Hey guys,

I have a 1999 vert and have the interior out now for some upgrades. I'm hoping to tame the road noise as much as possible, what's the best method, kit, etc.?

I have a few rolls of that black rubber, sticky on one side, foil on the other matting that my boys left in my garage after a stereo installation. I was thinking of covering everything I could with that stuff. Then add a pre-cut kit over top of that.

Any thoughts?

 

I used the "frost king mod" on my '99 vert 6 years ago. I did the cargo area as well as the whole cabin area. The differance was night and day improvement. Much less road noise. I think I used about 4 rolls and filled everywhere I could reach including rear floor covered compartments. No reason your audio insulation material shouldn't work as well. Set a day aside and go for it.

 

I wouldn't double-up on thickness of the insulation. You may find that the carpet won't fit so well with too much insulation underneath. Get a complete pre-cut set and install that. Use the leftover pieces you have already to line the inside of the doors and/or the rear fender wells.

On top of a complete insulation install, I added a Lloyds cargo mat and a cargo partition, both of which also helped. With the top up, my C5 is pretty quiet. With the top down you can still hear the road noise, but it is somewhat subdued.

 

The best thing I did to reduce road noise with the top up was to get rid of the run-flats. Thinking about doing some more but it's not much of a priority now as I like to hear the exhaust note from the stock exhaust and I can now converse in normal tones with the passenger. A sound engineer once told me the only thing that will really kill unwanted sound is mass, the light weight soft materials don't kill sound but will reduce echo - I don't know if I want the extra weight if that is true.

 

on 2000 coupe I did this in 2003...works great...hardest part was going back to Home Depot for more...two of us did our cars together and it went very quickly...as above do the whole interior...

 

Do not forget to do the sides of the center tunnel where the exhaust pipes go through. The stuff reduces heat besides increases quietness.

Also at home depot near the vent section they have a thick silver tape I used to hold pieces in place. It took me almost 14 hours to do the whole inside but it has provided 8+ years of cool quiet enjoyment.

Evil Twin was the original poster of this idea - so thanks to him.

Also it is NOT the tires - no tires are any quieter that others - some are just newer - when they get old they all make noise. And besides to me the tunnel heat was worse than the noise anyway - I could drowned out the noise with tunes.

 

You buy a vert and your worried about noise

 

if you haven't noticed... when you sit in your car, the tires are only 18 inches from your ears, the only thing between you and that tire noise is a glass window or a cloth top which acts like a drum when the harmonics of a rotating tire beat on that window... if you think putting something in the trunk will remove noise, its just a placebo. the noise also goes right through a cloth top. You can spend all the money in the world but you wont reduce tire noise with insulation, unless you insulate the windows and the top not to mention the 1/8 piece of plastic called an inner wheel well.. You can however reduce the road noise with quieter tires. of course most people buy a Vert to have the top down and the windows down. so their goes the slightest chance of reduction of 1 decible...
Do yourself a favor before you spend a penny on insulation.. walk down to a busy highway, get as close to the highway as you can but be safe... then listen to the sound of every cars tires... they all make noise... some are loud but many are very loud. you will never see a car go by and not hear the sound of its tires. WE are talking 30 mph plus, not ten miles an hour as a car turns a corner... if your doing 60 on the highway, the tires are singing. you can put 300 lbs of attic insulation in the trunk and you will still hear the tires through the window.

 

New tires.

The newer run flats are much quieter then the old run flats, or dont get run flats at all.

Plus as ET says, 18" away from the tires . . .