AAAARRRGH! Damn Neighbors noisey heatpump!

Forums › Home Workshop DIY › AAAARRRGH! Damn Neighbors noisey heatpump!

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bfginger

1267 posts

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#1428596 16-Nov-2015 08:16

If a contractor is being paid a fixed price to perform an installation they are incentivised to use the shortest cable run either to reduce time or material costs. An installation quote that includes the cable run length should remove that as a problem.

Removing the retailer as an intermediary and buying the heat pump from the installers should be much cheaper. There are big differences between what different retailers charge too.

These pages explain the difference between sound power and pressure levels.

http://www.sengpielaudio.com/calculator-soundpower.htm

http://www.sengpielaudio.com/calculator-soundlevel.htm

Kickinbac

427 posts

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#1428809 16-Nov-2015 12:14

A well aimed javelin would sort out the fan noise. Just say you was 'practicing' in my back yard and it went astray!
But seriously it is probably faulty and needs repairing. It should be under warranty as most heat pumps have a 5 year warranty.

Batman

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#1428925 16-Nov-2015 14:16

Use a decibel meter on your phone and report back

mattwnz

20141 posts

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#1428969 16-Nov-2015 15:08

surfisup1000:
mattwnz:
surfisup1000:
The RMA says people noise is not permitted, but there is not any enforcement action specified for 'people' noise. You can take away a stereo but you can't take away a person as such. Although, I suspect our council were just useless and didn't really have a clue.

The RMA is so vague, but I believe it overrides councils own district plans. I believe the RMA says something along the lines of that people have the right to enjoy peace and quiet on their property, but how is that actually enforced if people believe their rights are being abused by another party.

I've been through the wording very carefully -- and, to me it seems contradictory and open to interpretation in some parts -- especially with respect to people noise.

eg, from the RMA itself...

In this Act, the term excessive noise means any noise that is under human control and of such a nature as to unreasonably interfere with the peace, comfort, and convenience of any person
Without limiting subsection (1), excessive noise—
(b)may include noise emitted by—
(i)a musical instrument; or
(iv)a person or group of persons; ******

Such inconsistencies!!!

I believe the only way to get the RMA enforced is to go to the environment court. So even if a council breaches it by allowing an activity that breaches neighbours rights to peace, it requires thousands of dollars to take it to court. Madness. There needs to be a low cost way , something similar to the disputes tribunal, as councils make mistakes(though won't usually admit to them), but there isn't much people can do about those mistakes without spending thousands.

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#1428977 16-Nov-2015 15:21

You need to know the decibels to start with i think. Not sure

bfginger

1267 posts

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#1435525 26-Nov-2015 21:25

High kW heat pumps are noisy when working at capacity. It isn't economically practical to scale the external unit up in size for acoustic purposes so they're far louder than medium capacity units.

Technofreak

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#1435530 26-Nov-2015 21:43

floydie: its thier outdoor unit thats loud. it manages to get its sound through the fence and through our new double glazed window'd brick house... im betting thats its working ok as its only a 6 month old place but itll be some cheap HP.

EDIT:oh for reference i had our car idling on the driveway out the front of the house and their HP down the side of the section was louder then the car!!!!

I wonder if the problem is being caused by harmonic vibration. Is the fence (I'm suspecting it's the standard 2 metre high wooden fence you see in most suburbs these days) resonating with the outdoor unit and effectively magnifying the sound? How close is the fence to the unit? Perhaps adding some rails to the fence may change it's resonance frequency and help deaden the noise.

Another similar effect is the noise coming out of a workshop door opening that seems much louder at a distance than it does inside the workshop.

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Technofreak

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#1435532 26-Nov-2015 21:52

If the problem is indeed the outdoor unit and all reasonable approaches to get it resolved don't work you could borrow or buy a Holden Commodore V8 with a big bore kit or a Mazda RX8 or the like a park it in a suitable spot each morning while it "warms up" and the same when you get home to let it "cool down".

This is most effective if you leave home around 5 am or arrive home around midnight, i.e. times when your neighbour is still asleep or wants to be still asleep.

How do I know this works? We used to have a neighbour that did exactly that, only we didn't have a noisy heat pump (or anything else noisy for that matter) to annoy him with.

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MattEast

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#1435565 26-Nov-2015 21:59

Two stroke boat motors have a similar effect, and chainsaws....or any two stroke running for that matter, fire it up!

MikeAqua

7773 posts

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#1437284 29-Nov-2015 16:50

We had two Samsung heat pumps installed in our old house (from memory 8kW and 6kW).

The outside units weren't noisy, even when working hard.

As others have said try talking to the neighbour about it. Worth a try

Mike

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#1437286 29-Nov-2015 16:59

Try something like, hey how's the house! My house is so cold! Is your house cold? ... Wow heatpump! Ah ... is that the thing that goes bang at night? ... No no i'm sure it's nothing wrong, they normally sound like army trucks going past all night I'm sure. .... No no don't bother checking with the installer, nothing wrong surely it's normal. 2 weeks later ... hey you know my uncle has one. Quiet as a pin. Maybe you should get the installer to check it out. Surely it can't be right? ... 2 weeks later ... You know what I had a mate who works for the council who was over the other day - he says it's not supposed to be like that, maybe get onto the installer to say you got a dud or something?

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