or steel stud framing with isolation of some form to the flexible, but damped mass of the inner walls, more commonly 2-3 layers of drywall with green-glue. This gives the outer layer of isolation, but then allows the inner layer to eat up some energy from low frequency modes reducing their intensity (less difference peak to valley in level).

In what I've seen of your space, your biggest focus should be on maintaining any degree of left to right symmetry where you can. In cases like yours that might often come by NOT trying to make things overly rigid when you have a weaker boundary on the opposing surface, or beefing up the areas which do have matching rigid boundaries.

Thank you, Mark.

Do you think the two layers of drywall with green glue in between is better at eating up low frequency energy than a layer of mass loaded 3/32" vinyl on the inside of the drywall?

Paul, I would love to keep external noise out of the listening room, but unavoidably I will hear occasionally the refrigerator cycling on and off from the kitchen next door.

Is Roxul a better material to fill in the open areas in the wood framing than Ultratouch/blue jeans insulation?

Pb Blimp · Oct 30, 2017

Ron,

For the low frequencies its all about mass, ergo the benefits of mass loaded vinyl and Roxul. Roxul is very dense (not sure about Ultratouch). The KNC Clips are about 1" off side walls and the hangers for the ceiling are 1 7/16". You may want to chat with Nyal. He is a member here. My room is dead, dead quite.....no hvac, no fridge, no outside noise, nothing. It is really cool for dynamic range and immersion.

Ron Resnick · Oct 30, 2017

Pb Blimp said:
Ron, That is correct about Quietrock but if you want a real low noise floor, keeping outside noise from getting in is definitely improved. I forgot to mention that Nyal also included mass loaded vinyl (I believe it was 1lb per square foot) in the mix. If you want to manage the wall vibration I think you should definitely look at the KNC Isomax Clips and Wave Hangers. They float the walls. My room is Roxul=> Mass Loaded Vinyl=> KNC Hangers and Clips => first sheet Quietrock => Green Glue => second sheet of Quietrock => RPG Treatments and Helmholtz's.

I think you did an amazing job touching every base possible. In my case, since there are two large openings in the space, I just don't think it makes sense to make the walls that bullet proof when there are large openings elsewhere in the room. So, on a cost/benefit analysis basis, I have to figure out what makes sense.

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