Acoustical performance of wall assemblies containing wood structural elements.

Abstract

There has been little historical research within the acoustical community regarding the sound isolation properties of wall assemblies that include structural elements. On most buildings, many of the wall assemblies, including exterior walls, demising walls, and corridor walls, require wood shear panels and/or posts to be incorporated into their design for structural reasons. However, most common acoustical designs have not been acoustically tested with the presence of wood structural elements. Acoustical test results for such wall assemblies are presented. Since a conventional approach is to assume that a plywood shear panel performs similarly to a layer of gypsum board, the walls including a wood shear panel will be compared to equivalent assemblies where that layer is gypsum board. Additionally, field acoustical test results for walls including shear panels shall also be presented and compared with the laboratory tests, and translation of laboratory to field acoustical performance for these constructions will be discussed.