I’d recommend trying making thick flaps of several layers of carpet, attaching them at the top of the the windows, and rolling them down at night. Use fire-retardant carpeting, and make a way to hold the window coverings up in the day (roll ‘em up and tie them to nails, maybe). My bedroom window is boarded over, but if the whole house were, I’d go nuts.

Then go to the drugstore and buy a box or bottle of those cheap squishy foam earplugs. Wear ‘em when you sleep. These two things combined should be fairly inexpensive, and should probably get the Db level down to a sleep-inducing level.

Keep in mind if you’re wearing earplugs you can’t hear intruders as quickly. I live in a decent (for now) neighborhood, but have a LOUD alarm connected to all the windows and doors. And I own guns. I keep ‘em loaded. (I don’t have kids. If you have really young kids, you’ll need a lock box, but older kids, despite what the “gun grabbers” say, can be taught NOT to mess with them. Especially if you learn to shoot, and teach your kids to shoot, and teach them gun safety.)

MWD

Thanks for this excellent article.

Apologies for this long comment, but I will be obliged if someone can read the following and help me.

I am (desperately) looking for sound proofing my home, and I was searching on net for solutions. There are tons of articles on net, but most involve purchasing very very costly sound proofing products. Most of the time, these are not in budget.

My problem is due to the noise entering my rooms as I live on a traffic road. And its unaffordable for me to sell this house and purchase new.

My problem is that due to the disturbance of this noise, I and my family have started getting less and less sleep, and worst, we are getting interruptions in our sleep (due to noise) and this has started resulting in affecting our health and hence also my performance in my occupation. I completely fear this will also result in bad health of my kids and their performance in studies (and hence their future!).

Due to lack of sleep, my body is REMAINING tired. I am sure there must be a medical condition term associated with this, but I am yet to know what this is known as medically. Let me know if anyone knows what this is called medically.

With the solution that you have mentioned, can you please let me know the following:

1. If I literally shutoff all my windows with concrete wall, will THAT reduce more noise or your solution? I know my house will be a prison in that case, but I have less choices.

2. What I have started thinking is to use your solution (or completely shut all walls with concrete as you suggest) and then put 2 small low noise low speed inlet outlet fans in each room such that one fan will blow air out and the other will blow air in, in each room. Than use a timer (which are available cheap) which will start and stop these fans after each duration (say each 10 mins) (to save electricity expense and fan life). My question is if I do this, do you think even that small hole in the wall (for fans) will bring enough disturbing noise inside to create disturbance?

Also do you have any article with you which describe the effect of interrupting sleep due to noise on humans and especially kids.

Please help.

-Krishna Kapadia

So, I couldn’t resist planning on upgrading my sound situation ;). I’m searching around for a powerful sound system as we speak, actually…

In a moment of genuine altruism, I remembered how the effects of a giant booming sound system would really cause problems for my neighbors, the police, my parents, as well as myself and my home.

So, I decided to look around for a affordable way to soundproof my room from the outside world. My goal here is to ensure everyone OUTSIDE my room cannot hear my explicit death metal, Techno, Rock and roll, etc, while I can comfortably sit in a giant bean bag chair and listen to awesome music while I am high. Pretty straight forward.

Glad I found this, I will consider this into my plans ;).

If you own the house, adding a concrete wall with air between it and your wall might help, but moving would be easier.

MWD