Effect of temperature condition on sound insulation performance of laminated gypsum boards with adhesive

Double-leaf walls used in multiple-dwelling are often made of laminated gypsum boards to offer enhanced sound insulation. In Japan, the two layers are usually glued together with adhesive and staples after the bottom layer is attached to the studs using screws or nails. Polyvinyl acetate emulsion (PVAc) adhesive is mostly used as the adhesive; however, viscoelastic glue is sometimes applied due to prevent boards from vibrating. The sound insulation performance of the laminated gypsum board depends on a type of adhesive. It might be also controlled by temperature condition of the laminated gypsum board. Thus, we measured the sound transmission loss and the internal loss factor for several types of the two boards bonded with different kinds of adhesive in various temperature conditions. The results showed that the viscoelastic adhesive provided the higher sound insulation performance at high frequencies including the critical coincidence frequency fc than the PVAc one. We found that the bending stiffness increases and the internal loss factor decreases as the temperature decreases; consequently, fc is shifted to a lower frequency and the sound transmission loss at fc is reduced. However, PVAc adhesive makes much less effect of the temperature on sound insulation than viscoelastic one.