[SoCalWJS]

I need some help,  but it's kind of hard to describe. Hoping a picture of the room (before we really moved anything in) will help. It's an open concept room that has a "Built-in Niche" that is designed to have shelves. rack(s), or built-in's. We initially set up the room much as it was intended, but it sounded very bad, so we rotated everything 90 degrees. The Niche now forms the left side wall from the listening position. (Make sense?)

The problem is that the left hand "leg" of the Niche is hollow. Took me awhile to figure out that it wasn't things ON the wall that were buzzing from Bass, but the drywall itself. (The piece in question is next to the empty white & green office box on the floor)




Is there anything fairly easy that can be done to prevent this? I thought about making a hole in the thing and filling it up with some sort of expanding foam, but I have serious doubts that would do any good at all. Is there anything short of pulling off the drywall and reinforcing the beams that I can do? It's getting more and more frustrating. Now that I've identified the problem, I hear it all the time. 

[Big Red Machine]

Assuming some framing behind that shape I would sink some more drywall screws in to see if I can tighten it down. Then just patch the screw heads.

If that fails then you could remove and re-drywall and in that process you might see the frame is rattling and not the drywall.

Third, it will mess up your baseboard, but adding another layer will significantly change the resonant frequency of that wall. But if the rattle is the framing it will not help.

Those are my quick thoughts.

[SoCalWJS]

Assuming some framing behind that shape I would sink some more drywall screws in to see if I can tighten it down. Then just patch the screw heads.

If that fails then you could remove and re-drywall and in that process you might see the frame is rattling and not the drywall.

Third, it will mess up your baseboard, but adding another layer will significantly change the resonant frequency of that wall. But if the rattle is the framing it will not help.

Those are my quick thoughts.

FYI -  there is additional info that is known to me that I should share. I took photos during construction. It's hard to see unless you know exactly what you are looking at, so I didn't bother posting them.

There are no crossmembers in the frame except top and bottom. Zero. Zip. Nada. Vertical 2x4's only. If I had been thinking clearly during construction, I would have spoken up and insisted on a few more 2x4's to brace the bloody thing. 

[richidoo]

Vertical studs only is standard practice. Any production builder would not comply with your crossbrace request because it meets code as is.

+1 BRM's advice. Add more screws, make sure they land in the studs. Noise often comes from the sheetrock vibrating against a nail (rarely a screw.)

If you put expanding foam in there it would bow out the wallboard, or pull it right off the studs.

Maybe there is a wire or pipe touching the inside of the wallboard, hitting it when it vibrates, etc. It's really not a big deal to open it up for repair and redo the wallboard. Matching the paint will be the hardest part, but because it's got edges you'd never notice any color mismatch.  If the screws don't work, open up a 1 x 2 foot rectangle and jam it tight full of pink insulation top to bottom. You can watch video of how to patch drywall with backerboards on youtube, thisoldhouse, etc.

I have a noisy corner in my listening room. It is nail stiction in the house frame that squeak when house expands and contracts. It's an exterior corner that faces southwest and the afternoon sun heats it up making it expand and click every 30 seconds for a couple hours, then after sunset it cools and clicks some more. At first I blamed it on stereo components because the corner is directly behind my left speaker. After a while I figured out what it really was and now I don't even notice it anymore. Same thing with my frigerator compresor that chugs like a locomotive when it shuts off. Don't even hear it anymore, but noy was it annoying at first!! 

[JWL.GIK]

Good advice above. If the drywall itself is vibrating audibly then it means it's loose or wasn't installed correctly.

Try pushing against it while the music is playing and you can hear the vibrations, so you can find the exact spot(s) that require more fastening.