Noisy Track after Ballasting?

Carl,

I had the same thing happen.  I used strips of anti-fatigue rubber matting I got at Lowes and it made things very quiet.  Now I have about 2/3 of the mainline ballasted and I can tell the difference when I from ballasted track to non-ballasted.  I'm thinking of removing the ballast between the rails and seeing if that improves things.

I had that happen on every HO or On30 layout I ever built. When I switched to 3 rail O gauge I decided I didn't want to fool with the added noise and aggravation of traditional ballast. I simply painted the roadbed gray and moved on.  lol

Yes, had the same problem. Much more noise after gluing the ballast on our gargraves trackage. We had midwest cork roadbed atop a sheet of homasote.

When you glue ballast you are making it a solid mass. It's going to be louder

I agree with Chris. I only glued the ballast along the out side edge of the track bed, like a burm to hold the rest of the ballast in and around the track ties. This is working well and seems to kill most of the sound.

Dan

By gluing ballast down you are doing the same thing as fastening the track, that is proving a solid link for the vibrations of the track to travel to the large flat top surface of the layout, aka the drum head.

I always ballasted for appearances--always ignored the sound.  

I've used Brummy's ground rubber ballast and it seems to keep the quiet level the same on top of my Woodland Scenics roadbed. The ballast glue holds my Atlas"O" track secure without screws into my 2" poly-foam sheet underlayment.

Well, thanks for the replies so far, gents.

Like Dewey, I like the appearance, and I really don't want to rip up / chip up the best ballast job I've ever done (uhh...first?), so I'll live with the sound. Not really horrible, and, after all, it *is* train noise.  Like Andy, I'll probably go with just the paint method next time.