After a long absence from the hobby I am again in a position to build a layout. I would like some opinions on the use of Homasote. I intend to cover =BD =93 plywood with =BD" homasote for noise reduction and use cork roadbed in areas where roadbed is needed. The layout theme will be industrial/city with one section dedicated to steel manufacturing.
Any opinions would be appreciated.
Thanks
Jim
Question ---- Do you have large swings in relative humidity?
Homasote is wood/paper fiber pressed together --- very much humidity can and will do nasty things.
Other than that, it works quite well (once you get past the clouds of dust from cutting the stuff with power tools).
Chuck D.
Many people recommend a coat of latex paint (on both sides) to reduce humidity pickup. But even if it turned into piles of soggy goop it would never be as big a PITA as Instant Roadbed!
I haven't tried it, but a knife type blade (sharp, smooth, non-serrated - not a saw blade) in a saber saw is supposed to really cut the dust production down.
On 3/10/2009 10:34 PM Steve Caple spake thus:
Yes. One would have to be crazy to use power tools to cut it--that's just asking for clouds of dust. I'd try a carpet cutter, one of those dangerous-looking blades that sticks out about an inch. Remember that Homasote is really soft.
X-acto used to make a sharp blade that was about 3" long that you could put in a sabre saw. That's what I used and the dust was negligible. I would suggest that for cutting if you had a lot to cut. I don't know about the carpet cutter... I'd think it would be hard to score itseveral times & stay in the exact same groove.
dlm
That's why you do your cutting out-of-doors.
Preferably on a breezy day.
~Pete
With a face mask, and a good dust vacuum pickup on hte tool, feeding a HEPA filtered vac so the fine crap doesn't just blow back out.
On 3/11/2009 12:39 PM Dan Merkel spake thus:
Although I haven't tried it, I'm pretty sure a fresh carpet-cutting blade would go right through Homasote in one pass. I used to use those blades for cutting up cardboard cartons when I had my print shop; they would go through corrugated just like butter.
I don't understand this fascination with Homasote. This is such an old-school material which isn't really neded anyways. I suspect that the manufacturer somehow convinced all the model RR magazines to tout the virtues of Homasote so that they would sell more of it! :-)
Honestly why obsess with the sound deadening?! Real trains make LOTS of noise when they are in motion! Why should the model trains be quiet?! This "Homasote thing" is IMO total overkill.
Seriously, my friend build a good size N scale layout using L-girders and 1/4" lauan plywood (yes, 1/4"!). All the mainlines and most yards are on N scale cork roadbed and fully ballasted. We don't notice any noise issues while operating there (we sometimes have 5 running trains). The layout was finished in late 1990s and so far we have no problem with its stability.
Here are couple of photos of his layout:
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