I'm going to be using the soundproofing in the basement with the safe and sound but this stuff holds up way better then the normal insulation at least. I went with this stuff do to it being waterproof and its still fireproof as well which is perfect.

Insulation helps I guess my point was mineral wool doesn't really offer much more sound control then your standard fiberglass batt and if there is it's so minimal it's not worth mentioning but Roxul does do a great job at selling there product.

Like Hondaracer mentioned SilentFX or a similar product does work, creating an air space or additional layers of drywall is also a cheap way to create a better stc ratings. If I was to put a suite in my basement I would rip all the board off the ceiling, insulate and board it then add resilient channel and board it again.

There is nothing wrong with Roxul, it's a good product it's just expensive compared the the alternative. If you're doing small areas it's not enough to worry about, when I'm pricing large jobs the cost difference can be 10's of thousands of dollars so I almost always offer cost savings to switch to fiberglass insulation and there usually taken.

If you want google Insulation and STC Ratings, look at the wall/ceiling composition. The higher the STC Rating the better, you can see what adding different air space, thickness/layers of board and insulation does to increase it.

Quasi, so you would use resilient channel as an air gap, between two layers of 5/8 drywall?

Yes you can, if on a wall screw it to the studs and run it horizontal 24" on center before the drywall. If you're only 3 layers of board put the 2 layers on the non resilient channel side, if 2 layers both side you can screw into the Resilient channel but it's a bitch. I've seen people cheat and use 20 gauge hat track in lieu of the resilient channel because it's easier to screw into but you won't find a design for that if you're trying to achieve a certain STC rating or have to do submitals.


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Just wanted to confirm cause that's pretty straightforward and cost effective. Thanks.

It's wayyy more cost effective than the sound proof drywall

I only used the sound proof drywall due to low ceilings where I couldn't give up even an inch

Have Safe and Sound insulation on my basement ceiling and walls. Also resilient channel on the ceiling but can still hear my 4 year old running around, don't think there is any way to get rid of that noise. Getting rid of the kids not an option.

if someone is physically pounding on the other side of the wall or the ceiling above, no amount of insulation will stop the noise.

Sounds and impacts are different things

Of course there is if you have the space and the money. I mean if you want to get into ceiling isolaters and complete isolation systems there is a way. When my dads company worked on the Scotia Bank Theatre years back we had to isolate everything because there is residential above. The amount of Isolaters we put in that place is nuts, I actually had boxes of them left over that I tossed in the garbage after my dads heart attack because I had no use for them.

What I regret not doing now in my suite was using the sound proof drywall and building boxes around where my LED pots are going to go.

Seems kind of counter intuitive to spend all this extra money to board the ceiling then cut 4" holes in it for lights. At least with these slim LED's I can pack a bunch of insulation behind them but that obviously isn't the same as continuous drywall :okay:

I got a shit ton finished today, finished ripping apart the washroom, sanded second coat of mud and sanded the ceiling again and of course insulation and drywall and the plumbing was completed.

Fuck I'm beat and need to go to sleep

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looks good.

After getting into the guts of our new house and probably knowing it's insides better than anyone else in the last 108 years of it's history, IMO i think the way we are building houses these days is almost backwards as opposed to back then when it comes to Vapour Barriers etc.

100 year old house has no vapour barriers at all, beer bottle stucco on the outside, lathe and plaster on the inside with a bit of blown in cellulose insullation

this house will -never- mold or retain large amounts of moistuer because there are no solid vapour barriers, and, imo, this is why the house has lasted for so long and the solid wood construction remains intact and as solid as ever.

these days with your envelope and vapour barriers we put so much emphasis on keeping moisture out that if not done 100% correctly, problems can and will arise.

our neighbors house has fucking holes the size of basketballs all over the exterior and it's just shitilly patched with flashing, wood, etc.

if he had done this in a modern house his house would be falling apart in 10 years, however, due to the way it's constructed (exatly the same as ours) it breathes and even if it does experiance moisture, it always dries out

I totally agree about how the newer houses are built so poorly. Mine is build in 71 and you can tell how solid the main structure is made with old growth solid wood. I've been living the past two months with zero insulation no walls really and I didn't notice that much different in the cold weather we have been getting at the time which I'm sure in newer houses you would feel like you are sitting outside.

Not a fan of the LVT/WPC/Vinyl

At the end of the day, it is still a printed picture with repeating pattern....no different from laminate floor. High end laminate also tends to have better look and texture than high end vinyl at a cheaper price.

The only advantage it has is being waterproof. But the cost premium over laminate is not worth it imo. Also, the vinyl plank itself is waterproof, but your subfloor isn't. So if you have any thing more than a minor spill (e.g your dishwasher or toilet leaked overnight), you'll need to take off the floor and let the subfloor dry out anyway)

At $3.50/sqft...i much rather spend a bit more and go for the real thing. (Laminate on the other hand is a good low cost option since it is typically $1.50-$2/sqft)

I'm hopefully going to get my flooring from here www.eckowood.com, they are next to my work and will give me wholesale pricing lol

Tell me about it...lol
I tried to hang a heavy punching bag in my basement last month.
All the floor joist are these "engineered I-joist"...
The bag is 100lb+, I don't even feel comfortable hanging 50lb off these joist..

To be fair, I think they are more stable and can hold a lot of weight coming in straight from the top...just nothing from the bottom or the side.

I am pretty familiar with floors...(i sell them :pokerface:, not in van tho)
Feel free to ask if you've got any question.

In case your neighbor is ripping you off...
5" x 1/2" Engineered Floor from china cost is around $2.60-$3.60/sqft. (pretty sure those stuffs they are selling on the website are from China)
7.5"Wide & 6' Long Plank stuffs are around $4-$6.
The canadian name brand stuffs will be significantly more expensive...but the good chinese made stuffs is not too bad...for the average person it is hard to distinguish the good from the bad tho.
These are ontario pricing...direct import or retailer wholesale cost.


Also...some of my opinions in terms of look
Wavy Handscrapped texture is kinda going out of style now. (very popular last 5 years)
The European styles floors are getting more popular now (6-7"+ wide, matte/oil finish, flat but with textures)
The smooth finish floor is very "classic" and won't go out of styles..but they show everything. (Scratch & dents etc)
But at the end of the day...pick whatever look you like lol

The one lesson I learned about any kind of plank flooring is to definitely get the interlocking kind. We got tongue and groove and it was a huge pain in the ass trying to prevent gaps because any slight deviation along a piece would result in quite noticeable gaps. There might be a better technique but I had to glue 3 rows, then screw a bunch of pieces of 2x4 to the floor and hammer wedges of wood between the flooring and the anchored 2x4s to hold everything tight together while the glue dried. It took a heck of a lot longer than just cutting pieces and snapping them together.

Thanks Ferra, we won't be doing the floors anytime soon tho. Once the bathroom and kitchen are done we need new windows which will cost more then the cabinets I'm sure. My buddy just spent $18,000.

Well..that's the difference between shitty product vs a higher quality one.
The high end stuffs..you can have 500 planks and not 1 of them the width is off by 0.2mm...with the crappy product sometimes 50% of the planks are slightly off.
Shitty product also have a higher tendency to twist and wrap because the lumber weren't dried properly before milling...so like your 2x4 lumber they are no longer straight after they dry out.

Also..i dont like the click stuffs in a house. The nail down stuffs feels more solid when you walk on it. Click engineered floor needs an underpadding and you can usually feel some "softness" and bounce on the floor when you are walking on it. (same as laminate & click vinyl)

Click is definitely much more DIY friendly tho.
With T&G nail down, you need specialized machines, and you gotta make sure your start line is dead straight. Otherwise your floor will look crooked and your end joint won't be 90degree as you go further in.

There was only one option that we could find locally so I'm assuming it's not the best quality, it's bamboo so maybe that made it worse when it acclimatized to our house. The floor is floating so you do feel more flex as you walk on it but I prefer that over something rock hard. I considered nailing it but I was told it would have a higher tendency to creak as it ages which I definitely don't want.

Almost finished taping and mudding the kitchen, first time I have ever done this and I think it looks ok. Corner beads fricken suck

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I'm not a taper by any means but the wider you float your mud on the joints the easier it is to blend and hide the joint. Most the tapers I see work will typically use a trowel when they apply that first coat of mud over there tapes.

Saying that good for you for taking it on, taping isn't an easy thing to do.

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really the only visible tape will be on the back wall and I'm of course going to sand it down which should be more then enough to hide the joints. It's perfect to start in a kitchen since mostly everything will be hidden.