DIY Doctor UK DIY Forums

Hello. I have just moved into an old property on a really busy road in south London. It is annoyingly on a hill so there are cars accelerating and decelerating up/down the hill a lot. The sash windows have all been draught proofed and the noise is still really bad. The windows also all have shutters on them and although the noise is a more pressing problem, I do quite like them. I need to know what the best solution will be to get rid of as much noise as possible. Should I just replace the old sashes with modern upvc ones with thick acoustic glass or should I attempt to put acoustic glass in my original sashes? Ie are new window casements just better at blocking out noise?

Also, a few companies have offered to put secondary glazing inside the shutters ie only 4cm away from the window - is this actually worth it?

I don't want to reglaze the old sashes only to discover that I should have just put new windows in completely. One of the sashes has double glazing in it already and it is just as noisy as the single glazed one! Any advice/experience would be much appreciated!

Hi I hope I can help you!

I totally understand the problem that you are having. I had a very similarexperience when moving in to the house i currently live in at the moment.

We live on a main road opposite a school so you can imagine how noisy it can be sometimes especially in the morning! We had some double glazing in the house but we couldn't notice whether it was keeping the noise out or not before a friend had recommended a company that supplies secondary glazing.

I had never heard of secondary glazing before and just assumed that double glazing would've been enough!

I know have secondary glazing in every window of our house and the difference is amazing. I now dont get woken up by school children shouting as the walk to school and can have an extra lie in! (what more could you want)

I would definitely recommend going for the secondary glazing as you might spend extra putting in double glazing only to realise that you need secondary glazing.