Acoustics and vibration studies have been done on different floors and walls under laboratory conditions. To include the effect of flanking transmission, it is necessary to measure acoustic performance in a real building. It is important to make the connection between floor and wall to achieve good sound reduction without the flanking transmission. In Chapter 8 some examples of tested walls and floor that achieve high sound reduction are presented.

Section 8.2 describes sound and vibrations measurements on a test house, which are made with prefabricated floor elements and walls. The sound reduction through the floor element is compared with laboratory tests. Studies have also been made on the flanking transmission through the connection between the wall and floor elements.

Section 8.3 describes a number of sound tests on different types of walls and floors constructions. The effect of different plasterboards and resilient bars between the studs and the plasterboards has been studied. Tests on separating floors with and without floating floor have also been done.

Section 8.4 describes sound and vibrations measurements on a demonstration hous e. The damping properties were tested with heel impact impulses and the natural frequencies and damping factors are calculated.

In Section 8.5 Recommendations for the construction of a light steel- framed house are presented.

This document is excerpted from the report on the ECSC STEEL RTD PROGRAMME, Development of Dry Composite Construction Systems Based on Steel in Residential Applications, a project carried out with a financial grant of the European Coal and Steel Community.

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