Living close to an airport can be a difficult situation when it comes to loud noises. Whether it’s annoying you during the day or just keeping you awake at night, the sure thing it that you would love to reduce the noise as much as possible. Double glazing is considered by many an effective way to block out excessive aircraft noise and make your house soundproof. Let us see some facts and find out in this article if double glazed windows reduce airplane noise inside your home.
How Does Double Glazing Work?
Standard windows are manufactured using a single sheet of 2-3 mm glass. This is not at all capable of providing noise insulation to a house. The usage of thicker glass, however, can help in this field. The only problem is that it can’t really provide significant results on its own.
A double glazed unit, however can! A double glazed window or door consists of two panes of glass united together into a single window system. A spacer separates those panes of glass.
A layer of inert gas is sealed between the two layers of glass. The glass is then fitted to the window frame, which is made a bit wider than the original one to accommodate those two panes. This technique creates twice the insulation compared to single glazed windows and doors.
How Much Noise Reduction With Double Glazing?
Double glazed units provide better insulation to your house by creating a significant barrier between your home and the environment outside.
The air gap between the two layers of glass is what makes the difference. This technique is ideal for reducing medium to high-frequency noise.
Double glazed windows are also, the perfect solution for temperature control during the winter and summer period. When the cold winter days arrive, double glazed windows will prevent an amount of heat from escaping your house.
On the other hand, during the summer period, this unit will prevent excessive heat from entering your home. Nothing wrong with a cool house on a hot summer day right?
What About Aircraft Noise?
Aircraft noise can be of higher frequency than other typical types of sounds, like traffic noise. It is actually a unique type of noise in terms of duration and intensity.
Airplane noise is usually really short-lived and piercing. Therefore, reducing that kind of noise is more difficult than facing other similar situations.
Double glazed units are an ideal solution for this type of noise, and throughout the years they have received much popularity among people.
The Basis of double glazed technology is on two main processes: deflecting and dissipating sound waves. You should have in mind three basic parameters when you decide to install such a unit:
- The thickness and type of glass.
- The in-between spacing.
- The interlayers.
The basic rule here is that thicker glass will result in greater noise reduction. The spacing between the two layers of glass can affect the insulation level a lot. In order to reduce low-frequency noise and improve acoustic control, it’s advisable to leave an air gap of about 150 mm.
A more significant reduction in noise can be achieved by filling the gap with some heavy inert gas, like argon or krypton. As far as the interlayers are concerned, a thin layer of PVB (polyvinyl butyral) is the most common material these types of window manufacturers use.
Double Glazed Windows Reduce Vibrations produced by Airplanes?
When we think about airplane noise, the term vibration comes immediately to our mind, as well.
Why do the windows and door panes of your house vibrate when a plane flies over it?
The answer is quite simple. It has to do with a pressure difference in the air. When the wind moves fast, for example, due to planes zooming over your house, then the pressure present there is lower than the one inside your home.
We know that air moves from high-pressure areas to lower pressure ones. So, simply put, the air inside our homes tries to escape, and by doing that, it bangs itself on our windows and door making them vibrate.
Double glazed windows and doors, unfortunately, cannot really help us in reducing those vibrations. Other control methods have been developed to help fight those vibrations in urban areas.
For example, tuned mass dampers or pounding-tuned mass dampers have been used effectively for decades now in the field of reducing vibrations. However, those structures are all heavy, large and not aesthetically pleasing and therefore, cannot be placed in glass windows.
Where to Buy Double Glazed Windows
There are many double glazing companies nowadays, which offer different types of windows. When you choose to make such a purchase, you need to take into account the previous client’s reviews.
Some factors you should take into account are surely the quality of products and the installation’s effectiveness, any mess caused during the installation process and the helpfulness of the expert staff.
There are many trustworthy manufacturers of double glazed glasses around the world. For example, Ecoline Windows, Windows USA, and Double Glazing Liverpool are some popular choices.
If you wish to find something less expensive and have some basic knowledge on the type of double glazed windows you need to install to your house, then you can always buy those panes via e-bay.
There, you will find multiple types of units, sometimes brand new and some others secondhand, but with good quality, as well.
People should also, have in mind that they don’t need to replace their old windows. They can install a second window to the existing one.
These windows are generally acrylic, and they are stabilized with the use of magnetic forces. The air gap between your new sheet of window and the existing one will ideally be about 100 mm.
Cost of Double Glazed Windows
When we think about the total cost of buying and installing double glazed windows in our house, we should have in mind that many factors affect the final number.
The first things are the number of windows you wish to add to your house, as well as the style that fits your home best. The material of the glass and the type of glass, including the in-between air are also, important factors.
For example, a single casement double glazed window usually costs around $300-400. This amount covers both the materials and the whole installation process, apart from the purchase. For an average semi-detached house, the cost to install double glazed units to eight windows and two doors is approximately $4000-5000.
Although the price of a double glazed window depends a lot on its quality, you should expect to pay at least 30% more money than the one you would spend on a single glazed window.
Also, window frames which usually accompany double grazed windows are more expensive than aluminum or composite ones.
When the time comes to calculate the cost of glazing, you should expect to pay an average amount of $200-250 per square meter.
A glazier will generally charge you between $80 and $100 per hour plus the cost of any materials or extra glass you may need. There is also, the possibility of emergency repairs which could increase the total amount by at least 25 percent.
If you are planning to build a new home and wish to install double glazed windows and doors throughout, you should expect to pay up to $1000 per square meter.
If you choose to purchase aluminum double glazed windows, you will pay less than timber-framed ones. However, the final cost will still be higher than single-pane windows.
uPVC Windows Airplane Vibration Reduction
Double glazed windows can lose most of their acoustic effectiveness if they are not correctly installed. For this reason, the best way you can ensure the final result will satisfy you is to leave the whole task to a professional with years of experience in this particular field. You should never try to install the entire thing by yourself.
In any case, you should have in mind that putting new double glazed windows will reduce the sound produced by aircraft flying overhead, but not the vibrations they emit.
For this reason, you may need to further think about installing a combination of double glazed windows with retrofit uPVC windows. This will help not only reduce the outside noise by at least 50 percent, but it will make some difference to the intensity of the vibrations produced by planes, as well.
It is also not a bad idea to install a set of soundproof curtains to further help in reducing airplane noise. Check out our full guide of soundproof curtains by clicking this link.
Final Thoughts
It is true that the noise produced by aircraft can be annoying. Its piercing nature and vibrating force can really make your day and night a living nightmare.
Although there are some solutions you could take to reduce this kind of noise; the most effective one nowadays is considered the installation of double glazed doors and windows.
Apart from the airplane noise reduction, this technology offers other advantages to your home, as well. Safety and temperature control are the most important ones among them.
So, if you are tired of having to cope with noisy airplanes near your house, you could invest some money in the promising solution of double glazed windows and reduce noise significantly.