Cheap Acoustic Foam -Do you think it will be any good ?

monkeh · Post by **monkeh** » Thu Feb 03, 2005 11:47 am

In my search for acoustic foam that is not at a ripoff rpice i found this foam

It is semi-closed cell acoustic foam. it has a high density backing for extra sound proofing !!

shorter URL so the damn thing doesn't scroll sideways halfway to Timbuktu

What do you guys think ?

Edit by mod: Watch the long URLs guys!

Mr_Smartepants · Post by **Mr_Smartepants** » Thu Feb 03, 2005 1:11 pm

The heavyweight stuff is kinda pricey. £30 each ($60 USD), you'd be better off with the stuff from Mcmaster or acoustipack. You wouldn't be able to use this in many places in a case though. 50cm (2in) thick, you'd be blocking a fan or two if this were placed on the side panel depending on your case.

OMG!

I just saw their prices for melamine! £29 for a 600x500mm ceiling tile! I paid $3 each from mcmaster for mine. Ouch! Time to put down the crack-pipe!

Oh, and please use the "URL" button next time so the link doesn't stretch 15 feet to the right.

Chris`I · Post by **Chris`I** » Thu Feb 03, 2005 2:20 pm

Mr_Smartepants wrote: OMG! I just saw their prices for melamine! £29 for a 600x500mm ceiling tile! I paid $3 each from mcmaster for mine. Ouch! Time to put down the crack-pipe!

I know, I have tried googling and searching all over the UK and its the same everywhere! Such a shame, after reading posts on here I thought it would be a nice cheap sound proofing solution!

Mr_Smartepants · Post by **Mr_Smartepants** » Fri Feb 04, 2005 12:53 am

Mcmaster will ship to the UK, I'm just not sure about the cost. It's got to be better than this place though. Whew!

frankgehry · Post by **frankgehry** » Fri Feb 04, 2005 1:02 am

M,

You have to be careful with a cheap foam because it will or it may deteriorate and cruble over a short period of time. I've never installed foam or sound absorbing materials but I'm sure it is time consuming. I would use a material similar to the acoustimat product. Aslo if you have one of the cases for which there is a prefitted set, get that and save some time. - FG

monkeh · Post by **monkeh** » Fri Feb 04, 2005 4:49 am

cheers guys.

i will check out the mcMaster stuff.

sorry bout the long link. thats the trouble with a wide screen monitor

Callous · Post by **Callous** » Sun Feb 06, 2005 12:41 pm

The stuff from mcmaster is fire resistent, and gives good results.

monkeh · Post by **monkeh** » Mon Feb 07, 2005 1:44 pm

I ordered 10 24" celing tiles from McMaster. 2 days delivery to the uk is fantastic.

i hope it makes a difference

ckolivas · Post by **ckolivas** » Mon Feb 07, 2005 2:13 pm

Mr_Smartepants wrote:Oh, and please use the "URL" button next time so the link doesn't stretch 15 feet to the right.

Here's a lifesaver: http://tinyurl.com/create.php
It turned your massive url into this: http://tinyurl.com/3j8hu

Tibors · Post by **Tibors** » Mon Feb 07, 2005 2:26 pm

You'd better just use the phpBB URL tags. With that tinyURL stuff you can't see in the status bar where the URL points to. I wouldn't click on it.

ckolivas · Post by **ckolivas** » Mon Feb 07, 2005 2:40 pm

Tibors wrote:You'd better just use the phpBB URL tags. With that tinyURL stuff you can't see in the status bar where the URL points to. I wouldn't click on it.

sigh.. well I was only trying to help.

tobybton · Post by **tobybton** » Wed Feb 09, 2005 2:08 pm

hey monkei. i so want to get some melamine fome but as you know in Uk costs a bomb. mc masters looks the cheapest but wont give an approxamat shipping cost...o no. plkease can you give me an idea of how much it cost you? ( new to silent pc review and am hooked!!!)

monkeh · Post by **monkeh** » Wed Feb 09, 2005 2:15 pm

they didnt charge me a penny for shipping ?

2 day shipping with DHL for free. fantastic

this stuff makes a nice difference as well, the idle noise from my hdd's is very nearly gone, i just need to make a box to cover the exhaust fan and it should be silent

i got 10 sheets for $31.60

monkeh · Post by **monkeh** » Wed Mar 09, 2005 1:34 pm

Ok for anyone in the UK looking to buy from mcmaster look at the smallprint

i got my credit card bill today, and noticed that i was charged $92 shipping !! doesnt show that on the order confirmation

rocarpen · Post by **rocarpen** » Wed Mar 09, 2005 4:14 pm

monkeh wrote:Ok for anyone in the UK looking to buy from mcmaster look at the smallprint

i got my credit card bill today, and noticed that i was charged $92 shipping !! doesnt show that on the order confirmation

Damn, that sucks. I recently posted a thread dealing with the same problem. I had $19 US worth of melamine sent to Vancouver Canada, and I was charged $45.00 shipping; again, with no prior warning from McMaster-Carr. Man it sucks. They need a shipping calculator on that site!

O.Z. · Post by **O.Z.** » Thu Mar 10, 2005 2:24 pm

monkeh wrote:i got my credit card bill today, and noticed that i was charged $92 shipping !! doesnt show that on the order confirmation

Same for me: 92.88$ to ship 5 tiles in France (3kg) although I specified ground shipment. I sent them an email to know why they despatched them by DHL at this shipment cost and just got a reply "Sorry for the confusion...".
Thank you McMaster! The funniest part of the story is that the tiles are originating from Germany as stated on their invoice.

bobkoure · Post by **bobkoure** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 6:36 am

If you've got room for it, foams used to damp the interiors of speaker cabinets works very well.
I've used blackhole foams with good results - next system will probably use this stuff which is basically a blackhole knock-off that's less expensive. Note that it (and blackhole) is fairly thick, expanding the range of frequencies it absorbs - and there is some attenuation of all frequencies as there's a "limp wall" built in, so some sound energy is dissipated on reflection. The blackhole stuff also has a layer of heavy material that helps the surface it's attached to be non-resonant. Possibly a big feature if you're building in a case made of thin steel or of aluminum.
I've thought about the convoluted stuff, but I'd expect it to increase air resistance through your case (just guessing here) which might mean you'd need more powerful fan(s) for the same cooling. Possibly not a good trade-off...
Anyway, if PartsExpress doesn't ship to Europe, I'd expect there to be suppliers for speaker builders locally. If they haven't supplied damping materials for PCs before, be sure to tell 'em you care about not impeding airflow - like a ported speaker cabinet.

Mr Flibble · Post by **Mr Flibble** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 9:31 am

I just found this site while looking for some dampening material in the UK. After a quick skim, the SAPT220 on this page looks quite promising. Anyone have any thoughts?

m0002a · Post by **m0002a** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 10:19 am

I would go with the SBM5. It is very thin (2mm vs the 13mm for the SAPT220) and can be applied in multiple layers if desired. It also has superior heat/fire resistance compared to the SAPT220. I wonder if this stuff is sold in the USA?

JanW · Post by **JanW** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 3:26 pm

The SBM5 seems to be only a barrier. Nothing to absorb noise here, it's only blocked... and reflected. So Mr Flibble is right in preferring the SAPT200 with the noise absorbing foam on top. The heat/fire resistance seems very good (it's self-extinguishing, but I don't know what the norm it passes corresponds to). Weight of 5kg/m2 is similar to the best noise damping kits sold for PCs, IIRC. And the thickness seems about right.

But did you see the size/price? It's sold in rolls of 3.75m2 at 75 squid. That's not bad per m2, but unless you need material for at least 5 computers, you'll end up with a lot of extra material.

bobkoure · Post by **bobkoure** » Sun Mar 13, 2005 5:35 pm

JanW wrote:The SBM5 seems to be only a barrier. Nothing to absorb noise here, it's only blocked... and reflected.

A bit more than a barrier in that if you've light-duty panels then some sound is being carried out through mechanical transmission - and this should block that by raising the mass so the panel will resonate at a lower frequency. Get it below 15Hz or so and it's not "sound" any more. But, yeah - nothing being absorbed.

ultraboy · Post by **ultraboy** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 4:37 am

Has anyone tried this Sonex Willtec available at mnpctech. Good price too.

Bluefront · Post by **Bluefront** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 5:17 am

That Sonex foam looks pretty good and probably would work well....but. It will be a difficult fit in most cases due to it's thickness of 1.5". And I'm never happy applying foam products with glue. No doubt you'll be ripping it out to make some change or other....messy job.

Lately I've been using a foam called "Fun Town".....it's .5" thick, fairly stiff, can be wedged in most places without any glue. Now this is closed-cell foam which blocks sound transmission. I cover the foam with a second layer of Pax-mate 4mm foam, which absorbs high frequencies. The foam layer combo works well for me, is very cheap, locally available, and can be removed easily and reinserted without any problems.

FunTown foam is from Home Depot (it's a floor mat).....Paxmate can be had at CompUSA and many other places on-line.

One other foam I've been using comes from Walmart....it's also a floormat, called "Utiity Comfort Mat" by Apache Mills Inc. It's also .5" thick, but not very stiff. It acts like a memory foam, closed cell, and seals well around wires, and surface irregularities. Fairly heavy stuff, it blocks sound very well.

I see no sense in mail-ordering foams....that can usually be found locally.

JanW · Post by **JanW** » Mon Mar 14, 2005 7:59 am

I just placed an order for a sheet of the Illbruck Melamine Sonex foam (1.5"). I'll be picking it up later this week, but won't have time to start silencing the box I bought it for until July/August

. So don't wait for me to give feedback on how it works out.

Bluefront wrote:And I'm never happy applying foam products with glue. No doubt you'll be ripping it out to make some change or other....messy job.

That's something to consider. Personally, I modded my first case in a kind of permanent fashion (removing M/B, PSU or optical drive would be a major hassle). And I intend to go the same way with the second rig. But that's just because I never incrementally upgrade my computers. I run them for about 5 years, and then throw them out and get a new one. So for me it's mod once, use till it dies.

Bluefront wrote:I see no sense in mail-ordering foams....that can usually be found locally.

Funny how the American and European markets differ. I find it hard to come by acoustic foam here at all (other than a few kits specifically for quieting computers, but they tend to be expensive). Even Paxmate I need to mailorder. To get the Sonex, I contacted Illbruck France. All their retailers cater almost exclusively to construction projects. I was looking for the Sonex mini melamine foam, but the only thing they would sell by the sheet (0.78m²) instead of a box (19m²

) was the 1.5" (35mm) Sonex. I'll probably combine that with a pack of BeQuiet! foam for the places where space is tight.

m0002a · Post by **m0002a** » Wed Mar 16, 2005 9:50 pm

JanW wrote:The SBM5 seems to be only a barrier. Nothing to absorb noise here, it's only blocked... and reflected. So Mr Flibble is right in preferring the SAPT200 with the noise absorbing foam on top. The heat/fire resistance seems very good (it's self-extinguishing, but I don't know what the norm it passes corresponds to). Weight of 5kg/m2 is similar to the best noise damping kits sold for PCs, IIRC. And the thickness seems about right.

One thing to consider when looking at foam to silence a case is that AcoustiPack is a two layer material. The bottom layer is very, very dense and relatively thin, and the top layer is much thicker that is not at all dense that is supposed to absorb the sound. My own observation (having purchased AcoustiPack) is the top layer is of dubious efficacy and that the thin but very dense layer does almost all of the work of keeping the case quiet.

So my advice is that if you can only go with one material, is to use a high density foam, preferably closed cell, to keep the sound off the metallic case surface.

JanW · Post by **JanW** » Wed Mar 16, 2005 11:02 pm

I suppose it depends on the case. But if you have a steel case of a good thickness, that will already make for a decent noise barrier. My guess would be that If you glue a good foam (like Melamine) inside it will do what's missing in such a case: absorb the noise. But it's true that if you have significant vibrations, a light foam will not be able to dampen them, and a noise barrier might be the most important thing.

m0002a · Post by **m0002a** » Wed Mar 16, 2005 11:29 pm

I think if one is using a single material (not two materials stuck together like AcoustiPack) the trick is to get a compromise between blocking and absorption.

bobkoure · Post by **bobkoure** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 9:02 am

m0002a wrote:I think if one is using a single material (not two materials stuck together like AcoustiPack) the trick is to get a compromise between blocking and absorption.

There are actually more than two things going on with the blackhole foam (and, I guess, the acoustipack - haven't seen any of that "in person").
- base layer: add mass to panel, lower resonant point to sub-audio
- mid layer and foam beneath (limp wall): reduce reflection strength by being inefficient reflector
- top layer: absorb sound through air resistance at max-velocity part of each wave (depth affects frequencies "caught" at max velocity), density affects attenuation
- top surface (if sculpted - blackhole is not) diffusion of top-surface reflections , encourage tangential waves to penetrate rather than reflect)

Plus, of course, a whole bunch of stuff I don't understand - but the compromise(es) is a complex one.

Bill Owen · Post by **Bill Owen** » Thu Mar 17, 2005 6:31 pm

It will be a difficult fit in most cases due to it's thickness of 1.5"

Only true if you don't bother measuring out the sheets to clear obstructions before cutting them first

Compucase LX619 with 1.5" Sonex Willtec Acoustic Foam

And I'm never happy applying foam products with glue. No doubt you'll be ripping it out to make some change or other....messy job.

Goo Gone applied with a rag removes the yucky glue