Fine-tuning acoustic isolation in buildings

Spain’s Acciona Infrastructure is ranked among the leading construction companies in the world. They are recognized for implementing advanced and innovative techniques and technology. R&D is vital to keep the company at the cutting edge. Acciona Infrastructure created a dedicated team to analyse building sound insulation in relation to technological developments in building construction.

Challenge

Traditional acoustic isolation calculation methods are not always precise and often deviate from one another. The use of new materials and joining methods in buildings, plus the introduction of the Spanish Technical Building Code, CTE, inspired Acciona to carry out acoustic quality analysis on buildings. They hoped this would help them better understand the precise sound isolation required and to improve future designs.

Solution

For on-site building analysis, the team started with a Hand-held Analyzer Type 2250, Omnipower Sound Source Type 4292, and Tapping Machine Type 3207. As the research progressed and became more complex, the setup was upgraded to include a PULSE data acquisition and analysis system and LAN-XI data acquisition hardware.

Results

The initial project has been very successful. Acciona is now able to perform more precise analysis of existing and new materials, as well as new structural concepts. Moreover, they are able to validate these models so that better isolation methods and composite materials can be created and structural dynamics can be continually improved.