Neighbor noise question - with a twist
Question: we live on the top floor of a brownstone. During the week, we are routinely woken up at 2 or 3 am by our neighbor’s bass on the stereo. The catch is: we can’t figure out which neighbor! I think it is coming up from the apartment below us; my wife thinks it is…
Question: we live on the top floor of a brownstone. During the week, we are routinely woken up at 2 or 3 am by our neighbor’s bass on the stereo. The catch is: we can’t figure out which neighbor! I think it is coming up from the apartment below us; my wife thinks it is coming through from the apartment next to us that’s in the neighboring building. But I don’t think noise can pass through two brick walls (neighbor’s and ours).
So my question, fellow BStoners, is this: Can noise pass through brick walls like that? I thought they were pretty solid — does brick get more porous with time?
Maybe this is a silly question, but any guidance would be helpful…we don’t want to accuse the wrong neighbor!
Thank you…
As some other people wrote, bass travels through almost everything. The one thing that gets in the way is a lack of surface area. That’s why good speaker stands have sharp points for the speaker to rest on and between the stand and the floor. So, if you can get your neighbor to isolate the speakers from the wall or the floor by minimizing the area of contact, it will help you a lot.
There is a great article in Fine Homebuilding Magazine this month on sound control http://www.finehomebuilding.com. It gives you a complete picture of how sound is transferred through wall & floor structures etc. It is mainly for a framed home. The fact of the matter is these old homes mortar is dust & sound waves travel through the brick rather easily. We can hear people talking in there hall or stairway when the house is quiet. Our wall is exposed brick. Installing Drywall helps somewhat. There is special drywall for acoustical walls that you can buy but it is extremely expensive.
We had virtually the identical problem. The house next door is a mirror image of ours and was built at the same time. We could hear the top floor tenant who lived next door, a DJ, even though he had soundproofed the walls in the room where he played music. The architect who owned the house suspected that the loud bass was coming through to us via the floors–the two houses may even share some floor joists, which would make it easy to transmit the bass. The DJ has moved and all are happy!
We own two adjoining brownstone buildings. When we purchased the first we never heard any noise next door as our neighbor was elderly and quiet. When we purchased the second home and started a gut renovation we realized that there is absolutely no insulation between the party walls. Thus just standing on one side and speaking in a normal tone we can save on the phone bill. In other words…you need to look into insulation!!
We own two adjoining brownstone buildings. When we purchased the first we never heard any noise next door as our neighbor was elderly and quiet. When we purchased the second home and started a gut renovation we realized that there is absolutely no insulation between the party walls. Thus just standing on one side and speaking in a normal tone we can save on the phone bill. In other words…you need to look into insulation!!
Thanks everyone. Guess noise travelling through brick is pretty normal. Sigh.
And thanks, 10:20. That’s a good idea. I will try and check back with an update…
My neighbor plays jazz saxophone and flute, and I can hear him through two brick walls when he’s practicing. But we never hear their television, voices, stereo or anything else. Only the instruments.
As to your problem, you might get a better idea of where the sound is coming from if you stood outside the house and listened (and saw whose lights were on or off.) I know it’s the middle of the night when it occurs, but that’s the best suggestion I can think of.
Yep, musical instruments can definitely travel. I live in a private house and my neighbor plays some instrument starting at 6am. It goes thru two brick walls. Its not a totally unpleasant sound but still annoying and you cant do anything about it but ask nicely and pray they take pity on you.
sorry, i meant to say that “thankfully the sound is not that bothersome”