Noise control didn’t need much consideration when building the traditional “Kiwi ¼ acre dream”. That is not the case now, with many residential developers working to the mantra of “rack-em, pack-em, stack-em”.

Using a traditional double frame system for the intertenancy walls in these attached dwellings is fine and building up layers of plasterboard on the walls works well but with the fire safety regulations each penetration needs careful consideration and junctions can cause roadblocks at every turn.

Achieving adequate levels of noise control performance is often harder to attain than achieving a compliant fire safety design.

With the shift away from stand-alone dwellings to attached, terraced style housing, GIB Barrierline® intertenancy systems were developed as a quick  and easy ‘one-stop-shop’ to address all the usual difficulties encountered. With the central 25mm thick plasterboard barrier boasting 60 minutes FRR and a minimum 61 STC, junctions and smaller penetrations in the adjacent walls do not need special treatment.

Demand for this innovative intertenancy wall system has been strong and production has had to step-up to meet the sales. As you will expect, we have developed a wide range of specific construction details that can be found in both the GIB Noise Control® Systems and the GIB® Intertenancy Barrier Systems for Terrace Homes manuals. One of the flow-on effects of having such a great product is that it has often been adapted for use in other situations where it was not originally designed for.

 An example of this is the adoption of a GIB Barrierline® Intertenancy System in something like a three storey, timber frame, ‘walk-up’ apartment building. The presence of horizontal, as well as vertical, fire separations causes issues and we only have a few specific construction details available when GIB Barrierline® Intertenancy Systems are used in this type of application. 

However, one of the benefits of partnering with Winstone Wallboards is we have a team of Engineers, Technical Advisors and Architectural Specification Representatives ready and able to be engaged at early design stage and can assist with developing those Specific Engineered Details (SED) for your project.