Did you hear about the Building Acoustics Presentation?
Did you hear that SOA & Henderson Engineers hosted a Lunch and Learn on Building Acoustics? It was full of sound advice for acoustical challenges in new spaces and renovations alike. Participants toured three different spaces on the Columbia College’s campus, each with unique auditory requirements.
Before the tour began, Jeff Teel, Senior Acoustical Consultant from Henderson Engineers, gave an overview of building acoustics and typical methods for mitigating sound problems. SOA and Henderson Engineers have worked together on numerous projects, including several of the spaces toured at Columbia College.
The first space toured was Dorsey Gymnasium. Originally built in 1911, the entire space was made up of hard surfaces (plaster walls and ceiling, wood floor) producing a very reverberant (noisy) space. Making matters worse, sound easily travelled between the gym and the Jane Froman Studio located on the floor above. Because of these acoustical problems the College was not able to schedule events in Dorsey Gym and the Jane Froman Studio simultaneously. SOA and Henderson worked together to control sound on different fronts. As the detail below shows, a new insulated, heavy mass ceiling suspended by sound isolation hangers (Mason Industries), was added to the underside of the existing ceiling. Additionally, a spray-applied cellulose product called K-13 was added to the ceiling to reduce reverberation in the gym. Lastly, fabric wrapped sound absorbing panels were added on nearly all of the walls at the lower level. As a result, Columbia College schedules activities in the space nearly every day and for a wide variety of activities: from ping-pong competitions, to presentations and social events.
The second space on tour was one of Columbia College’s new Dean’s offices. The College’s recent academic restructuring created new Deans positions, and therefore offices needing speech privacy. Because the offices are in the 100+ year-old St. Clair Hall, a variety of renovation tactics were first evaluated. Demolishing existing plaster and lath walls was likely to cause too much disruption in the occupied building. Pumping insulation into existing walls was likely to be ineffective as blocking in the cavities would prevent them from being filled completely. Implementation of SOA’s recommended solutions has been successful including construction of new, insulated walls that are continuous from floor to structural deck and the addition of doors with sound seals and automatic door bottoms that drop to conceal the gap at the bottom of the door when the door is latched. To further increase privacy, the College worked with Lencore to install a sound masking system in each office. What makes the system especially effective is that each office has a control dial, shown in the photo below, enabling occupants to adjust the system according to their preferences. While sound masking does not prevent sound transfer, it makes speech unintelligible. These combined solutions have provided the College with acoustical privacy with minimal disruption to a historic structure.
Bixby Auditorium was the last stop of the tour. The auditorium is part of Brouder Science Center, newly constructed on Columbia College’s in 2013. SOA consulted with Henderson Engineers for the design of Bixby, which had two primary goals: to provide an ideal lecture and distance learning space as well as an excellent musical performance space. The space has proven to be extremely successful in both scenarios, due to a multitude of design features. As shown in the picture below, panels on the walls alternate between sound absorbing (flat) and sound diffusing (convex). Ceiling panels vary in their locations, angles and perforation (or lack thereof) to appropriately distribute sound throughout the room. The result is a highly utilized space that rarely requires use of a microphone and enhances both clear lecture and musical performances.
Featured Resource
Finding the Right Building Site
"Getting your Ducks in a Row" E-booklet 5
Download E-BookletCategories
- Sustainable Design
- Adaptive Reuse / Renovation
- Design Nuts & Bolts
- Ownership, Operations & Maintenance
- Energy Efficiency
- Making a Great Project Team
- "Building" your Business
- Dollars & Sense
- SOA News & Events
- Interior Design
- Case Studies
- Sites & Landscaping