Crumb rubber track base - any experience ?

[Norski]

Hi all, I've come by some crumb rubber sheet - 3mm in depth. I believe its crushed tyres. It's only a 200mm x 1000mm strip and I wanted to see how it affected the sound resonating out of the baseboard. Ive previously used cork on top of the ply sheet and then ballasted the track. It's ok but it's not great once you've ballasted and it got me thinking about alternative ideas, hence the crumb rubber sheet I spotted lying around in work (honest !)

I tested a small strip of cork on ply with the crumb rubber stuck on top of the cork and the track stuck (copydex) on top of the rubber - the sound reduction was frankly amazing.

I'm currently making significant changes to my layout (ok, I'm rebuilding it again) and I'm considering going with this idea. Has anyone else used this or similar? Ive got some foam sheet from a well known model railways supplier and its ok but its not as good as the rubber.

ps - it has a shelf life of 30 years apparently

pps - it sticks to the cork with pva

pps - I'm going to do a sample with ballast before I commit

[RobinofLoxley]

On my previous layout I used 5mm closed cell neoprene sheet with one side having sticky back tape on it. I ballasted the sticky side having stuck the track to it. The foam was tricky to use, probably easier without the tape in fact. For noise suppression it was extremely effective. Probably very good for component life on the locos too. But for the second layout I switched to a 2mm foam of a different kind that was easier to handle and gave adequate noise suppression. Ask if you want supplier details.

[Mike 84C]

I also used the closed cell neoprene rubber with the sticky back but mine came in 2" wide rolls!  I cut the rolls into 1" wide rolls, this made curves much easier to lay and then glued cork on top of the rubber using bath sealant. Result! very quiet running trains. I got the idea from an article in Model Railroader. Downside its quite expensive, or so I thought.

[The Stationmaster]

I have used closed cell neoprene with a sticky bacb but I had it cit to the size I specified by the sy upplier (a company in Reading) for a small extra charge.  I know of two people who have been using it on layouts since the 1960s with no problems.  No need to cut it for gentle curves either.

[Ben Alder]

Take a look at Tracklay. Makes the whole job very easy. I ballast the track in lengths when sticking it on the underlay and curve to suit when laying.

 

https://www.tracklay.co.uk/browse/cat37pG1_961968.aspx

[brossard]

On my current layout I used Woodland Scenics foam underlay, box says it all:

 

 

Also comes in sheets:

 

 

I also use tacky glue to fix the underlay to the boards and to fix the track to the underlay.  Looks like PVA but dries rubbery.  Layout's been running for probably 4 years now, no issues.

 

I have no experience with Tracklay.

 

John

[Norski]

9 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

On my previous layout I used 5mm closed cell neoprene sheet with one side having sticky back tape on it. I ballasted the sticky side having stuck the track to it. The foam was tricky to use, probably easier without the tape in fact. For noise suppression it was extremely effective. Probably very good for component life on the locos too. But for the second layout I switched to a 2mm foam of a different kind that was easier to handle and gave adequate noise suppression. Ask if you want supplier details.

 

Thanks, haven't looked at the neoprene. Only experience has been with wetsuits and that's quite 'stretchy'....is the closed cell the same ?

[Norski]

6 hours ago, Ben Alder said:

Take a look at Tracklay. Makes the whole job very easy. I ballast the track in lengths when sticking it on the underlay and curve to suit when laying.

 

https://www.tracklay.co.uk/browse/cat37pG1_961968.aspx

 

Thanks - what's is that made of please?

[Ben Alder]

20 minutes ago, Norski said:

 

Thanks - what's is that made of please?

Closed cell foam, very similar to the Carrs shown above - I use that as a sub base with the Tracklay on top and they give silent, smooth running.I have some lengths of Streamline kicking about from twenty plus years  ago and it is as good as new, so the product lasts well.

Here is a link to a blog entry I did at the time - the images are gone from the text but I have added them, plus some later ones at the bottom, which should help.

 

[RobinofLoxley]

25 minutes ago, Norski said:

 

Thanks, haven't looked at the neoprene. Only experience has been with wetsuits and that's quite 'stretchy'....is the closed cell the same ?

It's isn't in itself stretchy however the backing tape, once the release paper is peeled off, is. So stretch becomes a problem - I used to get annoying gaps caused by it. Maybe faulty technique was involved. I would have done better without the tape gluing track sections to it but the ballasting result was really good I have to say. 

 

I wasn't impressed at all with the commercial offerings hence what I did - I bought 30cm wide rolls of it. I had a lot of track!! Direct from the supplier RH Nuttall.

[Norski]

Thanks all, (nice shots in that blog Ben) some ingenuity going on. Ive attached a better picture of what I've got. A very ropey experiment with a db reader on my phone gave a 43 db average for a mk3 coach rolled back and fore by hand over normal cork. With the crumb rubber that dropped to an average of 33 db. Im not a sound expert but I believe db increases and decreases are not linear so that looks like a significant reduction and backs up what I'm hearing (not hearing). Will investigate examples above before committing but definitely coming away from cork only - paying for sound locos and hearing my baseboard "trumpet" 🙄

[RobinofLoxley]

Decibels are a log scale. Noise doubles every 2 dB. But both values are very low.

Edited August 9, 2023 by RobinofLoxley

[Nick Holliday]

10 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

Decibels are a log scale. Noise doubles every 2 dB. But both values are very low.

Trying to recall details from over fifty years ago, when I did noise surveys during my gap year, as you say, it’s a logarithmic scale, so it’s 3dB that indicate a doubling of the noise level, and 10dB difference, ten times. So the difference recorded using the crumb is a reduction by a tenth. Background noise levels obviously depend upon the local environment, but 40-45dB is fairly normal for a suburban area IIRC.

[TangoOscarMike]

10 hours ago, RobinofLoxley said:

Decibels are a log scale. Noise doubles every 2 dB. But both values are very low.

 

A log scale of sound pressure, but a linear-ish scale of perceived loudness. Unless I'm wrong, which happens a lot.

[RobinofLoxley]

23 hours ago, Nick Holliday said:

Trying to recall details from over fifty years ago, when I did noise surveys during my gap year, as you say, it’s a logarithmic scale, so it’s 3dB that indicate a doubling of the noise level, and 10dB difference, ten times. So the difference recorded using the crumb is a reduction by a tenth. Background noise levels obviously depend upon the local environment, but 40-45dB is fairly normal for a suburban area IIRC.

Yes I winged that one it is 3 dB not two; however a reduction of 10 dB is a reduction of 90percent. My impression of cork Vs neoprene was night Vs day

Edited August 11, 2023 by RobinofLoxley

[simmo009]

We are implementing this on our new club layout, approx 40' x 20', multi-scale. With the temporarily laid track without ballast the trains were near silent. We will be ballasting only after intensive operational testing, but so far we are highly impressed. Sticking it down with PvA to clarify.