REDUCE NOISE AND PROTECT WORKERS' HEARING
SONEXONE™ PANELS REDUCE NOISE AND HELP PROTECT WORKERS' HEARING AT BROUDY PRINTING
Award-winning Broudy Printing is One Of Pittsburgh's
Largest Printers. This Year The Company Decided to
Expand its Facility, Adding Two Additional Presses.
One new press was installed on the first floor. The other went in on the lower level. Printing presses are always extremely loud. But it was immediately evident that these new machines were particularly noisy. Something had to be done before employees working in and around the presses started suffering from health issues related to unrelenting loud noise. Common symptoms include: headaches, fatigue and possible hearing loss.
Broudy decided to call Acoustics & Vibration Technologies (AVT) onto the job site for help. "They called and said they wanted to make the new spaces user-friendly for their employees. I went in and talked to them about their options," explains Matt Harding, AVT project manager. "The presses were located in rooms that were filled with hard reflective surfaces, which created a real noise problem."
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The room on the first floor had 16 foot. ceilings, so reverberation was a problem. But controlling it wouldn't require extraordinary measures. However, down on the lower-level, the ceilings were significantly lower, only 9 feet. That left only 2 feet between the press and the ceiling, creating a confined space where the noise was compounded many times over. To make matters worse, steel beams hanging from the ceiling added to the reverberation. |
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Broudy's goal was to reduce the noise level in the press rooms to below OSHA's standard of 85 decibels. Harding considered the problems of each room and recommended Broudy install SONEXone Panels in natural willtec® foam, 3"-thick panels for the ceiling and 2"-thick panels for the walls. The steel beams in the room on the lower level would be covered in additional panels. Broudy staff did the installation themselves in just a short time, applying glue to the back of each panel and pressing them into place. Recent tests revealed that the new panels reduced the previous level of 91 decibels by 8, putting Broudy well below OSHA's acceptable level.
Since the project ended, Harding has visited the press rooms and been personally thanked by some of the employees who run the machines. He's not surprised. He often recommends pinta products to clients looking to solve tough acoustical problems because he knows people will be satisfied. "I think pinta sells a quality product and they're very knowledgeable. I really think they're the best in the business."
To speak with a Memtech Acoustical consultant about SONEXone Panels and willtec® foam, contact Memtech Acoustical LLC
