VIBRATION TRAINING

Your home machine and your neighbors

by Lloyd Shaw

This problem is raising its head again and again , with one company being
sued in Italy for not warning its customers about issues such as the noise
and vibration that these units can create. In this case cracking a
neighbors bathroom tiles. It seems they are pleading ignorance as to the
nature of vibration , which is funny considering they sell big vibrators for
a living ?

I will go through the basic potential problems one at a time , and they can
be discussed in more depth in the blog if needed.

(a) Vibration..

Vibrations can travel through your building much further than you imagine ,
this can depend on the construction of the building and how powerful the
vibrations are being sent "downwards".

A number of things can be done to help these problems with mats , good
isolators etc... but you will always get some energy being sent into the
floor.

The science of annoying your neighbours...

A typical home unit produces 3G of force . This means the object being moved
becomes 3 times its own weight while being slung around by the vibration.

A typical home unit weights about 60kg.

So 3 x 60Kg = 180

The unit running by itself is like a 180Kg person jumping up and down on
your floor. Yes putting a mat under the person will help , some isolators
will work better , but you still have 180kg of mass jumping up and down on
your floor.

But wait folks , it gets better. How much do you weight ? Add that to the
equation once you get on top and start working out. Lets say you weight
70Kg.

3 x 70kg = 210 .

Add that the machines and you have 390kg of dynamic mass moving around in
your building , think the neighbours will feel that ?

Creating a noise 150 feet away...

These vibrations can travel silently under you and turn a wall 50 meters away
into a speaker. If fact the machine may appear very quite standing right
next to it, so being deceived at the shop is very easy.

How does this work ? Well a speaker is only a flat surface being vibrated ,
it hits the air and causes a "sound wave" to hit your eardrum , and your
"hear" the change in air pressure. Think about an old record player (
gramophone ) , it has a small needle running over little bumps , this causes
a "vibration" which is then amplified into a horn so it is loud enough to
hear.

If you are vibrating someone's wall next door you are effectively playing
your machine into their living room.

My advice , talk to the sales staff before putting one in your house , if
they do not know any of this stuff , walk away.

Please note: Pivotal machines do not transfer much energy into the ground. But also lose inertia in the vibration into the muscle due to their design. But Pivotal may be needed at some locations due to location.