I recently purchased a used '01 Insight and drove it up from Monterey, CA to Renton, WA. Two full days of freeway driving really shows how much this car needs some sound deadening. So I started looking into what others have done and posted about.
grebe and Mr. Salty have used Quietcoat's QuietCar liquid product and seem happy with the results. From Quietcoat advertising, the QuietCar seems very flexible in that it can be used as undercoating on the exterior or inside the car.
Rick (AZ) and BlueInsight1701 used .25" generic insulation mostly just laid out without glue except in the doors. This was fairly cheap and gave 4-5 dB noise reduction.
Rick Reece used Brown Bread, LComp, and foam with satisfying results. (I swear I read someone getting 8 dB reductions with this same type of install, maybe the yahoo forums)
After reading about all of this done last year, 2003, reading all of the propaganda from the marketing departments, and trying to get a sense of what is going to work well, I am leaning towards a combination of QuietCar to damp panel vibrations and generic .25" thick insulation material to absorb the sound that gets through.
Does anyone have updated information on their installs from last year? For the QuietCar installs, is the material still holding up? Has it flaked off or degraded in quality? Any regrets? Any odors resulting from installs that people are regretting now? Any changes to the insulation/damping materials installations since last year?
I plan to decide what path to take in April sometime and do the install in May along with my stereo system.
As far as the sound insulation in mine's been going so far so good. I have removed the piece under the rear carpet and the piece going up the wall behind the seats. They did almost nothing and I was scared that it might cause too much heat to the battery box durring the summer. I still have the piece in the rear well, and it's been staying put quite nicely. Again, I wanted it to be removable.
Clayton's (BlueInsigh1701) car has since departed, and he removed everything. In fact I still have 3 of the 4 under carpet pieces from his car in my garage. Whatever you end up doing, if you can please go to radio shack and buy a $30 sound level meter so we can get some before and after results. We were the only ones that did that to my knowledge.
I'm still convinced I have more sensative than average hearing, but quite honestly mine still leaves something to be desired, but really in comparison to normal cars it's on par with their road noise level. I know if a quieter tire was used it would make all the difference in the world, but it's a sacrafice I suppose.
Mine was done in a few steps, the two areas the made the largest difference were the doors and the rear well. As a general disclaimer here I will say again, any insulation you do can potentially cause things to get too hot and could result in warranty problems. This is why I really wanted removability on mine. Of course, I guess that might not be such an issue where you live. One other thing to consider, the material we used is pretty much what is used in every other car, but it seems if it gets wet that it won't easiliy dry so you might want to take this in to account. Phoenix doesn't see much rain.
Good luck, keep us posted.
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Later, Ricky
02 Red Insight - Sold
06 Silver Civic Hybrid
92 Saturn SC2 Electric, Arizona Alt fuel plate "ZEROGAS"
It seems almost too simple to make a big difference, but it sure helped. I recommend something simple and cheap as a first pass, if you are lucky, that will satisfy you before you get lost in complexity.
When I see pictures of red Insights, I sometimes wish I had a one rather than silver. They remind me of little red Ferrari's......
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2005 Insight, UK Spec Silver 5 speed with Alpine stereo, subwoofer & speakers with iPod link, IMA C&C, Shark Fin Aerial, Garmin EcoRoute HD, Skinz sound deadened rear shelf, 'InsightCentral' number plates, 19" rear wiper, Osram nightbreaker plus bulbs
Previous owner of 1999 Japanese Silver 5sp, 2001 UK Citrus 5sp & 2000 Japanese Red CVT Honda Insight - An extraordinary car for ordinary people
I am happy with the brown bread. The doors sound very solid and I get little outside noise. (I took a fair number of pictures and plan to post someday when I set up my webspace). The drawback however is the tires. They are still the largest component of the noise. I imagine the vibrations are transmitted through the body. Too bad they dont use sound isolation mounts or something to decouple the noise. Have fun, Rick
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Rick 00 #4738 (5sp) Lmpg 90.7 @ 150K miles
02 #1784 (CVT) Lmpg 52.6 @ 35K miles
Thanks for the replies Rick, figgy, and Rick Reece. I am going to go all out and try to only do this one time. Adding loose fill will be easy to add if I need more absorbing of sound. Hopefully I can damp most of it out though. Not afraid of warranty issues either, so it does not have to be removable.
Nice summary of what people have done so far, kedge, thanks. My comments:
Futon mattresses are made from alternating layers of egg-crate shaped sheets of foam, cotton padding (I agree this is what it looks like Figgy used) and a polyester fiber such as Hollowfill from DuPont.
In mid-install of my ShoeBox subwoofer I drove the car across town to do some shopping, with all the rear carpet removed. The increase in noise was amazing, so I figured post-install it wouldn't hurt to add some sound insulation. I cut up old backpacking foam mattresses to fit under the rear carpet, in front and back of the cargo bin, and underneath the cargo bin atop the spare tire.
I also have wider (185/60R14) and quieter tires.
I suspect the cargo mat (shown here) would also help to damp sound from the rear of the car.
For those who have done door insulation, how much work is it? I am thinking of a dynamat-type solution on the inner surface of the exterior door panels, if possible. InsightCentral has excellent directions on removing the door panels but does not go beyond getting the interior panel removed. Judging from these pictures it looks like there is more work to get deeper into the doors (towards the exterior of the car from the inside). Also, that set of pictures shows that the moisture/water barrier on the door has been removed (a plastic sheet that is sealed along the still-visible white glue line in the top right picture). I have had problems with door modifications in the past (dealer repair to window regulator to fix auto-down issues on driver's side) that didn't reseal that barrier properly later leading to the infamous "wet seatbelt" issue, plus the eventual water damage of a speaker, and would rather not have it happen again.
Is there a way to do door sound insulation without removing that plastic? If so, how? What did you guys do? If not, what did you use to reseal it?
One more question. If you stand at the rear of the car, facing forward, there is a large cavity to the right of the metal IMA box and forward of the install location of a shoebox subwoofer (which sits to the right of the cargo bin).
Anyone ever consider stuffing that area with sound insulation? Are there vents back there going into the IMA that would be blocked?
If you make up cloth bags, similar to pillow cases and fill them with acoustic material, they will have enough rigidity to be shoved into areas that would otherwise be difficult to reach using loose fill. They can also be easily removed if servicing is needed. Seams can be made using contact cement if you don't want to mess with a sewing machine.
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Kip Munro
The laws of physics don't need changing, but rather our attitude and values. 72.8 LMPG
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Sound Insulation
