Doors banging from next door. What do u think of this advice?

rover25

Posted previously. Have a real problem with noise from next door. Hear every door, cupboard banging and when they play music hear that too.
Somebody suggested that we may have a cavity wall between us and next door (semi-detached) as the houses are not level. Ours is higher than next doors. Said that there would have to be a cavity at the top where the roofs are and that this may follow on down the house too. Does anyone know anything about that. They said maybe filling this cavity with noise insulation specific product may help.
Secondly they said that the builders may not have put enough or any rockwool/insulation fibre? in the floorboards of upstairs/ceiling and as such, that void would echo any noise travelling from next door.
They said lifting the floor boards in the hotpress or built in wardrobes and having a look should give us an idea. Anyone experienced anything similar?

27col

There is unlikely to be a cavity wall between adjacent semis. The most you can hope for is 9"solid masonry wall, or if you are unlucky a single brick wall. There is no requirement for a cavity wall as they are intended to prevent wind driven rain from penetrating the wall. There is no risk of this in the middle of a pair of semis, hence no cavity. Also it is doubtful that the builders did anything about sound proofing unless it was specified in the plans. It is , I believe, quite difficult to sound proof between semis. I suggest that you Google the subject. There is quite a lot of information out there, as there is about almost everything.

rover25

Thanks for your reply. When you say that they don't have to put in soundproofing, do you mean that they don't have to put in the insulation fibreglass in the floorboards/around the joists?

27col

I cannot say for sure, but I doubt whether they would bother. In any event they would not do it unless it was in the specification.
I believe that in some of the old stately homes they used to put layers of walnut shells between the floors in order to deaden the sound. Mind you, I do not know where they could have got the huge quantities required to have any effect.
Sorry that I cannot be more help. Soundproofing is a very specialist subject. As I said earlier, Google it and you will see what the possibilities are.

baccyman

i had a lot of trouble with my neighbours making a lot of noise untill 3 and 4 in the morning, we would be awake all night and they would go to bed around 4 or 5, anyway this happend once too often on a saturday night sunday morning and what i did was put my surround system on at 9 o'clock on sunday morning and had led zeppelin blasting for half an hour and we have not had much noise from the neighbours since.

VfM4meplse

Presumably your neighbour can hear every movement in your home but is less bothered by it? If you are both suffering equally there may be scope for negotiating, eg to keep the noise down 11pm - 7am.

Love the headbanging smiley BTW

rover25 wrote: »