Vinyl Floor tiles alternatives? What about neoprene rubber?

[IKIKUINTHENUTZ]

After hearing about people putting vinyl backings so sound cannot pass through simply for damping their case sounds, I remember about neoprene and how companies like nexus sell them for fan mountings.

At my work place, we sell neoprene sheets by the roll 5mm (or 10mm version but no roll) thick and I can get them really cheap since I work there

Can this be a good alternative compare to vinyl panels?

[ronrem]

should be pretty good,maybe a little less dense but the slightly softer surface can mean a bit less "bounce" of sounds. You could even do both,getting the benefits of both materials.

[jhhoffma]

Vinyl tiles and other products (like Dynamat and others) are used because they are very heavy and dense. You can add mass to the panel which will in turn take more energy to vibrate. When the panel does vibrate it will resonate at a lower frequency. In general, the denser the material, the better.

Thickness doesn't really matter if the density is too low. If you can get the sheets real cheap, it might be worth a try, though you'll have to work out how to get them to adhere (and stay adhered). You can always put the neoprene sheets on top of the tiles, like ronrem said, but I think you'd be fine with just the tiles and then some open cell foam (or auto headliner fabric) over the top.

I'd be interested to hear how it works though, how dense are these neoprene sheets?

[IKIKUINTHENUTZ]

well I have no idea how to measure density but these thin sheets are actually heavy in size of 300mm X 300mm X 0.5mm

is that how you measure density? weight?

[IKIKUINTHENUTZ]

[Dutchmm]

Density is Weight over volume, as I recall. So if you have two objects which both weight 1kg, and one of them (your plastic sheet) has a volume of 0.045 cubic metres, and the other, (a sheet of lead) has a volume of 0.0045 cubic metres, the density of the lead is higher.

'Course, I am not suggesting you use lead sheeting to damp the noise on your PC

So you could ask the vinyl tile vendors about the volume and weight of their stuff. And make a direct comparison.

HTH

[jhhoffma]

Most tiles are sold in standard sizes (12"x12", 15"x15", 18"x18", etc), but vary in thickness. So all you have to do is compare the thickness of each tile against it's weight.

Let's assume standard 12"x12" tiles.

Tile 1: 5mm thick and 4 ounces (.25lb)

Tile 2: 3mm thick and 2 ounces (.125lb)

Obviously the Tile 1 is more dense (4/5 > 2/3) despite it also being thicker.

Please don't go to the hardware store asking the guy about the "volume" of his tiles. He'll look at you like you're an idiot.

Honestly, just walk into the store and tell them you're looking for the heaviest or most dense tile he has. If he gives you a puzzled look you can always tell him why you're looking. He'll still give you the puzzled look, but at least he'll know where you're going with it.

[bobkoure]

There's also the issue of how "bouncy" the material is ("hysteresis" means "not bouncy").
The made-to-damp materials, like dynamat, are high hysterisis - and they don't just change the resonant frequency of the sheet metal they've been bonded to, but also convert vibration to heat.
Possibly more of an issue in damping car panels where damping per weight efficiency matters...