Q. I need a noise solution for my company's building. It is a warehouse building made of concrete, cinder block and steel. We have a meeting room where we are planning on having meetings, birthday parties, and potentially some yoga classes. It is roughly 30 x 60 feet in size. We are trying to eliminate sound coming in from the rest of the complex. Will sound masking work for us?
I was also curious to know if we could cancel out any fan noise for the players within the facility. We have 30 foot ceilings with a 178 x 80 foot soccer field and two half court basketball courts. I know it is impossible to remove all noise since it is an open warehouse style building, but I was trying to find any solution to help reduce the fan involvement.
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A. Thank you for reaching out to us. As you describe your goals, I fear I must tell you that sound masking may not offer the solution you need. Sound masking is used for two purposes: to reduce distraction by masking (drowning out) irritating noises, and/or to provide security by preventing overhearing of confidential conversations. Your situation sounds quite severe, so it is not likely that sound masking will provide the result you want. I would highly recommend that you do some testing before investing in a sound masking system.
Sound masking systems operate at a volume around 47-50 dB, max. That means they cannot drown out noises that are louder than that. Of course, you may be able to drown out half or more of the irritating noises with such a system, and that could be enough of a benefit to make the spaces workable for your purposes.
If the facility is in operation, I would suggest that you download a noise level meter app for your smart phone and do some sound level monitoring to see just how loud the noises are that you want to avoid. If they are at or below 55-60 dB, sound masking could be worthwhile. Another test you could then run is to get a box fan and operate it a different levels to see how effective the masking noise generated by the fan will be.
The benefit of professional noise masking equipment is that the sound is engineered to be pleasant and uninteresting to listen to, such that the mind quickly tunes it out; you do not even hear it unless you intentionally attend to it, or when you first enter or leave a treated area. Also, the sound is engineered so as to mask human voices more effectively than other kinds of sounds because humans are most sensitive to voices making these sounds the most disruptive to us.
Until next time, be safe and do the right thing.
Tom Bergman, Vice President
Ear Plug Superstore
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