Road Noise Reduction?

[Brandon J]

Does anyone know of where and what type of insulation can be added to the car to reduce road noise? The highways I drive on aren't paved too smoothly and on long trips the noise can get a little annoying.

I could swear I read something about this a year ago or so. Someone got something from Lowes and added it to the front wheel wells?

Thanks in advance!

[chameleon]

I would suggest adding some Dynamat to your car if you want to reduce the noise levels. Dynamat is a sound dampaning material, sold by square feet, that is easily installed in the interior of your car with it's adhesive backing.

I would suggest that you pull off the door panels and put some dynamat there. That would probably reduce the noise level enough to satisfy you. If that isn't enough, you could always go in and do the trunk area because a lot of noise comes from back there. You can really take this as far as you want. You can even pull out the entire interior and put dynamat on the floors, firewall, you name it. If you did that you would have one quiet ride.;)

There are lots of sites that have Dynamat and other sound dampaning materials that you could use on your car. I would suggest that you do a search on the internet so you can see all your available options. Dynamat is probably the most popular brand that people use in their cars. Here is a site to get you started. They sell Dynamat, as well as a generic equivalent to it, plus they have pictures of some installations in progress so you can get an idea of what you have to do.

http://www.b-quiet.com/

[oldster]

Any idea how much that stuff weighs?

[chameleon]

One sqare foot of Dynamat original weighs 0.68 pounds.

If you want to spend more money you can get Dynamat Xtreame, wich not only weighs less, but it provides much better sound dampening as well. One square foot of Dynamat Xtreame weighs 0.45 pounds. If you wanted to do both your doors with this you would only add a total of 1.35 pounds per door with their Dynamat Xtreame door kit.:)

[oldster]

Thanks!! :)

[Brandon J]

Thanks for the link! Got a few more questions:

Where does most of the road noise come from in this car? Also, I haven't taken any parts of it apart (unlike my other car, nothing has broken). What type of insulation does it already have? In my other car there's a fabric type insulation under the carpet and basically everywhere except for in the doors.

I'll probobly keep it simple - put some of this in the doors and in the trunk area since I bet there's a lot of noise coming from there (would it hurt door speaker performance?). Hopefully the car won't become rattely. Almost forgot - can this stuff be bought locally? I'm in a town of about 50,000 until January.

[kuno]

If there is a car audio shop around im sure they carry some dynamat. Call around.

[chameleon]

Brandon J, there are three main areas that let the most road noise into your car. The number one area is the doors, so if nothing else, you should definately do the doors. The second most noisy area is the floor. The third is the trunk.

The Celica does not have much sound deadening insulation in it from the factory. You should find a fabric similar to your other car every where but the doors also. The fact that cars don't come with any insulation in the doors probably is the main contrabution to them being the source of most of the noise.

There are three big benafites to adding sound dampaning insulation like dynamat to your car. One of them is the decrease in road noise, what is what you are going for. Another benafit is better thermal insulation, which means your car will get colder faster in the summer with the ac on and hotter quicker in the winter with the heat on. The last main banafit is INCREASED speaker performance.:)

So you don't have to worry about it hurting the door speaker performance because it should actually noticabley improve it, your speakers will sound better than ever before. It will also stop rattles. That is why almost every car audio shop sells it, so I would also suggest that you check out any local car audio shops in your area. If you cant find any there, you could always order what you need online.

[dragonfrog]

my $.02. hehehe.

i haven't taken out any of the main interior, but if you take out the plastics in the trunk, then you're looking at the car's metal. so that's a big difference to me. leave the back seats down and listen.

[Brandon J]

Increased performance for the speakers - sounds good. I had no idea car audio places sold this stuff. That's good - I know of a couple of those around here. The doors would probobly make a fun little project.

Any disassembly tips for the doors (and anywhere else too)? How to take the panels off isn't as obvious as it is on the other car. I can think of 5 places where it's screwed on, but there are bound to be more.

[chameleon]

Disassembly of the doors should be no problem. One thing I could point out for you, however, is that there is a hidden screw behind the door handle. Directly behind the handle, there is a black plastic peice that you have to pop off to reveil the screw.

Other than that, I beleive all the other screws are in plain sight. You just undo the screws and the door panel will pop right off.

[Brandon J]

I'm glad you mentioned the piece on the door. I checked out the door panels when I was cleaning up the interior this afternoon and didn't catch that one.

It looks like there isn't anything between the side of the car and the back seat except for a layer of carpet padding. I took out the rear cupholder and peeked inside. I'd be real tempted to take apart the interior and add that stuff if I knew more about the side airbags. Is it safe to unplug those for disassembly just like any other wire harness?