woodworking noise

[tenpin]

i have a question

does or has anybody had problems with neighbours compalining of the noise created by using their woodwoking machinery during different times of the day/week

i may have an issue with one of my neighbours who complained a while ago to the nosie dept of the local council of me making excessive diy noise and need some ammo to lob back at him if he raises any problems in the future.

i rarely if ever use my toys during the week as i work from 7am till 7pm weekdays
but weekends...mainly saturday i try to crack on with a project....never past 5pm though...

sundays i may poke around in my shed but never try to fire up any noisey stuff just to be carefull

i find i'm being restricted by someone who may be over the top plus wife is a wreck if i make any unjustified noise.....so if anybody has had issues or problems they have been through can you offer some advice.

Thanks

Nick

 

[special bone]

What sort of time do you start DIY at a weekend? Also, what does you neighbour do for a living? If they're unlucky enough to work shifts, that might be the reason they complained :evil: . I try never to fire up anything before 9am but I'm also lucky that my garage is on the end of a terrace. If you've got a party wall, the sound might travelling through that.

As for legal advice, why not ask the council department that your neighbour called about the rules?

Rich

 

[TonyW]

I assume from your post that the neighbour who complained to the local council did not speak to you first about the noise. If this is the case I think I would feel a little upset about being reported.

Did the local council take any action or issue warnings etc?

Can you approach the neighbours to discuss any issues and see if you can arrive at a mutually satisfactory solution - maybe offer to make them something

Cheers
Tony

 

[duncanh]

Have you actually spoken to the neighbour or have you just heard from the council. It may be possible to come sort of agreement without involving the council further.
Where are you doing the work? It could be possible for you to put insulation on the walls/roof/floor to reduce noise levels. If you're in a shed this also helps with heat Noise was my main concern when I bought my shed so I lined it with 5cm rockwool slabs and I can barely hear noise when stood at the house (approx 10m away). I only use a lathe, dust extractor and occasional band saw though.

I heard (from someone at my turning club I think) that there are council regulations regarding when you're allowed to make diy noise at home. If such regulations exist they probably vary around the country so you'd have to look into it. The version I heard was no noise on Sunday

Duncan

 

[ByronBlack]

from what you've said, I doubt you have anything to worry about, you are hardly making noise are unreasonable times of the day, it's no different to say for example; having the builders round and working from 8am onwards..

If I were you, I wouldn't worry about it.

 

[gasmansteve]

Hi Nick
Don`t know if you get on with the neighbour but I had a not dissimilar thing a while back. In my other life as an amateur astronomer my neighbour had some security lights fitted which shone into my observatory and were a right pain in the ??@£ so one night I invited him round to see some stuff through the scope and show what effect his lights were having on the viewing. Never been a problem since as he turns them off at night now. Don`t know if you could try talking to him or showing him what you do??.
Cheers
Steve

 

[Karl]

As BB says - I wouldn't lose too much sleep over it.

My next door neighbour (detached from us) works shifts. Out of courtesy I always check whether his bedroom curtains are closed before firing up the table saw in the shop - good neighbourly relations are important to me. I also never have any power tools going after 6pm.

This is also one reason why I have tried to switch as much of my work to hand tools as possible.

IIRC, there was a thread about this not so long ago by p111dom????

Cheers

Karl

 

[tenpin]

hi guys.

thanks for your respones

as to more info...
i never start any work on sat till 8am...and always try to be careful of starting any power tools till after 9am.

my neighbour is i would guess 60+ so him and his male associate are both retired which is why i can't understand...since i'm away all day and there is no noise what so ever during their quality time why this could be an issue....

ironically my other neighbour(i live in a victorian terrace) used to work nights so sat am he would be still in bed but as he understands my hobby and says it's not even noisey enough to wake him so since the other blokes living room is some 15-20 metres away from my shed and has utility rooms and outbuildings blocking the path of noise i can't see this becoming a prob but just need some informed words for SWMBO.

she feels unless we have some sort of legislation or backuop from the council, just because he would take it on himself to complain i would be restricted to furthering my hobby.something that neither of us would like to happen.

Nick

 

[OPJ]

With regards to regulations, I think there's some kind of restriction on making noise after 8pm - if your neighbours don't like it. But you seem to be okay in that respect.

It does sound like something which could indeed be resolved by some agreement between yourself and your neighbours. I think it's only after ignoring the first couple of warnings from the council that you can expect to be losing money from it.

There was someone near me recently who got done for not controlling his dog's barking recently and was fined several hundred pounds at the end of it - this was after several repeated requests from the council, mind you.

 

[TonyW]

hi guys.
as to more info...
i never start any work on sat till 8am...and always try to be careful of starting any power tools till after 9am.

Maybe 9am is too early for them - they may like a lie in on the weekend

I still feel that they should be first approaching you to discuss. This is the action they should be taking

From the Home Office website Crime Reduction:

If talking to your neighbours and mediation between the interested parties has failed you can complain to the environmental department of your local authority.

What should you do if you experience noisy neighbours?

There are 3 steps you should take:

1. Make a friendly approach to the neighbour - Point out the problem, but think about how you would like to be approached. If you're not confident enough, you can always get a friend or family member to do this on your behalf. It is common the neighbour won't realise they are disturbing you.

2. Mediation - If a friendly chat doesn't work, try involving a 3rd party to listen to both sides of the story and to help reach an agreement. You can obtain details about the location of services from Mediation UK on 0117 9046661 or contact your local authority to check if the offer their own mediation services.

3. Formal action - To be undertaken where informal action fails or is not possible. You can contact your local authority that will send an environmental health officer to investigate the noise, and if they are satisfied the noise is a nuisance they will take action. If the noise is intermittent they are likely to ask you to take records of the noise occurrences. They may also leave equipment in your house to measure the noise levels. If other neighbours were disturbed they could also provide useful evidence.

Full link HERE

Hope this of some help
Cheers
Tony

 

[Adam]

Cor interesting stuff. My previous workshop, was about 5 foot from the side of my neighbours house. (that backed onto the end of the garden). I insulated it, and after that considered it quite reasonable to use it up 10pm.

I did check if they could hear it, and they said it was fine, although the vibration (possibly from the P/T not the table saw) did couple down through the floor and into their house foundations.

:lol:

Seriously, I think provided you don't have an "impact" on your neigbours enjoying their garden, they don't have much room to complain. The noise of powertools from someone who isn't a professional sounds very reasonable provided its within "acceptable" hours. I'd say 8am to 10pm is reasonable. Is their any guidance from your local council? could you batten and line the inside of the workshop with some sheets of MDF? (Also do the roof / door - in fact the door is normally an obvious source of "sound" leaks. Double glaze it as well?

In my other life as a beekeeper, their are similar arguments about people who have hives in their gardens. At what point is it considered "intrusive" on your neighbours?

Could you check you local council website for noise etc? see what it says? Or ring them up and ask?

Adam

 

[craftsmanm]

It sounds to me as if your neighbours are just a little tetchy - unhappy too.
Why not give them a little example of your work.
I had a set of neighbours who drove me out of my house, i had to sleep on my workshop floor.
Took 10 weeks for the council to come round with their noise measuring machine and tell me i had a problem.
They told me i would have to take the guys to court which would take a further 6 weeks.
They also said i would have to deal with this myself - so i did.
Stuck a 7 inch disc on the end of a motor with a counterweight, screwed it to the floor on a raised ply platform so as it went up and down it hit the floor, got a 24 hour timer and went away for the weekend - i also added another little joy to their life and it seemed to work.
Sometimes the law is just not enough.
OOh yes rave music from 4 in the afternoon till midnight, then at weekends the same untill 10.00 in the evenings then out for 3 hours then rave music till 2in the afternoon the next day. No way of sitting anywhere in my 2 up 2 down without the drumming - changing beat every 2 minutes or so.

 

[mr]

provided its within "acceptable" hours. I'd say 8am to 10pm is reasonable.

Adam

Surely you jest. 8 am to 10 pm?

Cheers Mike

 

[Pete Robinson]

Sounds to me like they are the sort of people who just like to complain about something, doesn't really matter what it is but it gives them something to do!! SAD BA****DS!!!

Try taking their hearing aids off of them!!

If that doesn't work, nail their front door shut!!

 

[Adam]

provided its within "acceptable" hours. I'd say 8am to 10pm is reasonable.

Adam

Surely you jest. 8 am to 10 pm?

Cheers Mike

Nope no jest. I use my workshop at any times between 8am to 10pm. Of course, when you work and are a hobbiest the time you spend with a machine running, vs the number of times you actually get out in the workshop means its miniscule. Most of the time in a workshop is not spend "cutting" things anyway. So you are not in their that often, and mostly its "quiet" time anyway. Gluing, planing, sanding etc. Only the planer/thicknesser / tablesaw and extractor generate any "real" noise I think. OK, a router as well perhaps.

I wouldn't dream of complaining about a neighbour running a lawnmower from 8am onwards, or even moving a lawn in the summer after 9pm - why is it any different in the winter? I also wouldn't complain about a neighbour doing "one-off" DIY tasks upto 10pm. In fact thinking about it, I didn't complain when my neighbour was stripping plaster off up until 11pm. When else is he going to do it?

I guess I feel it depends on the frequency of things. Occasional noise between 8am and 10pm is fine, and the noise from woodworking is a constant hum or noise, which is very different to music with heavy bass beat which is annoying.

Adam

 

[mr]

Very occasional noise is fine, the odd party here and there. People over the road had Rock band in the back garden the other night - that was loud couldnt hear the tv at all in my place.
But Table saws, routers etc running at nightime, summer or winter is a bit beyond the pale I think particularly when, as in my case there are kids in bed from 7pm or so. I've had to speak to my neighbour a couple of times to ask him to desist for the evening (he was knocking down an internal wall in the room on the other side of a party wall from my 4 year olds bedroom at 9 pm). As you say most workshop time is reasonably quiet and not going to cause any issues but those powered beasties should be kept to daylight hours only IMHO. If that means that the hobbyist who is otherwise employed during the week is restricted to weekends and days off then that's just tough luck really. If I wanted to live on an industrial estate next to a workshop I would have looked for a house on one

Cheers Mike

 

[White House Workshop]

I never run any noisy machinery before 10am or after 5-6 pm, and hardly ever on Sundays. I can't stand the noise myself! Fortunately I have a neighbour who actually does run a woodworking business from his home so there are always saws and planers going during working hours - but he switches off by 4-5pm and doesn't start until 9 in the week or much later at weekends, if at all.

Retaliating by making your own noise doesn't work; it just gets peoples' backs up and makes a bad situation worse. Talk first, tell them about the regs next, enforce them last. We had this problems about 16 years ago with a rock band who used to practice day and night at full blast - and we weren't even a direct neighbour! Talking did no good, but when we threatened to call in the enforcers (the EPA in this case) they got really worried and finally did something about it. Their situation was poor - they rented, their landlord would be fined and they could be thrown out on the street if they didn't comply. The next door neighbours were really happy with us - but why didn't they follow the same route as we is beyond me.

I also had a friend who built his large workshop on the neighbour's boundary, which was rather silly of him. Of course the neighbour complained and the council threatened to shut him down, and it was his livelihood. He put in lots and lots of sound insulation, and that worked. He was also careful not to make noise outside normal working hours. Result, everyone happy.

Be reasonable, talk it out. Only invoke the law as a last ressort. Your neighbours were a bit silly about complaining to the council first and not talking to you, but push that under the carpet and go find out what their real problem is. Often it's not the noise, but something else - like when the woman next door to us was dying of cancer and we didn't know; the first we got was her husband shouting at my kids for always playing in the garden when it was sunny.......

Communication!

 

[RogerS]

.......
Retaliating by making your own noise doesn't work; it just gets peoples' backs up and makes a bad situation worse. Talk first, ......

I agree that's the best way...it's what a friend of mine did. He lived in an end terrace - three storey high. His neighbour had a teenage son who was trying to play the guitar....badly....noisily...at all hours. So Pete went and asked his Dad if his son could play at a more reasonable volume etc etc. No problem. Dad told son. Son shut up. Until the next time. Repeat the process.

Until one weekend the parents were away and so son decided to up the volume. Pete went around to ask him to turn the volume down and got, in reply, a few Anglo-Saxon words. Well, Pete used to work for a loudspeaker manufacturer and had some very, very large speakers. Which he turned around to face the party wall. Remember when CD's first came out, there was a demo disc featuring one of those metal up-and-over garage doors that creaked and squeaked and groaned before coming down to earth with a clap of doom? That's what Pete put on the CD player. Maximum volume. Repeat track. Then he went away and spent the weekend with friends. Result? Guitar played very quietly from then on.

 

[Adam]

But Table saws, routers etc running at nightime, summer or winter is a bit beyond the pale I think particularly when, as in my case there are kids in bed from 7pm or so.

My case also is a toddler asleep after 7pm. To be fair, the workshop is now at the bottom of the garden, but I regularly trundle the mower under her window on a concrete drive after 7pm in the summer when I get home and it has a metal roller so makes quite a noise. Next door shares the drive and he brings his mower up and down too. Noise travelling through a party wall is quite different to noise out in a shed in the garden I think. What about those of us who cut the hedge after 7pm? Thats as noisy as most power tools are.

In my defence the workshop does have shiplap, double glazing, 75mm of the rigid kinspan insulation and OSB boards on the inside so its pretty quiet. That was my aim at design, to allow "quiet" working at potentially unsociable hours. If it was an "open" shed, I might think about it again. A router in a shed pales into insignificance compared to someone repairing a motorbike in the driveway, or working on a classic car (i.e. with rubbish exhaust!).

It just shows the difference between what people consider "acceptable" noise....I was fitting the stair gates on the landing using a hammer action power drill whilst the little 'un was asleep (didn't wake her!) in the adjacent room as it becomes essential once they are crawling.... waiting for the weekend is no good. I guess if you consider it reasonable for yourself, you consider it reasonable for others.


Adam

 

[mr]

if you consider it reasonable for yourself, you consider it reasonable for others.


Adam

That's key I guess. I'm always at pains not to create noise, having had many unpleasant experiences with noisy neighbours. A case of do unto others... etc

Cheers Mike