richardblack

@ PN33 I was seeing it more as a you know it's not possible to make a temporary solution so you might as well approach the landlord with an educated solution to a permanent solution that they would be ok with being done or even help towards the cost if they wanted to keep their tenant. For a really temporary solution? Polystyrene sheets fixed against the wall. Have done that before. Minor, and I mean minor improvement. I'm afraid it really is all about making the wall more dense

I have some practical experience of this in our new flat in Catford. Shared wall in the downstairs hallway section was very thin. Wasn't even stud wall so couldn't insulate a cavity at all. I clad it first in soundproof plaster board secured with acoustic sealant (note this board is 'soundproof' in the sense it's much heavier and denser) and then a layer of high mass load vinyl. And then finished off with another layer of the sound plasterboard. All sealed up with acoustic sealant (remains more flexible longterm so helps reduce drum effect) Essentially what you have to do is the increase the mass of the wall. Different densities of materials help with this. In our scenario it has helped absolutely massively. However if you have a chimney breast or interior features such as plasterwork cornice then it becomes much more difficult and thus expensive or you have to ruin things like period features. Because our's was a hallway I didn't have to worry about that. However if you read up on these things then you'll find issues regarding flanking sounds whereby you might soundproof a wall. but the vibrations of the noise can still flank it by going around. In short you'll likely manage to muffle sound coming through the wall but would be almost impossible to eliminate it. For reference although we haven't eliminated the worst of the kids shouting playing noises we have taken out probably 80% of all the noise which was then echoing in our hallway. It has made a massive difference to our quality of life in our flat. Excluding my labour time as I did it all myself it cost around ?400 excluding surface decorations because I also brought a lot of extra acoustic sealant to do the joins between floorboards before relaying the carpets. This was an area 3.2m high at highest with a 3.5m flat hall way section and then up one side of the staircase in addition which obviously tapers to a point. Hope that's of some use to you and good luck.

PN33 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Otta Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > Personal taste I guess, but I'd pick Forest > Hill > > over Nunhead in a heartbeat! > > Nothing against Forest Hill, I guess it's just > personal taste. I really like the fact that > Nunhead is zone 2, close to Peckham and the nice > green open-ness of the Rye, The Old Nuns Head is a > cracking pub and the vibe just seems perfect... > Peckham has become too hipster and we're possibly > a bit young for ED/Honor Oak (we're only 26!) so > Nunhead seems like the perfect compromise. > > What do folks think about Catford? I know it's got > a bad reputation (although I've never actually > seen it for myself).... it's never been on our > list of desirable places to live but we can't > ignore the fact that a beautiful, 2 bed period > property in Catford will sell for about as much as > a grotty, ex-LA, one bed flat in Peckham We moved to Catford (very central) because getting onto the ladder wasn't even a goer for us in East Dulwich unless we wanted a box room bed sit type place. Ok it's not as pretty, we don't really have 'posh' shops. But we use the ones within 5mins walk of us now far more than we did the ones 5mins walk from where we lived in East Dulwich. It's just London though, its the cycle that happens, eventually all places become unaffordable for certain segments of society and become more places to visit, than places to live. Who would have thought that Brixton would have ended up how it is today when I moved to London 11 years ago. If you were lucky enough to have already been here before 'it started' then good luck to you, but don't be amazed when people have to move away.

Well we've left East Dulwich (renting) to move to Catford (buying). We did look around the area's surrounding, but either just couldn't afford it, or there seemed to be very poor value. (size, condition, storage space, standard of fitting out etc)

davidh Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > there cannot be any sensible argument against ALL > cyclists being tested and licensed, being insured > and well lit after dark. discuss Well given that I routinely stop to indicate politely to various drivers the light defects on their car, van, bus perhaps we could admit that within each and every group that there are good and poor road users. But that is what we all are...ROAD USERS and as such should be prepared to judge our 'own' as harshly as others and to cut a little slack where possible. Personally I would have the police enforce the use of lights after dark and the agressive fast cycling on the pavements, however like so many rules they don't enforce it at all even when asked directly one to one and so frankly I'd feel like if you might start doing cyclists for lack of lights you should equally do drivers for stopping in the green cyclist box. Sadly it's just a vicious circle.

Hi binery star Yes have put in a complaint to royal mail regarding the incident. Have had it acknowledged and it is with their incidents team or some such. Sadly I had to cause traffic chaos as the driver basically refused to speak to me or provide details until someone from the Peckham office had walked down to belleden road in person. An unusual experience having to carry your now bust bike down the road to apologise for the delays. I'm hoping they see sense and pay for the repairs but sadly don't appear to have had any luck tracking down either of the cyclists near the junction so it could come down yo my word against the driver. Luckily I have several friends involved with motorbike organisations, the police and the legal profession so have had good advice on addressing royal mail.

I don't suppose that any of the other cyclists that were about at the junction of Bellenden Road and Peckham High street by the Lidl saw my incident where by I was shunted by a royal mail van at the lights. There were at least two other cyclists who may have seen but not realised the extent of the incident who would be able to verify my road positioning. If you were there and saw the incident then please feel free to contact me on [email protected] On a side note to the others who stopped and checked I was ok thank you. I'm fine, I wasn't actually taken off my bike but sadly my rear wheel is completely knacked to use a technical term. Many thanks

Thanks everyone, yes I did go out and politely ask them. Sadly you do get contractors starting jobs at funny times but this was an emergency so sadly on they went. Richard

Anybody got any thoughts on if they are allowed to be doing this at this time of night? I feel most sorry for the person who's house it is directly outside of. I accept that there's a case where emergency repairs might be needed but they have suddenly turned up just before 9pm.

For the second time in recent past we've got workmen drilling using heavy equipment late at night on a sunday. Same spot as last time. The vans say that its the gas network. Unreasonable noise late at night? do i have grounds to tell them to stop? are they just dodgey workmen trying to sqeeze jobs out? Any thoughts Richard

Thanks for the link *Bob* might give that a try. apparently your signal strength is only meant to be in the 70-80% strength and ours is up at 100%.

Stuff that my wife seems to have read up on online seems to suggest that the signal is too strong. We have a real problem receiving some channels now such as several of the BBC ones, film 4 etc. All the stuff online also seems to suggest that you don't want to have the arial power on. Just completely confused by it all frankly as it worked perfectly for 8 months and now we're getting problems with it. Tried it with two different arials as well.

Hi everbody. Last christmas we got a Humax PVR-9150T freeview box, last couple of months we've been getting problems that seem to stem from the signal. From rummaging around on the net it seems that we might actually have too strong a signal. Has anybody else had this problem?