Repartee wrote:
Regarding pads and sound absorption and acoustics, I wonder are you doing this because you are disturbing someone else or because the noise is disturbing to you?
If it's the latter then I would give yourself some more time with the machine. I've grown to love the sound of some fairly noisy machines - fortunately I am not disturbing anybody else and it just sounds like work being done! The only style of sound I dislike is one that is both high pitched and loud - all slap and no chunk.
I don't recall a typewriter whose sound I disliked. I've noticed some, like you said, have a bit higher a pitch in their hammering sound, while others, have a nice bottom quality--a more robust sound. Underwood 150 and Touch-Master II machines have this sound. You can not only hear it, you can feel it. That's why so many people love their Underwood typewriters. Olympias, now, have a high and a low at the same time. While they have a nice bottoming sound to them you can feel, they also have a ring to the keystrike as well. I even like the little tinny clink-a-te-clink of my little "new" 1974 Brother Activator 800T (yes, it actually has a tabulator, this pocket-size miracle. Only the stops are ten spaces apart, so I set the margins where I can get a five-space paragraph setting.