club have many locos with sound. Some seem too loud and anoying.
has anyone given thought about what a realistic sound level (~dB SPL at some distance) should be, in particular when there are multiple locos active at the same time?
Best answer is “it depends.”
Size of the room, how the room is finished (wall, floor and ceiling materials), other noise (A/C or heating, onlookers).
I’ve never heard of a club with a specific rule. I would think a good rule of thumb would be that no loco should be much louder than the others, then consider overall sound.
I think a couple of my locos are a bit loud for others and there are a couple I have thought about turning up. I wear hearing aides, so do not hear some sounds as well as other folks.
Out of courtesy to others, all loco owners should be willing to turn down the sound at a club layout, so that no loco stood out and an overall sound level was not too loud.
Soounds like a club level problem and a consensus would have to be reached on how to monitor the sound levels.
Good luck,
Richard
I can’t give an expert insight on that.
But a suggestion would be to have a group of folks get together as a panel. Put one loco on the track, near the group, and adjust the master CV up and down to put a range on the too loud and too soft “limits”. Use a sound meter (like my Android phone app) that would be the agreed tool in the future. (Repeatability matters, not absolute accuracy to true dB levels.) See what the consensus level is for one loco, perhaps in the middle, and make that the loco target (using that tool). Anjust any new loco to that spec. Consider both high rpm and horn sounds.
Then go to a relatively large number of locos running simultaneously and scattered a bit, to see if the additive effect (sound works funny in terms of our perception or tolerance for increased loudness). If needed, lower the target a bit and ask everyone to tune reasonably close to that.
That would be one way to approach it. Realize that half the battle would be in different viewpoints / opinions of what various folks prefer, as there is no “right” answer. And it sometimes depends on duration. It can be nifty at a higher level for awhile, but then preferable to turn it down. And some folks don’t like small scale sound reproduction as they think none is better than our compromise sounds.
First, as soon as I have set the cab # as the address, I get into the master volume of a new/newly reset decoder and halve the maximum value the manual says it can rise to. From that much more civilized cacophony, I adjust the individual volumes. I set injector, blow down, pop-off, hiss, and turbo-generator even lower so that I can just hear them. The bell is also low, but not as much, and the same for the whistle and chuff. I have to custom-fit each loco for the installation parameters of the speaker and the capability of the decoder. This takes maybe five minutes with each new/newly reset to defaults decoder. I have to do this perhaps twice a year. Once just for practice.
In an generally quiet room of any size where loud males aren’t commanding all the attention, decoders don’t need to compete at such a volume that they destroy any pleasure they may offer the person wanting very much to appreciate all their various sound capabilities. Imagine a busy restaurant, not even a ‘family’ one with kids and annoyed teenagers complaining that the service is slow…you have been there. You talk louder to hear above those who hear you talking louder, thus forcing an ever escalating cycle of auditory desperation.
On the face of it, if you are the only one put off, you are in trouble at this place. If no others have noticed, or attempted to negotiate a happy medium themselves (and obviously failed…), you have a tough row to hoe. Tough sledding. An uphill battle (infanteers will get this). You’ll have to hope that some of them admit they know what you mean when you raise the matter at a meeting. If they do, maybe you can ask for some support to a bylaw or policy that all decoders have to be set to approximately half their maximum volume level as set in the Master Volume CV…or less. No more than half.
FWIW, I really liked the QSI feature when they were more popular that allowed one to customiz
This is the practice used by the Edmonton Model Railroad Assoc. The locomotive and db meter are about a foot or so apart. The db meter is a cell phone app. Accuracy is not important for the meter just consistancy. The actual levels you choose is a personal preference but this works for us.
Sound Setting Practice
Sound volumes need to be low enough that the sound is for the most part isolated to the area the locomotive is in. People operating or working in other areas of the layout should not hear the locomotive. You may hear or read this referred to as the 6 foot rule.
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Sound Settings |
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Volume |
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Sound |
Level |
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Overall (at idle) |
45 ±2 dB |
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Horn |
55 ±2 dB |
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Bell |
55 ±2 dB |
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Locomotive centered at Point 1 on Test Track |
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Sound meter at Point 2 on Test Track |
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Miscellaneous |
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Brand |
Function |
CV |
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QSI |
(Ver.7) Automatic Mute Time-out Value |
CV 51.5=30 |
Yup - “it depends”. At home, I like them fairly quiet, so I can hear them when standing next to them but not standing across the room. In public club displays, I turn them up all the wya, or as loud as they will go without distortion - in a big open venue with lots of people, you’d never hear them at ALL on my ‘home’ setting, plus the crowd wants to hear the whistle blow. Just like they want to see stuff always moving, realistic switching bores most common spectators.
–Randy
All,
To date, the SoundTraxx Bachmann Sound Value family of decoders do not support CV 113 - Quiet Mode Timeout Period.
RR Baron
I agree with Richard and Randy. At home I have the sound levels set to about 30% of max., but at public shows I put the sound up as high as possible. None of my sound equipped locomotives seem to suffer from distortion thank goodness.
Dave
[quote user=“CNR378”]
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Sound Settings |
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Volume |
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Sound |
Level |
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Overall (at idle) |
45 ±2 dB |
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Horn |
55 ±2 dB |
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Bell |
55 ±2 dB |
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Locomotive centered at Point 1 on Test Track |
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Sound meter at Point 2 on Test Track |
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Miscellaneous |
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Brand |
Function |
CV |
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QSI |
(Ver.7) Automatic Mute Time-out Value |
CV 51.5=30 |
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QSI |
(Ver.7) Sounds on Power Up |
CV 56.0=0 |
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Soundtraxx |
(DSX) Quiet Mode Time-out |
CV 53=1 CV11=18 |
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Soundtraxx |
(DSD) Quiet Mode Time-out |
CV 113=3 CV11=18 |
Off. The sounds are all tinney and when you get several people it sounds like fingernails on a blackboard. I am not a fan of sound. I only have one sound loco, a steamer. I would like to reprogram it so all you could hear is the whistle.
I believe that is easy to do if you find the CVs for the various sounds plus the master volume CV. It depends on the decoder, of course. Easiest to do with JMRI Decoder Pro, where each sound could be adjusted with a slider. Simply dial down the ones you don’t want to function, such as chuff and steam release (whatever called), and set items like the horn and bell plus master volume to uyour liking.
For a Tsunami, I believe if you hit F8 it will silence the sounds you want to kill but also the whistle/horn and bell. So you may have to do what is described above.
On the LokSounds, which one usually sit silent when the layout power is activated, one hits F8 to start the motor and related intermittent sounds. But the horn and bell are functional withhout activating the motor with F8. So a LokSound I believe (working from memory) would not need any special attention to behave as you prefer.
Greg,
I may be out on the distance, might be a bit more (but no more than 2 feet). I’d have to measure.
As I said these values work for us, using the app on a designated phone. You’ll need to change these values to what sounds good to you and your members. Others sounds would use the 55 value.
Peter
Not quite true, while most don’t support CV113 there are a few according to Soundtraxx documentation that do.
Peter
If any of my locomotives had sound, I’d keep the noise level around low/medium.
Keep in mind sound can be annoying after awhile.
this topic is obviously subject to opinions.
so i’m wondering if it’s possible to “scale” prototype levels.
he’s a paper that compared diesel and electric locomotive noise measurement. It provides several measurements, one of which is for a diesel pulling a coal train: ~80 dB SPL at 13.5m.
sound measurements are always reported at some distance. Double the distance and the level should drop by 6 dB in an open field and increase by 6 dB if the distance is halved. The following attempts to scale the measurement.
SPL m ft scale-ft
80 13.5 44.3 0.5
74 27.0 88.6 1.0
68 54.0 177.3 2.0
62 108.0 354.6 4.1
56 216.0 709.2 8.2
50 432.0 1418.4 16.3
This data suggests a level of ~68 dB SPL at 4'. This is for a diesel locomotive, not a horn/whistle as the table posted earlier described. (still looking for info on a steam locomotive chuffs). A [steam whistle](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steam_whistle#Sound_pressure_level) is reportedly 110 dBC (C weighting) at 100'.
As I said earlier, I measured ~46 dB in a quiet carpeted hallway. I believe the Bell System used a value of 74 dB for the average speaker (person) level a meter away, which is what they targeted the level coming out the ear piece of a phone.
I think this is what to expect if you were listening to a train these distances away. The train would be noticable (above background noise) but not loud enough for someone standing next to you to have to raise their voice (74 dB).
And as just mentioned, while these values may be realistic, it may make sense to use a lower level if you're constantly exposed to them for a period
I can personally attest that if your pop-up camper is about 30’ from the Durango & Silverton track centerline, you are sound asleep and the steam loco approaches in the early AM while you are still soundly sleeping, that (a) the approaching chuffing may not wake you, but (b) when the whistle is blown within 50’ of your camper you will come close to hitting your head on the ceiling! You will be instantly wide awake.
One of those memorable experiences (quite a while ago).
Peter,
Has the documentation for a Sound Value decoder showing it supporting CV 113 been verified as accurate? Too many known discrepancies between some Sound Value decoders and their documentation on SoundTraxx Bachmann webpage for me to trust documentation.
RR Baron
I don’t know that you can actually ‘scale’ sound, like other physical phenomena it doesn’t really scale. Simulate the scale distance, perhaps. Some sounds would have to either be completely ignoored or exaggerated to some degree because at the scale distance you would be standing from the model, you wouldn’t hear those auxiliary sounds from a real loco. Trying to calculate out ‘scale’ sound levels will likely result in values below the background noise in the room, maybe even below human threshold despite your ears being only a foot or two away from the sound loco.
An interesting mathematically exercise, but one I fear yields impractical results. For my purposes, a reasonable sound level that does not overwhelm the room and allows the loco to become audible as it becomes visible around the bend, and then trail off as it disappears into the distance a train length or so away, some manual tweaking is all it will take. And unless I have two exactly idenctical locos with the same body shells, same modeal speaker, same exact speaker enclosure, same decoder, and same sound file, any settings used on one will only be a suggestion for any other loco. 30 out of 255 might be plenty for the prime mover on Loco A, which fits a nice big speaker and has open radiator grills for the sound to get out, but Loco B might need 100 out of 255 with its smaller speaker and more closed up body shell to get the same sound volume at the same distance.
–Randy
Randy,
the values i posted are all above the threshold of hearing (> -9 dB SPL), certainly above what I measured in a quiet hallway (46) but not above typical speech (74) unless you lean down (1 ft).
I hear locomotive clanks as I walk down the step to the club. That can’t be right. Or chuffs 15’ away in a tunnel competing with people’s voices.
I totally agree, hearing rod clank before you even get in the room - too loud. Hearing a loco in a tunnel, 15 feet away - definitely too loud. Tunnels open another can of worms - a real train in a tunnel is separated by a lot of dense rock and earth from an observer, a model tunnel, maybe a liner of some sort plus a big open space covered with a thin layer of plaster and other scenery materials. The trick, if all decoders used F8 for mute, would be to broadcast F8 starting just inside the tunnel mouth, and ending just before the tunnel mouth at the opposite end. Or we will have to put sound insulation in our tunnels to muffle the locos.
–Randy