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Natural Science Forum / Physics / Acoustics / December 2004Need some advice
This is my first time here and I'm wondering if I can get some advice. I live in a New York City apartment. Several months ago, a new neighbor moved in upstairs and brought a stereo system in with her. The volume at which she plays it is not a problem. The problem I am having is with what I'm told must be a subwoofer. No matter what volume she plays the stereo at (and she favors music with a heavy beat) I get a constant low level rumble and vibrations that I can feel more than hear. An hour or so of the experience is unpleasant. After 5 or 6 hours, I'm ready to go nuts. I've always been pretty good about tolerating noise and this is the first time in my life I've been moved to complain. I need to know whether I'm being hyper-sensitive or whether I've got a legitimate complaint. Any insight and advice you could give me would be greatly appreciated. J.D. > I've always been pretty good about tolerating noise and this is the first > time in my life I've been moved to complain. I need to know whether I'm > being hyper-sensitive or whether I've got a legitimate complaint. Any > insight and advice you could give me would be greatly appreciated. If it perturbs you on a repeated basis, in my opinion you should find a diplomatic way to inform her of that. Cite times of day, days of week, etc. The chief problem as you state is likely the sub woofer. She may not have a sub woofer, but it's worth noting. She may not be aware that it annoys others. The level of this sub woofer is often set to provide a sensual feeling in harmony with the audible music and words. But through walls and floors, all the good intelligence and harmony is blocked, leaving only the faceless beat, a very dull thing indeed. Anyone using loud bass in this mode may feel entitled to do so at any time unless there is an objection. With great diplomacy, work with her to turn down just that sub woofer sound level, to the point where it does not bother you, while it still may be perceptible to her. Just my 2 cents... Angelo Campanella >> I've always been pretty good about tolerating noise and this is the first >> time in my life I've been moved to complain. I need to know whether I'm [quoted text clipped - 16 lines] > > Just my 2 cents... also, see if you can find out where her loudspeakers (inc. sub) are placed. some people plop them right on the floor and put a lamp or some other object on top. try to get the speakers off the floor and with some carpet or other cushioning to decouple the box from the building structure. it might make it louder for her (enabling her to turn it down for the same sonic effect) and quieter for you. my far less expert $0.02 . r b-j i think r b-j's thought has considerably validity. long ago, before the car audio market became so enormous, i got ahold of a 12" pile driver, built myself a 1/2" particleboard box, threw the result in my car and was pleased... when i got to college, i drug it up to my dorm room, connected it to my roomates reciever, and was pleased again. the next day the RA (local authority type figure) came up, and was not pleased. apparently half of the floor below had complained about the noise. and in this case, it wasn't airborne sound, it was structure transmission. i had 1. a flimsy resonanting box 2. plopped it right on the tile floor = 3. all kinds of vibration going into the structure to annoy everybody. i put the box on two bricks over a foled up sleepin bag, not so many complaints. later i built a better box with bracing, and carpet, and bassed myself through freshman year. good luck Brian it might be interesting to note that the volume of the woofer got significantly louder when i built the more stury box. makes sense, i guess, law of conservation of energy. power goes itno the voice coil, some amount of it is transferred to cone motion... and that total net energy (power*efficiency) either goes into making airborne sound or shaking the enclosure. also, i suppose if an enclosure was flimsy enough, the action-reaction could drive the baffle backwards and forwards out of time with the cone, creating an "anti-speaker"... cancell some of the energy. Brian Few years back friend of mine was in similar situation. He tried to resolve that diplomatically but failed. Finally, he brought his motorbike into his apartment; setup one to the ceiling (his music lover neighbor used to live right upstairs above friend of mine). Certainly, friend of mine setup the bike for maximum noise and ceiling vibration and turn engine on. Neighbor came to complain immediately, but friend of mine helped him to understand the beauty of engine sound, he demonstrated different engine modes and together they enjoy the bike view and bike sound. BTW, friend of mine was motor bike fun, had a lot of bike magazines, pictures and parts. That was about lunch time, weekend. For some reason, the neighbor upstairs stopped turns his music loud after that conversation. |
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