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New slats make the Golden Gate Bridge sound like a David Lynch movie

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281–290 of 344 posts

Re: New slats make the Golden Gate Bridge sound like a David Lynch movie

#281
post #14

I'm just glad they identified the source of the hum, many people are impacted for years by unexplainable sounds, and it is maddening. It took me and my neighbours a month to find the source of a hum that was resonating with our windows. It was torture, with midnight walks and lurking around potential sources, mapping nearby industrial sites, and questioning our sanity, while our windows were vibrating without a stop.…

Nice work! Any specific techniques you used to identify the source? I've longed for the day an inexpensive or software based acoustic camera comes into reach. So many sounds I've been on the hunt for in the past an even unto today. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_camera

Re: New slats make the Golden Gate Bridge sound like a David Lynch movie

#282
post #223
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two unrelated anecdotes: 1. A few years ago I spent some time in Falmouth, MA and there was an ongoing battle over newly installed wind turbines. The humming sound was getting to people, including to the point where they were getting headaches. Some people heard it and others didn't. The locals were going to war with the initiative. This article reminded me of that and I checked in on the ordeal. Looks like they shut…

Same think was driving me nuts in the BWCA, camping in areas where there should not be any engines. Came back all salty that someone must have a gas powered well or something. Outfitter said I should find a recording of a horny grouse... and I'll be damned, that was it beating its wings. Last trip over Memorial weekend we had one nearby, and it brought nothing but smiles.

So how has this affected your life since? Did you stop assuming things more? Do you like the sound of lawn mowers because they sound like a natural sound?

Re: New slats make the Golden Gate Bridge sound like a David Lynch movie

#284
post #14

I'm just glad they identified the source of the hum, many people are impacted for years by unexplainable sounds, and it is maddening. It took me and my neighbours a month to find the source of a hum that was resonating with our windows. It was torture, with midnight walks and lurking around potential sources, mapping nearby industrial sites, and questioning our sanity, while our windows were vibrating without a stop.…

I hear what I suspect is the subway on the next street over moving underground periodically throughout the day. There isn't even a station there, I just hear a low rumbling that moves up or down the route.

Re: New slats make the Golden Gate Bridge sound like a David Lynch movie

#285
post #29

"In the future the most valuable thing will be silence" --Voltaire

Pretty much the only good thing about the lockdown was the massive reduction in sound levels in London. Just off Old Kent Road which means traffic noise dropped, plane noise disappeared[1], general hubbub of the feral children vanished, no late night parties at the community centre, etc. It was as close to blissful as I've encountered in London. [1] Normally one every 5-10 minutes from 0500 to 23000 since we're on He…

In LA, the city has used the downtime to ramp up road and metro construction, and buildings have been shooting up at a faster pace. I drove past one of the neighborhood pits that will turn into an apartment eventually and they had six excavators at the site all digging at once. Instead of road noise, now I get to hear drilling and hammering and dump trucks backing up and having rocks tossed into them at 7 am.

Re: New slats make the Golden Gate Bridge sound like a David Lynch movie

#286
post #14

I'm just glad they identified the source of the hum, many people are impacted for years by unexplainable sounds, and it is maddening. It took me and my neighbours a month to find the source of a hum that was resonating with our windows. It was torture, with midnight walks and lurking around potential sources, mapping nearby industrial sites, and questioning our sanity, while our windows were vibrating without a stop.…

Nice work! Any specific techniques you used to identify the source? I've longed for the day an inexpensive or software based acoustic camera comes into reach. So many sounds I've been on the hunt for in the past an even unto today. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_camera

Ooh I wonder if hacking a smart speaker would let you make one

Re: New slats make the Golden Gate Bridge sound like a David Lynch movie

#287

There should be an app for this. To get direction and location, you need acoustic samples from multiple widely-spaced locations, all synchronized. Human ears are not wide enough apart to directionalize low frequencies, but with a baseline of tens or hundreds of meters from separate cell phones, it's not hard. Run a correlator, line up the samples, compute the hyperbolas of constant time offset, (like GPS and LORAN) a…

You'd also need microphones that pick up low frequencies.

Re: New slats make the Golden Gate Bridge sound like a David Lynch movie

#288
post #28

I honestly think this is awesome and beautiful, though I might feel differently if I lived nearby just because of how relentless it is. I remember years ago I had the idea that if you could design construction equipment to rotate/oscillate/whatever at frequencies that were harmonic with each other, construction noise would become musical, almost like a very loud set of wind chimes.

[deleted]

Re: New slats make the Golden Gate Bridge sound like a David Lynch movie

#289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear this all the time. I was just talking to someone about it. It’s not everyday but it’s frequent. I hear it mostly in the morning and at night. It’s always the same length, about a second. It’ll come in pulses of 2 or 3 usually. Spread out a few minutes a part. It definitely sounds like an electronic sound. Almost like a sci fi satellite sound but deep in the water far away. Or maybe a far away whale mourning or…

Power companies transmit a signal at certain times of the day through the lines. This controls devices that can switch between day and night mode. My ceiling fans will buzz when it's happening. Sounds almost like the old SMS interference you'd get with FM radio.

This is called Ripple Control, for anyone interested:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Load_management#Ripple_control

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