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Sound is a pressure wave

– Cannot exist in vacuum. Therefore, for it to
exist it needs:
 a source (vibrating body to produce the
pressure waves) and
 a medium (something for the pressure waves
to move)
– Is not part of the electromagnetic spectrum

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Transmission of sound
• Sound is transferred into building and between different
parts of building by means of two ways.

• It is necessary to identify the types of sound involved.

• There are two ways in which sound can be transmitted.

1. Air borne transmission

2. Structural-borne transmission

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• Air-borne sound is sound which travels through air
before reaching a surface.
– Typical sources of air-borne include voices, radios,
musical instruments, traffic and aircraft.

• Structural-borne or known as impact sound is sound

generated on a surface.
– Typical sources of impact sound include footsteps,
slammed doors and windows, noisy pipes and
vibrating machinery.

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• A single source of noise may also generate both types of
sound.

• Example: footsteps on the floor would be heard mainly

as impact sound in the room below, but as air-borne
sound in the room above.

• Sound can pass into a receiving room by flanking

transmission.

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• Sound Insulation
Is a reduction sound energy transmitted into an
adjoining space.
Insulation is a method for controlling noise in buildings.

The sound insulation of a structure depends upon its

performance in reducing the airborne and impact sound
transferred by all sound paths, direct or indirect.

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• Sound Reduction Index (SRI)
Is a measure of the insulation against the direct
transmission of air-borne sound insulation.

• STC  Sound Transmission Class

is an integer rating of how well a building partition
attenuates airborne sound

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• Insulating Principles for a good sound insulation
1. Mass
2. Completeness  fullness, unity
3. Stiffness  solidity
4. Isolation

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• Heavyweight structures transmit less sound than
lightweight structures, because the sound waves on
dense materials have vibrations of low amplitude and so
the sound that is re-radiated into the air is of low amplitude.

• The Mass Law

The sound insulation of a structures is dependent on its
mass per unit area. (material dense)
Sound insulation depends on the frequency and the mass
law also predicts that the sound insulation increases by
about 5 dB whenever the frequency is doubled
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• The completeness of the structure depends
upon:
Uniformity
Air tightness

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Example: A wall of area
18.0m2 contains a door of
area 2.0m2. The SRI are
50 dB for brickwork and
18 dB for door. Calculate
the overall SRI.

Solution: Using SRI = 10 log (1/T)

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= 10 log (1/ 0.001594) = 28 dB
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 Nature and Properties of Sound

vibration of the sound source

The wave moves forward by one wavelength.
The number of vibrations per second therefore indicates the total
length moved in 1 second; which is the same as velocity.

This relationship is true for all wave motions and can be written as
the following formula.

v=ƒxλ
where
v = velocity in m/s
ƒ = frequency in Hz
λ = wavelength in m
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 Examples

• A particular sound wave has a frequency of 440Hz and a

velocity of 340m/s. Calculate the wavelength of this
sound.

Using : v=fxλ
340 = 440 x λ
λ = 340 / 440 = 0.773m

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