On Thu, 01 Jun 2006 13:34:52 -0700, broke out their crayolas and scribbled:

All,

I was surprised to find little about this topic searching the internet,
but as a first floor condo owner my upstairs neighbors drive me crazy
with their opening and closing of their sliding glass door. My one
neighbor directly above me smokes and every 10 minutes I hear their
sliding glass door noise reverberating throughout my apartment. It
almost sounds like somone dragging a wooden crate across pavement just
above my head no matter where I am in the unit.

The harder/faster they open and close door the more noise it makes.
I've asked them to do it slower and the one upstairs neighbor replaced
the wheels on the door but it still makes that sound. I think the
sound I hear is the friction from the heavy weight of the door being
dragged. I also hear the unit above and to the right of my unit.

Are there any solutions to this? Any suggestions/ideas I can make to
my neighbors? I am surprised sliding glass doors are so poorly
designed as some type of system to stabilize the weight against the
ground could counteract this and create a "smooth and quiet" sliding
experience. I have not found anything like this in my searches.

Please help.

Annoyed in Florida...

Our sliding glass doors used to take two hands to slide open and shut and
were noisy as hell. The house was built in '59 and the rollers had wore
out a couple of times, but the track was the real problem. Replacement
roller kits are available at HD & Lowes. Remove the old rollers and take
them with you because there are different size and style of rollers
available. The last time I repaired the doors I drew a profile of the
bottom track the door rides on and was able to find a new piece of track.
The track being damaged was the problem with the rollers failing every
couple of years. once the track was replaced the doors can be slid open
with a finger and is almost silent. Finding the right aluminum track
extrusion is the main problem.

I lucked out and found a piece that matched what I had at a place
that salvages windows, doors, plumbing, what have you. Paid $8.00 for a
six foot piece a year ago, that was "new old stock" that I was able to
match to the profile of the track I already had on the floor. The place is
in Pinellas County Florida where I bought the track and I had to rummage
through the yard to find it. I was just lucky that day.

I believe the big box stores carry some extrusions for the brands of doors
that they carry or can still order it. Your condo is probibly newer
than '59 and they might have the profile you would need. They didn't have
the profile I needed though and were unable to ID or didn't know where to
look up the profile or didn't figure it was worth their time or were due
for break, you understand.... grumble-grumble-grumble

I understand this is your neighbors problem but maybe the offer to help
would yield better results. Many people move to condos because they are
not so handy with tools.

Good luck!