Q.I'm renovating a downstairs apartment in an older four-unit
building and have been asked to make the apartment quieter. The
floors in the second-story apartments are newly carpeted, so any
soundproofing measures would need to be limited to the first-floor
apartment's ceiling. I've recommended screwing resilient channel
over the existing plaster-and-lath ceilings and installing new
drywall, but are there other steps that I should
consider?A.Bonnie Schnitta, an acoustic consultant at SoundSense in
East Hampton, N.Y., responds: Resilient channel will add
flexibility to the ceiling assembly, which is needed to deal with
foot traffic and other types of structure-borne noise. But when you
fasten the drywall to the metal channels, be sure...