First Real Layout, Noise Reduction??

How sound sensitive are you?

Not crazy, it will be in the basement, but I'm trying to keep from ****ing off the wife as we don't have a basement door just yet lol

You will no doubt get many varied answers on what works for them. If I was using FasTrack, I'd have a sheet of homasote board glued to the plywood surface (no nails or screws which transmit sound to the wood structure). On that surface I'd use Woodland Scenics foam roadbed under the track bed, also glued to the homasote. Use the short Atlas"O" track screws to mount the track. These screws shouldn't reach into the wood surface, thus cutting down noise transmission.

This will probably help a lot!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhBhA_4LLg0

I would look at making sure your locos are lubed properly and there is no binding in the drive mechanisms.  Then make sure your rolling stock all rolls freely and has no binding in all moving mechanisms.

Sound deadening the room will also go a long way to cutting down noise bleed.  Also putting a heavy curtain on a rod where the entryway is would help.

I believe I have seen other threads here where people have inserted material underneath fastrack taking up the dead space in effort to eliminate noise transfer.

One area some overlook is the flooring in the train room. Adding high quality padding and wall to wall carpeting absorbs a lot of the sound. It also keeps your feet, legs and back happy while standing!!

You have to deal with the surface that the track is laying on.  Fastrack on wood is going to be very noisy.  Fastrack on Homasote will be much improved.  I'm not sure where your going with your scenery efforts, but laying some kind of noise absorbing material like carpeting on the wood then your track on top will yield the best noise deadening results.  For many of us though our scenery efforts would prohibit being able to do that.

Fastrack is going to be loud, especially with two or more trains running- unless you run command control at s-l-o-w speeds.  I started out with a bunch of it and just couldn't take the noise.  My layout consisted of homasote on plywood, covered with indoor/outdoor carpet.  What I found was that the concrete walls and floor echoed the noise.  As Pete said above, carpet on the floor would likely help.  I ended up switching to tubular track and it made a BIG difference.  I imagine GarGraves would be quieter as well.

what I have found in the many years I have used fastrack strong benchwork with thicker tops atleast 5/8 then if you like put down foam board than mount the track thru the foam to the wood some say that makes it vibrate thru to the board but the thicker board doesn't vibrate very much. then scenic the track with ballast it seems to cut down a lot of the noise. that's what I have done. also tried indoor out door carpet with ballast that worked too.

Many of the ideas you mentioned work, homasoate, foam etc. The pink foam is not known for being best sound deadoner, but I used 1/2" pink insulation foam and it made a HUGE difference in the noise level. I could have gone with1" foam and gotten even better results. 

I tested my layout with the track directly on the tabletop, it sounded like billiard balls rolling around on a tile floor. It was so loud, I was having serious second thoughts about even having a layout.

I have been avoiding screws totally with Fasttrack.  Half inch or thicker foam board, then I use cable ties, the small 4 inch ones.  I slip one through the top...the head in the concave hole of the screw hole, then place a second tie up from the bottom and tighten.  Finally I snip off the top that is exposed above the level of the roadbed.  Quiets down the noise tremendously and makes the changing of track simple, just clip, replace track, use new ties, and you are done.

Quietest bases I've heard, #1 felt, #2 carpet, indoor then #3 outdoor , #4 homesote, #5 ceiling tile, #6 rubber, #7 foam..

Sound reflecting off surfaces, including the layout top is a factor. So is the tables underside; foam seems to telegraph more to the table than other methods, but offers an advantage being easiest to work with and offers more 3d versatilities like carving grades, ground reliefs, ponds, etc..

I.e. I thought I'd get more sound reading out of it than I did, so I'd recommend at least an inch, but 2-3" for max deadening

Layers of differing materials are an option not used often, but I think holds some untapped potential. Rubber on thin felt in particular.

Hard fasteners do telegraph sounds to the bench. With thick foam you can "pin" to the foam and not go into the wood. Or.....

The HO crowd uses "roadbed" track too. Caulk to hold the track and kill noise is popular. Some folks just run a bead on the track underside to deaden vibration rather than fasten it.

Whatever you choose, test any chemicals, and let it cure and sit for at least a week or thoughly research it, even by brands. You never know if your opening a can of worms with plastic.

Along with the other suggestions above relative to table top construction and sound absorption, here is one way to stop the sound at its source. Since you are building a relatively small layout, the best thing to do to Fastrack is "massdeadning". To quiet it you need to add mass to it. The best way to do this on a small layout is to go buy cheap white silicone (Walmart @$1 a tube). With the track upside down and using a trowel of some kind fill the entire void with silicone. It takes almost an entire tube per 10 inch section. It will take a few days to completely cure and be very heavy after but it works. Because of the cost of all that silicone this method only works for smaller layouts. As a side note, the modern "Fast angle" wheels are considerably noisier than post-war wheels. 

Tim

Another product you can use which is quite inexpensive is called sill seal.  It comes in rolls from 25' on up.  It is a cellular foam approximately 3" to 4" wide.  It is just over an 1/8" thick and can be purchased at any big box building supply store usually back in the lumber or insulation area.  

Tom Tee posted:

 

Sound is a  is a by product of vibration and movement.  Rigid, dense, solid materials are your friend.  Hollow rail track, generous size frogs and plywood are your enemy.

 opinion tt

Couldn't agree more. If you wish to use Fastrack you MUST add mass to it.

About 15 years ago, the other magazine did a article on building a quiet layout.  The layout was actually for a company related to Neil Young.  They used carpet padding on top of plywood and then glued cork to the carpet padding. Also used zip ties to secure the track.

I used carpeting padding on my layout, with indoor/outdoor carpeting on top of the carpet padding.  With tubular track, it is extremely quiet. I built the layout before Fastrack was available, never did try the same approach using the Fastrack.  Would be a interesting experiment to see how standard Fastrack would sound.

If you haven't invested already, and noise is a major concern, I'd find another track brand to run with. I'm running 4 loops of Fastrack on 8x12. and I've got 3/4 ply with 1/2" homasote, followed by the cavities in the track base filled with foam pieces to try and keep the noise down. It still get quite loud when 4 trains are running faster. Lots of tedium filling all those voids too with the foam.

Now that I've gone mostly Legacy, I run everything much slower, and this alone has reduced most of the noise to almost nothing. But if you want to highball on Fastrack, no matter what you do it'll be louder than most other track. Just how it is.

My game room/train room doesn't have a door either with a 5-6 ft entrance, so there are times when I just can't run, as you can still hear it all over the house. 3500 sq ft and you can hear something from most any room.

Having said all that, the track has worked very well. The switches are great too and super reliable.

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Homasote or ceiling tile work pretty well, are easy to find and cheap. Filling the underside of the track with silicone would be almost more expensive than purchasing new track, I wonder if plaster of paris could be used may not be AS effective but cheaper. Just putting the track down on homasote then caulking the edge down will help a lot. The caulk at the edge could be covered with roofing minerals or dirt while it is wet than vac up the excess once it is dry to cover that seam.

People have done a variety of things, because fast track is hollow is resonates. Putting homasote (some people use ceiling tile that they got cheaply) on the table top then securing the track to that, others have used a combination of a sound absorbant surface like that and insulation tape (the double sided stuff that has foam in the middle) under the track, to hold it to the surface and further deaden it. 

Others make a good point, it isn't just the track, the plywood on wood legs transmists the sound. Having something under the legs (carpeting, or even a rubber foot kind of think like they use to keep couches from moving) can help. I have heard of people putting heavy rubber strip on the wood that supports the tabletop to try and isolate it, that might be a possibility. 

Just remember, sound moves best through air and dense material.  Seems like for Fastrack, using felt or something cheap underneath would be a good start. Eliminating ways for sound to leave the room will probably be the best way to avoid annoying your wife.  It can be 130 db inside the room, but if you prevent the sound from escaping, will she care?

Sounds like a layer of 3/4" plywood/Advantech, Homasote/ceiling tile (can't find Homasote here), carpet padding and white batting (for Christmas) with solid rail track would make for a nice quiet holiday layout. My question is does it make any difference if the entire layout is covered or just the track runs? It seems to me that large areas of wood on a table style layout would amplify noise compared to the minimal wood with a cookie-cutter style layout. Seems to me too that covering the bench work rails and crossmembers with something like sill seal would help reduce noise transfer to the bench work and floor. My layout is going to have table top areas for landscaping, but I'm wondering if cutting around the track runs to provide a vibration gap would also help with noise or if it's not worth the extra effort.

Caulk isn't extremely permanent either, the track can be pulled free if its along the edges, under the track. You have to redo the ground cover there, but that's likely regardless.

I like the carpet pad idea. I think cork and rubber are likely to give a similar result too.

Fastrack is a great product, I just wish it weren't so farkin' loud.  I'm particularly sensitive to the noise; I set up a loop of it on the floor recently... ran the train about five laps and put everything away.  Reminded me why I sold most of it.

Bottom line is that you're not going to silence it, but there are ways to mitigate the sound somewhat.  If your wife will object to the noise, I'd invest in a door first, then look at ways to quiet things down.  Carpet/padding on the layout, carpeted floor, finished walls and ceiling will all help to an extent.  Just don't expect "quiet".

Tom Tee posted:

As I mentioned in another thread, one trick I do on three rail layouts, using #1 sq. drive  1 5/8" long trim screws every 6" over all cross members and edge frame into 3/16" predrilled holes, is to screw the 3/4" decking down lightly over a 3/16" bead of 100% silicone.  DO NOT run the screws down tight, you want to leave a nice inter face body of silicone. 

Then remove the screws in 48 hours.  No mechanical  connection.

Sorry, but I was on vacation and got way behind on posts, so I didn't get to read them all. I like that idea a lot though and will give it a try. Thanks for repeating the tip.