Does anyone know if there is a standard for allowable vibration emitted from a facility into a community? A customer has a neighbor that is complaining about vibrating windows and pictures. The person is complaining about feeling the vibration in their body. The only source is a generator that runs peak hours and is about 2000 feet from the nearest house. There is supression for the noise and some buffering. The complaint is more about the vibration, than the noise. They can hear it, but it is not the issue. Is there a standard for this? What and how to measure?

Lake Man,

There are many enviromental noise criteria that set sound level limits based on type of land use (zoning). I have not seen the equvalent criteria for ground vibrations. There is ANSI S3.29-1983 "Guide to evaluation of human exposure to vibratoins in buildings". There are other design criteria based on third octave frequency bands from 8 to 80 Hz. 78 dB (re: 1 micro-inch/sec velocity) is consided the threshold for barely feelable floor vibrations. 65 to 72 dB might be chosen as a design criteria. Here is a few questions:

1) Can you as a visitor readily feel the vibrations, or is it just the residents that are tuned-in?
2) Can you measure vibration levels that low?
3) Can you record vibrations over a period of time, if the vibrations are not constant?

You need to play detective to really identify the vibration source by making measurements and not by visual identification. Reducing vibrations at the source, along the path, or at the receptor location can be a daunting task.

Walt
w_f_strong [at] msn [dot] com