A wall system’s sound attenuation, or ability to reduce sound pressure, can be measured in laboratory conditions through a test published by ASTM, under Standard E90 - Laboratory Measurement of Airborne Sound Transmission Loss of Building Partitions and Elements.
This test requires a wall assembly 8 ft. square to be installed in the aperture of the test chamber. A multi-spectral frequency is then produced inside the chamber at preset amplification, with microphones arrayed outside the wall to measure the response in decibels at multiple locations.
The sound reduction is charted across the input frequency spectrum and the result is processed through an algorithm to determine a sound reduction value, known as the Sound Transmission Class, or STC value.
Common interior structure walls may be built to have an STC value between 30 and 56. A common windowpane has a value of 26.
Our FireblockWall™ system has been tested with a STC rating of 40. The value of a high STC rating is to isolate the space from exterior noise sources such that the sound level is appropriate for the occupancy.
For more information about STARC's FireblockWall or RealWall™ solutions, click here.
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