Whether you’ve got a fully upgraded car audio system that you turn up to 11, or you enjoy playing some smooth jams to relax and de-stress. For a lot of us, our car is our mobile concert hall. But it can be tough to get into the rhythm when unwanted noise is infiltrating your sanctuary from all angles. From wind noise, to road noise, to rattling sheet metal - most of us wish our car ride was a little quieter.

If you’re here you’ve probably heard of sound deadening. Sound deadening works by adding materials such as damping mats or foam to the metal surfaces of your car to absorb and help block unwanted noise.

By utilizing sound deadening material, you can simultaneously quiet the unwanted vibrations you hear as road noise and add some much needed thermal insulation to reduce unwanted heat transfer during those summer months.

• Tire noise, bumpy and poorly maintained roads
• Wind noise
• Outside noises. Construction, other cars.
• Rattling from inside car

• Road noise & tire noise from bumpy/poorly maintained roads
• Wind noise
• Outside noise. Construction, other cars.
• Quarter panel, door panel, and other sheet metal rattling inside your car

• Tire noise, bumpy and poorly maintained roads
• Wind noise
• Outside noises. Construction, other cars.
• Rattling from inside car

• Speaker quality improvements necessary for any speaker install
• Eliminates metal vibrations

• Eliminates metal vibrations
• Quiets rattling plastic
• Improves car audio
• Provides thermal insulation

• Superior car audio acoustics with sound absorption
• Eliminates metal vibrations
• Improves insulation

• Improves mid-bass response and quality of car audio
• Eliminates metal vibrations
• Improves insulation

Car Door Sound Deadening

The key to car door sound deadening is using a quality sound deadener on the metal in your car door. We recommend installing the deadener on the outer door skin and around your speak to kill the vibrations. Follow as we go through the multiple different ways to approach adding sound deadener to your car door.

How to sound deaden car doors?

1. Find out where the noise is coming from by adjusting the fade and balance settings on your audio system.
2. Tighten any loose screws to stop rattling. Try adding washers or closed cell foam to decouple.
3. Replace blown or broken speakers.
4. Install Speaker Tweakers to improve car audio by preventing speaker back waves from bouncing directly back into your door speakers.
5. Install sound deadening and soundproofing materials to your door. Read on to see which products we recommend!

If the metal in your door is vibrating, dampening it will allow your aftermarket speakers to be what they were made to be! A quick solution is to place Damplifier Pro™, the best sound deadener on the market, over the area where the speaker hole is (covering it), and then use a utility blade to cut a hole for your speaker. By completely encasing your speaker with high-end sound deadener, you're attacking the root of your car audio problem as efficiently as possible. Depending on the strength of the vibrations, you'll also need add some Damplifier Pro to the outer door skin and to remaining parts of the inner skin.

Optional: Speaker Tweakers for Improved Car Door Audio

Couple this method with Speaker Tweakers to keep the audio focused towards you and help stop speaker back waves from distorting the speakers in your car doors. We think of The Speaker Cradle as Steve Meade's signature deadener move. You'll see it in a ton of his videos. Another option is to add speaker box insulation, which we wrote an article on if you're interested.

Installation Tip

Use plastic panel popper tools to carefully disconnect the plastic clips when removing the door panel to avoid scratches.

Research Tip

When buying deadening materials, pay close attention to what it’s made of. You don't want cheap fillers in your butyl or asphalt. Using a poor performing mat will drastically reduce your vibration damping (sometimes as little as 1/10 the effect). Not only do these products do a bad job of sound deadening, some versions smell bad, offgas, or come unstuck.

If you want to ensure that your car doors stay quiet and don’t rattle, you’ll want to cover the outer skin and inner sheet metal with sound deadener. Focus on covering the door's outer skin as the metal surface is less rigid and more prone to vibration noise. You may see a plastic “vapor shield” covering the inside of your car door, you can remove this to make it easy to access the inside of the door with sound dampening material. When you're done, you can add the vapor barrier back if it's in good shape. (Our butyl tape is the perfect adhesive for that.)

High Density Closed Cell Foam for Improved Car Door Insulation

Take it the next step by adding high density closed cell foam, a denser material that will improve car door insulation inside the door cavity while reducing some low frequency sounds like road noise and speaker distortion. Besides giving you an insulated door, closed cell foam is the best material to use as a decoupler to ensure plastic parts, like those in your door panels, won’t make rattling noises when you turn up the music. If you've got rattles, especially rattling plastic, the answer is OverKill or OverKill Pro closed cell foam.

To make the inside of your car quieter than thanksgiving dinner at your in-laws, you’ll want to go the extra mile by combining Damplifier Pro sound deadening mats with Mega Zorbe™ hydrophobic melamine foam (HMF) on the door's outer skin and Luxury Liner Pro on the inner sheet metal to create a sound blocking and protective layer. You may be wondering why we recommend two materials to go with your sound deadener. HMF is an aircraft-grade insulation and sound deadening foam great for off-roading vehicles, older cars, premium sound systems, or… aircraft. Because its excellent thermal insulation, it'll also help keep your car cool in the summer, and warm in the winter.

That sound absorption is absolutely key to improve the sound quality of your door speakers. Absorb the echoes and sounds that are living in the background to get the acoustics right and increase what your ear perceives as the overall power of the system. Whether you're soundproofing truck cab doors or car cab doors, this will get you the quiet you deserve.

Luxury Liner Pro (LLP) on the other hand is the best automotive sound barrier material you'll find. Adding an auto sound barrier inside the door will increase its density and reduce outside noises from resonating through the metal and into the car's cabin.

The end result of using all 3 materials is a soundproofing one-two-three punch made for an audiophile. That car audio system is going to sound straight-up awesome.

1. Damplifier Pro deadens the door's metal, and cuts down on all the vibrations coming from road noise and your bumping speakers.
2. Mega Zorbe HMF absorbs the unwanted sounds bouncing around in your door panel to further improve acoustics.
3. The LLP blocks all sounds from getting through the door to your car's interior, keeping the overall noise level down.

Ok, we get it, quiet isn’t good enough. You don’t just want to eliminate road noise you want to amplify your audio quality. The inside of your car should rival the recording studio at Abbey Road, concertos at the Sydney Opera House, your 9th grade country-rock band in your neighbor’s garage.

Check out how our friends over at CarAudioFabrication used a combination of Second Skin sound dampening materials to transform their car doors from echo chambers into beautiful speaker enclosures. By sealing up the door cavity with Luxury Liner Pro, you will get more out of your speakers while also making the vehicle quieter.

Mark from CarAudioFabrication Upgrading the Door Panel

The Second Skin Car Audio Door Kit has everything you need to amp up your car audio and max out your stereo system. You'll be shocked at how loud your speakers sound and will be completely done with that annoying rattling in the background of your music. This combination of materials will get you the results you're looking for.

• Damplifier Pro is the highest performing sound deadener available today. You want your music sounding right, so apply this to the metal on your doors to guarantee you're done with rattles.
• The second protective layer depends on which kit you go with. OverKill Pro closed cell foam decouples rattling plastic and improves acoustics. Luxury Liner Pro will create a noise barrier between you and unwanted outside noise.
• Finish the job with a pair of Speaker Tweakers to break up speaker backwaves.
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