Is there anything worse than living next to someone who has windchimes ringing day and night? Can anything be legally done to put a halt to this scourge? Can the cops be called on such a matter? It probably isn’t technically “disturbing the peace” and yet… 
It is a Chinese water torture for the ears.
I feel your pain.
I went on spring break recently and stopped at a friends house halfway to Destin, Fl. We spent the night there and I slept in the living room. Guess what was outside on the deck that windy night. Yep that’s right, the bigest stupid windchime I have ever seen. It keep me up all night long and I just wish that they could be banned out of existance.
but that’s just my $.02
Tyklfe
Hey! Are you that cranky guy that lives next door to me in Stillwater, Oklahoma?
Personally, I love windchimes. Other than asking your neighbor to tone it down or stealing them in the middle of the night, I don’t think there’s much you can do.
Having to unpack, price, and put out a whole palletful of the things in the store? BTDT.
I’m rather fond of chimes, but not the freakin’ huge varieties that people have taken to hanging up. The tiny little bells I use on my (2nd story) balcony are inaudible on the ground or on the landing above. If you can hear chimes through a closed window or around the corner of the building, they should be taken down, especially if there are neighbors nearby.
I suppose, if you felt the need for commando tactics, you could sneak over and stuff padding up the tubes. That would go a long way toward silencing them. Art gum works particularly well.
Windchimes are one of the most annoying noises for me because usually the person who owns them has them on the Day side of their house, e.g. the kitchen window, which is the bedroom side of their neighbors’ houses.
Other things that make noise only the neighbors hear are dogs that only bark when the owner is at work and cars that “warm up” for twenty minutes when you’re asleep and the owner is eating breakfast.
Please, let us distinguish between tuned windchimes and dangling hunks of scrap metal. Yeah, I have a small windchime on my porch and I love it. You can’t hear it 6’ away and the metal tubes harmonize. The sound is very soft and melodic, even in the highest wind.
I agree that pieces of metal, pottery, plastic, etc. clonking and clanging away are annoying. (A former apartment neighbor had one hanging on the balconey that sounded like hubcaps rolling after a 10-car wreck.) It’s sound pollution, but hey. Lawn flamingos, concrete trolls and “bend over grannies” are visual pollution. Short of vandalism, whatchya gonna do?
Veb
First, I must admit to having the complete set of Woodstock’s Gregorian chimes on my front porch. To me, they are wonderfully melodic. And since we have a fair bit of space between houses, I don’t think they bother the neighbors.
On the other hand, all it would take to convince me to take them down would be one of my neighbors mentioning that they were disturbing her. Have you actually said anything to the folks next door?
Sometimes a little vandalism is necessary.
My situation used to be just what BarnStormer described. I had an apartment neighbor who hung a chime near her front door, which happened to be next to my bedroom window. Tried talking to her about the noise, but she refused to admit that anyone wouldn’t love the sound. Never mind that she couldn’t hear the chimes from her own bedroom. During windstorms the thing sounded like a truckful of scrap metal on ten miles of bad road. (TVeblen, I don’t buy the big/little distinction at all. My neighbor had a “dainty” chime. Even on the good nights it sounded like a gerbil trying to escape its cage. On the windy nights, it was the truckload of metal. Or an AngelDust-and-amphetamine-addled gerbil trying to escape its cage.)
When diplomacy failed, I finally started putting rubber-bands around the chimes. The neighbor was offended and she persisted, but quickly got the idea when I ran out of rubber-bands and starting wrapping the chimes with duct tape.
I happen to like my windchimes. I have at least 10 sets hanging around my bedroom. The only difference being, they’re on the inside of the walls. No wind. No annoying chimes. They just look cool hanging from my ceiling 
I’m sure the neighbors are much happier…besides, if I put them outside, someone would be sure to steal them.
I don’t mind wind chimes per se, but my neighbor has the worst. They sound exactly like the little beep a phone makes when you press its buttons. It sounded like someone in the next room was making a phone call, all the time. Annoying as hell. My dad was ready to vandalize the neighbor when she went ahead took the chimes down on her own.