As you all know, I recently purchased a house and moved in with my wife.

The house is a little older, made in 1960, and had an addition at some point along the way. It is a single-story ranch style house.

Ever since we moved in, we did notice that during the night, there are the occasional creaks and noises from the house settling etc.

The past 2 nights though, the noises seem to be more noticeable, and almost sound louder. Kinda put us a little on edge as we didn't know exactly what was going on.

I did a little reading this morning, and it seems like it is normal.

Did anybody else notice this? Or has anybody else seen this before in their houses?

Thanks!

EDIT: Yes, we do make sure we keep all doors and windows locked at night, and we do have a security system installed, which helped calm us down a little.

It's normal in older houses especially as the these nights have gotten so cold. Wind will get it going too. In a month or so you will probably mentally block it out and you won't hear it any more.


But if the roof snaps off and crushes you to death in your sleep I call dibs on guns and ammo!

wood expands and contracts with temperature changes

What these guys said.
The changes in temperature cause the building materials to expand/contract.  Humidity also does it.

The fall when my a/c is off and my heat isn't on yet, my floors creak the most.  Very annoying with a 3 month old baby

I forgot to add that roughly 60% to 70% of the house is hardwood floors. The only room not hardwood on the bedroom side of the house is the tile-floor in the bathroom.

We dont have any rugs or anything like that in the house, and the floor-plan is pretty open. Makes things echo a little in the house too.

As stated, thermal expansion/contraction.

Curiosity, what kind of heating system?


We don't have many creaks and pops from the structure itself (built 1965), but our heaters are pretty loud every time the heat kicks on. This weekend I'm pulling all the covers off the radiators and straightening the aluminum fins so none of them touch each other. It's going to be annoying, but not as annoying as all the cringling and crinkling 3-4 times a night.

Normal. It is the wood drying out. My house is 1910 and creaks and groans often. When windy you can hear it most.

@zager.....Good luck trying to get finned radiators to be quiet. They are one of the reasons I hate baseboard heat. It is a good idea to comb the fins and clean all the dust out. That will help with efficiency. Removing those radiators and replacing them with cast iron is the only way you will get rid of the tink, tink, tink noise.

ours made the same noise. got a woodstove, now they dont creak at all

My current and my last home both creek and cracked after the sun sets and cools our vinyl siding. The vinyl siding actually makes noise I'm assuming from expansion and contraction. Stand out side your house next to the siding, if given the chance tonight as the sun sets.

These guys are bullshitting you.

The noise is from the graves underneath the house.

Nighty night......

Baseboard heaters, but they are the cast iron kind, not the aluminum fin kind. They look like this:



And the siding is painted cedar shakes, like this:

Yea it's almost definitely the studs in your walls, and or the joists under your floors(basement ceiling).  Creaking on your hardwood floors is from the hardwood sitting on top of plywood, and your either pressing on them with your feet or the change in temp causes them to flex.

As far as your baseboards zager....if you hear any sort of banging, you can purge your zones easily in the basement.  You didn't say you heard that, just the fins, but I wanted to throw that out there just in case.

Demons. Definitely demons.



Guns and ammo are already called for so I call dibs on all of your haunted mags.

Been splitting and stacking my back out all week.

Gonna be a toasty next year, though.

Appreciate the insight. No bangs, yet.

Zager, you could be replace the cheap Slant Fin style baseboard radiators with something in cast iron. I would do the bedrooms if it is bothering you.

Something like this....Link

Nice. How much per room do you suppose? Assume ~12-15'

No idea. You would have to Google around or find a distributor and call them. I am sure it is not cheap so just do the bedroom.

I think Bending is an HVAC guy. Maybe he can help with the supply house.

Also to straighten the fins you will want a fin comb. Just measure how many fins per inch and order one. Wear gloves those fins are sharp. it is worth it to take the covers off, clean the dust out with a vacuum and light compressed air. Also free up the adjustable shutter so it works. Make sure air can flow freely from the bottom and out the top. If there is obstructions you will not get good convection and just waste money.

Another thing you should do is check the aquastat on the boiler. Most oil guys turn them up way too high. They do this to prevent complaints during super cold temps. This will cause you to waste oil just to keep the boiler hot. Turn it down and keep an eye on performance. if you find it takes too long to come to temp on a cold morning just turn it up 10 degrees at a time. It is much better for the boiler to run for longer periods than a bunch of short periods and much more efficient energy-wise.

if you heat your domestic hot water with a tankless coil in the boiler you will want to de-scale it for maximum heat transfer. Also you can turn down the temp for the domestic hot water, again most oil guys have it so high you will get scalded. Heating that high is just a waste of oil. As with the main boiler temp just adjust it to the point it is not hot enough. It will take some tweaking.

EDIT: with all the energy savings you can buy more guns or ammo!

I also forgot to say that I have programable thermostats for the house. At 10pm, they go from 68 to 62.

I wonder if I left it at a constant temp, if it would keep the noises down. Would probably cost more though to keep the house at a stable temp though.

During the day when we're at work, it kicks down to 62, and it goes up to 68 during the evening., then back to 62 at night.

We're 68/64. Just bumped it up from 68/60.

I don't think it's the most efficient yet, trying to find that balance. From what I understand, it is actually cheaper to maintain temp (to an extent) than it is trying to chase a temperature when all the walls and objects are holding a lower temp.

Thanks for the pointers.

We had turned our DHW down to 140(iirc) or whatever the bacterial sanitizing temp is for the dishwasher.

I go to TORRCO (sp?) in South Windsor for plumbing stuff, I'll have to ask them for pricing. Maybe theyll have a comb, too.

I see dead people, OP they are coming for you ……..

I work in an old firehouse with cast iron radiators. Those radiators are loud enough to wake the dead.

Mike

Probably a steam system.They rattle and bang like hell.

@zeger. It is more energy efficient to let the house cool off when you don't need the heat. Like when at work or when sleeping. I set back to 54 degrees. For wake up my wife gets up at 4:30am so I have it at 68 until 8:30am when I usually leave. Then in the evening it is 67 during the week and goes to set back at 10pm. On weekends during the day it is at 65 because we are alawys moving around. In the evening it goes to 67.

I have insulated and replaced my windows. This house was built 1910 and is 1600+ square feet. I do not burn wood, pellets or coal. When I bought it I used over 800 gallons of oil for the heating season. Last winter I used just under 400 gallons. I track my oil usage with a spreadsheet. Kind of a geek thing I know.

A couple of energy saving tips. Insulate your domestic hot water pipes and your heating pipes in the basement. You will find that you can actually turn down the water heater a few degrees. Use a water saver shower head. I have one that uses .55 gal/min. I bought it to try. Money back guarantee. I figured it would be horrible. I installed it and said nothing to my wife or son. They said wow that shower head is great!

Modern dishwashers have a water heater built in so you do not need 140 degree domestic hot water.

One last tip is to pay the $99 Eversource gets for an energy audit. They will come and do a blower door test, seal leaks, replace regular light bulbs with CFL so make sure you put in old school bulbs for when they come, and they will find sources of wasted energy. Well worth the price. My father had it done to his house. They found stuff that he hadn't thought of. His already efficient house saved about 10% the winter after he had the work done. All in all he spent about $400 total after some of the not included work he did. He more than paid for the work that one winter. I am going to call in the spring. I have to replace a leaky front door and then I am ready for an audit.

Yep.

 

Consider an indirect fan or air purifier in the bedroom (as you sleep).


A fan type air purifier also offers the benefit of breathing clean air as you sleep, while masking the settling sound of the structure.


I sleep with a "barrel" type air purifier from Sears for over 15 years (same unit), and just the mellow sound of it running surpasses ordinary "settling" of the house.


I actually have two (sorry I can't link to the make/model because they are that old).


Good luck OP.

I believe now code requires a thermostatic valve limited to 120 degrees for domestic hot water.

One day when I stop being lazy I'm going to use one to cheat the flow rate on my tankless heater.

My old home is from 1888.  We are only the 2nd family to live in it, too.  We actually bought it from the family that built it way back when and today, it looks just about the way it did back then as we decided to preserve it rather than try to make it "better".  That exclues niceties like modern heating system, full power panels and modern plumbing but none of the interior was ever painted over the original shellac which remains perfectly intact.  

We still get creeks and cracks and sundry sounds depending on the season.  In the more humid months the floors remain pretty tight but during the winter they will dry out and we will hear creaks on the stairs.  Stick to the sides against the walls or railings to avoid they at night if you're sneaking in.  

I'm sure one of the fellas talked about humidity in your home during the winter is crucial to keep your home comfortable and you warm.  Super dry hot air does nothing to hold the temp in the air.  A minimum relative humidity of about 40% is what we shoot for and have had good success with.  We do have a forced hot-air system, however, which makes adding warm humid air easier than baseboards.  But just make sure you've got a good humidifier going all through the winter and clean it regularly.  It can cause molds to grow.  

I'm a professional cabinetmaker and I work with wood and have to accommodate expansion/contraction coefficients in my work all the time.  As wood ages, however, it tends to absorb less moisture and, thus, expands less.  I'm still surprised at how much our 127 yer old home responds to the differences between cold dry and warm humid atmospheres.  It's really amazing.  But with proper care and maintenance, this house will easily last another 127 years.  I wonder what the more modern houses being built around here will look like!

Rome

2 more things to check if they weren't already mentioned;
Pay attention to the holes in the floors where the feed & return pipes pas through for hot water baseboard and check the baseboard heating element supports, there should be small plastic "shoes" that the elements rest on.