The Forensic expert kollegium conducts forensic construction and technical expertise to study all types of sound insulation of any building envelope. Field measurements of sound insulation are carried out using modern measuring and testing instruments which are included in the State register of measuring instruments of the Republic of Belarus, and which annually undergo state metrological verification and certification. Forensic expertise of all types of sound insulation are carried out by full-time certified forensic experts and experts in certification of organizations (in terms of working conditions based on the results of an assessment of physical factors) in the System of voluntary certification of organizations, specialists, products and technological processes in the field of labor protection (Russian Federation), trained in acoustic measurement and design methods in the leading educational centers of St. Petersburg and Moscow.
A feature of the actual insulation of airborne and impact noise of enclosing structures determination expertise is the possibility of its production both at consumers and remotely, by performing acoustic calculations. In most cases of expert practice, full-scale measurement of the insulation of airborne and impact noise of enclosing structures is carried out in order to determine the compliance of the actual values of the sound insulation indices with the requirements of technical regulatory legal acts, and the corresponding acoustic calculations are carried out to determine a set of measures aimed at eliminating the identified inconsistencies.
When conducting the parameters of insulation of airborne and impact noise of enclosing structures expertise at the consumer, it is necessary that the court, in its ruling on the appointment of a forensic expertise, obliges the parties to provide full access to the living rooms of the apartments where the study will be carried out. In addition, within the framework of civil proceedings, questions regarding the compliance of the actual insulation of airborne and impact noise of enclosing structures with the requirements specified in the project documentation for the construction of a house often arise. In this case, it is necessary that the technical passports of the apartments, as well as the architectural part of the project for the installation of enclosing structures (explication of floors, walls) of apartments, or drawings of floor units between apartments, are submitted to the forensic institution along with the materials of the civil case. This documentation can be requested from organizations operating the capital structure under study (housing maintenance services, housing repair and maintenance associations, housing and construction consumer cooperatives, etc.).
When carrying out acoustic calculations, in addition to the listed package of documents, it is necessary to submit to the forensic institution a list of building materials used in the installation of the building envelope, indicating their thicknesses and densities (surface or volume). In the absence of reliable information on all building materials used in the floor unit between apartments, experts are forced to open the flooring (and sometimes the suspended ceiling) and remove samples of the used materials for field density measurements. Therefore, before appointing a forensic expertise of objects and territories functionally related to them, on the issues of the parameters of airborne and impact noise insulation examination, it is advisable to clarify the availability of all of the above documents with the parties, and in the absence of any in the ruling on the appointment of a forensic expertise, to give the forensic institution the partial destruction of the components of floors and enclosing structures permit. It should be noted that in the absence of the architectural part of the project for the installation of horizontal enclosing structures (explication of floors) of apartments or drawings of floor nodes between apartments, it becomes fundamentally impossible to carry out acoustic calculations, since in addition to the density of the floor material itself, the expert needs to know the features of its geometry, such as the presence, the number, shape and location of voids in floor slabs. The way out of this situation could be to indicate to the expert the number of a typical project of a residential building, information on the vast majority of which is contained in the project base of the Forensic expert kollegium.
Often, disputes on the determination of compliance/non-compliance of airborne and impact noise insulation of enclosing structures arise after redevelopment or reconstruction of residential premises (replacement of the old floor covering, removal of beams, part of the wall, etc.), as a result of improper selection of building materials (laying laminated or parquet boards without soundproofing substrate, laying ceramic tiles, cutting holes in ventilation shafts, etc.).
The following are the most typical tasks of acoustic calculation and field measurements of sound insulation:
- determination of the soundproofing ability of new structures;
- determination of the soundproofing ability of the enclosing structures of the projected or erected buildings;
- estimation of the soundproofing ability of enclosing structures to the requirements of technical regulatory legal acts in force on the territory of the Republic of Belarus;
- estimation of the soundproofing ability of enclosing structures to the requirements of project documentation for the construction of a house;
- estimation of the soundproofing ability of enclosing structures after redevelopment or reconstruction.
Typical questions of a forensic expertise on determination of the parameters of sound insulation can be formulated in the following generalized form:
- Does the insulation of airborne and/or impact noise of the enclosing structure (name of structure) between the living quarters of apartments (numbers of apartments) located at the address: (city, street, house number) comply with the requirements of technical regulatory legal acts in force on the territory of the Republic of Belarus (for newly erected buildings)?
- Does the insulation of airborne and/or impact noise of the building envelope (designation name) between the living quarters of the apartments (numbers of apartments) located at XXXX meet the requirements of the technical regulatory legal acts in force at the time of construction of the house (for already built buildings)?
- Does the insulation of airborne and/or impact noise of the enclosing structure (name of structure) between the living quarters of apartments (numbers of apartments) located at: XXXX meet the requirements of project documentation for the construction of a house?
- How did the redevelopment (change of flooring, changes in wall structures, etc.) affect the insulation of airborne and/or impact noise of the enclosing structure (name of structure) between the living quarters of apartments (numbers of apartments) located at: XXXXX?
You can consult on the issues of conducting a forensic construction and technical expertise of the sound insulation of enclosing structures at the Forensic expert kollegium at: Minsk, Zhukovskaga St., 11A, 4th floor
or by phone +375 (17) 317 04 71; +375 (17) 317 04 72; +375 (17) 317 04 73; +375 (17) 317 04 74; +375 (17) 317 04 76; +375 (29) 198 60 11; +375 (44) 588 60 11
© A.Kazak; K.Dadzkou
