The wall between home theatre and music room

Although the home builder put a wall to separate the HT and music room, I had to pull it down, as it wasn't isolated from the ceiling. I am not concerned about noise transmission between the two rooms (it is highly unlikely both rooms will be used at once). I do want to prevent sound from traveling up the wall, onto the joists and throughout the rest of the house.

I decided to use RSIC-DC04 isolation clips from soundisolationstore.com to attach the top plate of the wall to the joists - at 2' OC (manufacturers recommendation). This totaled about 7 clips for the whole wall.

This was my first time using these clips, so I learnt some lessons for next time. Here was my technique: 1) Attach clips to top plate on the floor - screw through center of waffle. 2) Attach top plate to joists with screws through metal part of clip. 3) Build base plate, and finish the wall with studs etc.

The problem with this technique was that the RSIC clips were fixed before the studs were built. So after I put the studs in, the pressure on the top plate was different to when I fastened the top plate - creating tension on the clips. This probably doesn't optimize the effectiveness of the clip, but is not a big deal.

 

 

Structural reinforcement

Due to the additional weight being added to the ceiling (already 3 layers of 5/8" drywall under the subfloor, and 2 layers on the ceiling), it was necessary to determine that the joists could support the mass. My builder did some calculations, and although it seemed safe, decided to build a support beam under the joists that were 2' longer than the rest of the joists - to be sure.

As seen in the photo below, this support beam and posts are not isolated from the structure (wouldn't be a support beam otherwise!). Therefore, some work will be required to separate the drywall and the support structure in the future.