I don't know if this is really the place to ask this question, but I am getting desperate...
I live in an apartment building run by people who do the bare minimum, only when forced to by Code Enforcement. This winter, the pump for the hot water heating system has been making a significant hum. It is vibrating the pipes, which appear to my untrained eye to basically be transmitting that vibration/hum into the walls and into apartments 50 feet away. While the noise at the pump itself it not that loud, it is about the same volume in my apartment. From what I can see, the pipes are so tightly wedged into holes in the wall that those vibrations are also being transmitted into the walls, causing my walls to become giant speakers.
I am looking for any ammunition I can use to get my landlord to fix it, as I have called 3 times, and even gotten Code Enforcement on them, and they say that the noise is normal. AS if all buildings make a humming noise due to the heating pumps. (Funny, because I have lived in the building for years and it never made that noise before.) But the maintenance guy is the quintessential "handy man" who is not an expert on anything, and certainly not plumbing. He claimed the noise was just water running through the pipes, even though it is very clearly a mechanical hum.
As you can see, the pump is very old and basically one big pile of rust. I would imagine that buying a new pump for a little over $100 would save them far more than that with better efficiency. (My apartment also does not get to the state required 68 degrees, perhaps because the pump cannot pump the water fast enough to reach my apartment at the end of the line before it loses too much of its heat.)
http://imgur.com/r3Z8tmg
http://imgur.com/VSeiNsx
Again, I am looking for some expert information to take to them, or to the Code Enforcement to get this fixed. My neighbor is a woman in her early 80s and she is being forced to use her electric oven for heat, leaving it on all day with the over door open, as well as sleeping in her living room because the noise is SLIGHTLY less here since her bedroom is right over the furnace room. And when I told them that our apartments never got about 64 degrees, and often hovered around 62 or so, I was told "So, you ARE getting heat...just not what you WANT to get." which is ridiculous since by law it must be 68. My neighbor is a woman in her early 80s and she is being forced to use her electric oven for heat, leaving it on all day with the over door open, as well as sleeping in her living room because the noise is SLIGHTLY less here since her bedroom is right over the furnace room. To me, this should make the landlords eligible for criminal charges.
Here are some videos of the noise. The first inside the furnace room itself, and the second in the stairwell of one of the buildings it handles. This stairwell is about 20 feet away, and two walls away from the furnace. And yes, that IS an apartment to the right. No one is living in it now, and I am guessing that they would never be able to get anyone to rent it in the winter.
http://youtu.be/ZrkjiOznxiQ
http://youtu.be/lt4aqeniv6U
The even more telling thing about this noise is that when I am standing in my apartment, the noise will be VERY localized, though in many spots. By that I mean, I can stand in one spot and the noise will be very loud. But if I move just 2 feet to either direction, it goes away COMPLETELY. OR if I get lower to the ground it might go away. One spot where it is the loudest, my wall is very warm, so obviously the pipes are very close to the wall there. It is even to the point where I can change (slightly) where I hear the noise by wedging a tennis ball between the two pipes that the noise is coming from. I assume that is because I am changing the frequency and wavelength of the vibration and therefore its peaks are at different spots on the pipe.
I am just looking for some verification that this pipe is obviously causing the noise and vibration. I know it sounds stupid, but even after being shown where the noise is the worst, management and maintenance say it is normal. My other fear is that the pump is all set to fail and that it will do so during one of these cold snaps we have had this year. And with my landlord, it would take days to get the heat back on.
I live in an apartment building run by people who do the bare minimum, only when forced to by Code Enforcement. This winter, the pump for the hot water heating system has been making a significant hum. It is vibrating the pipes, which appear to my untrained eye to basically be transmitting that vibration/hum into the walls and into apartments 50 feet away. While the noise at the pump itself it not that loud, it is about the same volume in my apartment. From what I can see, the pipes are so tightly wedged into holes in the wall that those vibrations are also being transmitted into the walls, causing my walls to become giant speakers.
I am looking for any ammunition I can use to get my landlord to fix it, as I have called 3 times, and even gotten Code Enforcement on them, and they say that the noise is normal. AS if all buildings make a humming noise due to the heating pumps. (Funny, because I have lived in the building for years and it never made that noise before.) But the maintenance guy is the quintessential "handy man" who is not an expert on anything, and certainly not plumbing. He claimed the noise was just water running through the pipes, even though it is very clearly a mechanical hum.
As you can see, the pump is very old and basically one big pile of rust. I would imagine that buying a new pump for a little over $100 would save them far more than that with better efficiency. (My apartment also does not get to the state required 68 degrees, perhaps because the pump cannot pump the water fast enough to reach my apartment at the end of the line before it loses too much of its heat.)
http://imgur.com/r3Z8tmg
http://imgur.com/VSeiNsx
Again, I am looking for some expert information to take to them, or to the Code Enforcement to get this fixed. My neighbor is a woman in her early 80s and she is being forced to use her electric oven for heat, leaving it on all day with the over door open, as well as sleeping in her living room because the noise is SLIGHTLY less here since her bedroom is right over the furnace room. And when I told them that our apartments never got about 64 degrees, and often hovered around 62 or so, I was told "So, you ARE getting heat...just not what you WANT to get." which is ridiculous since by law it must be 68. My neighbor is a woman in her early 80s and she is being forced to use her electric oven for heat, leaving it on all day with the over door open, as well as sleeping in her living room because the noise is SLIGHTLY less here since her bedroom is right over the furnace room. To me, this should make the landlords eligible for criminal charges.
Here are some videos of the noise. The first inside the furnace room itself, and the second in the stairwell of one of the buildings it handles. This stairwell is about 20 feet away, and two walls away from the furnace. And yes, that IS an apartment to the right. No one is living in it now, and I am guessing that they would never be able to get anyone to rent it in the winter.
http://youtu.be/ZrkjiOznxiQ
http://youtu.be/lt4aqeniv6U
The even more telling thing about this noise is that when I am standing in my apartment, the noise will be VERY localized, though in many spots. By that I mean, I can stand in one spot and the noise will be very loud. But if I move just 2 feet to either direction, it goes away COMPLETELY. OR if I get lower to the ground it might go away. One spot where it is the loudest, my wall is very warm, so obviously the pipes are very close to the wall there. It is even to the point where I can change (slightly) where I hear the noise by wedging a tennis ball between the two pipes that the noise is coming from. I assume that is because I am changing the frequency and wavelength of the vibration and therefore its peaks are at different spots on the pipe.
I am just looking for some verification that this pipe is obviously causing the noise and vibration. I know it sounds stupid, but even after being shown where the noise is the worst, management and maintenance say it is normal. My other fear is that the pump is all set to fail and that it will do so during one of these cold snaps we have had this year. And with my landlord, it would take days to get the heat back on.