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Bumps In The Night (Strange Sounds In Basement Flat)

liveinabin

liveinabin

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I wonder if anyone can give any solutions to this problem I have.

I live in a basement flat. My bedroom is at the front of the flat. The top of the room is at street level. There are stairs coming down from the street to our front door. These stairs pass the bedroom window. The foot of the bed is just below the window. As you lie in bed the bedroom door is on your right and the top of the stairs is on the left.

The problem is this every night (and during the day, but neither of us like the room so we only sleep in there) there is a strange noise coming from the top left (as you are lying in bed) corner of the room.
It started as a ticking sound. It would tick for about 30 seconds then stop for about 3 minutes and then start again. There are no analouge clocks in the room. At this time the wardrobe was in that corner.
Since I moved the wardrobe we have a whole new noise. I happens over the same time frame. But this time the noise is like someone pushing a rusty spring. I know it's not our bed as none of the springs make a noise, and I have heard the noise when no-ones been in bed.
I've tried to "find" the noise but everytime I get near it, it seems to move.

The corner is where the top of the stairs meet the wall and the top step is flush with street level.

Does anyone have any ideas what this could be? It doesn't feel menacing and it doesn't keep me awake but I don't know what it is.
 
Could it be your immersion heater/central heating?
 
Your next door neighbours extractor fan? Ours in the kitchens broken - the bearings have gone, and it sounds like a rusty squeak.
 
Is it perhaps some sort of animal/insect infestation?

Carole
 
Could birds be nesting in the wall? Or mice?

Alternatively, perhaps it's something to do with the place where the stairs meet the wall - is there subsidence in the area? One flat I lived in was slowly sinking into the mire, and the building would shift every once in a while. And I thought pipes did run down exterior walls??????

The only other thing I can think of is - is there perhaps rampant nookie going on above your head? Sorry, it was the mention of rusty springs...

;)
 
Sounds like rats or mice to me. The ticking could either be a mouse gnawing on something (wood? cables?) or death-watch beetles...
Occasionally, I have funny noises in my house similar to those that I heard in the previous house. Sounds like someone rolling a billiard ball along a shelf next door. Why I should get the same noises in this house, I don't know. It used to annoy the hell out of me when I was in the house in Peterborough, and I thought the neighbours were doing it just to annoy me.
 
It's no-one up to anything upstairs as the house upstairs is where our elderly German landlady loves. Also it's her front room.

it could be an extractor fan as next door is nextdoors kitchen!

Thanks for your help.

BTW It's turned into a taping now.
 
liveinabin said:
...the house upstairs is where our elderly German landlady loves.
Click to expand...
I say! It's that sort of establishment is it? No wonder there's lots of knocking.
 
You know what mean.

At least I think it's not a knocking shop!
 
This sounds very similar to something that happens in my house.When in bed at night there is a strange tap that seems to come from the window.The taps come in quick succesion and last less than a minute.It only happens very rarely,perhaps four times this year.
Whenever I try to find it,I also cannot seem to locate it as it moves or stops.It has had me perplexed ever since I first heard it.
I doubt its mice as I have also had problems with them and they tend to make different sounds and I cant see how they could make such a quick tapping sound as opposed to a gnawing on wood sound.
If you work it out please let me know.
 
A ticking or tapping sound could be death-watch beetles - I've heard them. The other noises could be due to almost anything - mice, other insects, subsidence, contraction/expansion, machinery vibration being 'focussed' into that spot... Loads of things.
 
Could it be coming from anywhere else in the room?

You said that it appears to move when you get close to it, so could it be a doppler sort of projection of sound effect, coming from elsewhere in the room? I get a similar thing in my house, my bedroom is at the front of the house and my bed is opposite the window. At night I can hear cars going down the road, and the sound appears to eminate from behind my headboard.
 
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