Effects of stud properties and spacing on acoustical performance of single stud walls

A common wall design is gypsum wall board (GWB) cladding on each side of a row of steel studs. Steel studs are available in a variety of metal thicknesses and designs, not all of which is standardized, and can be installed with a range of spacing. Most published laboratory testing on these walls uses only a small subset of the available stud types, and the acoustical effect of changes to the stud parameters is not well understood. The authors and colleagues have performed several laboratory testing programs to systematically investigate the acoustical effects of stud properties and spacing. The effects of changes to stud mil thickness, model, and spacing on third-octave transmission loss values is presented and compared with earlier analyses.