Compact environmental noise absorber

Abstract

With the development of the industry and the society, noise pollution becomes increasingly severe, especially in large cities. Generally, there are three major noise sources, namely industrial noise, traffic noise and community noise. In response, several measurements have been developed to achieve effective noise control. Examples of noise control methods are reduction of noise at source and abatement of noise during the transmission. Since noise sources are more difficult to control, and sometimes already fixed, noise control during sound transmission is more broadly applied. Traditional passive noise control techniques include Helmholtz resonators and noise absorption materials like felt, glass mineral. The sound absorption materials (SAM) are found to be efficient in attenuating noise in high frequency domain, but their performance at low frequencies is quite poor. On the other hand, the Helmholtz resonator works perfect at any target frequency but suffers from its narrow absorption bandwidth, so that it’s only effective within a limited frequency band.

As an innovative solution to passive noise control problem, micro-perforated panel absorber (MPPA) has attracted great interest in recent years. It turns out to be a competitive alternative to sound absorption materials and Helmholtz resonator. The parallel and series arrangement of MPPAs backed with cavities of different depths allows them to obtain decent noise absorption performance over a relatively broad frequency range. However, the performance of MPPA is restricted by its volume, as large volume is demanded for decent low-frequency absorption, which is also the case for noise absorption materials.

In this thesis, a potential way to improve the low-frequency performance of the MPPA without occupying extra volume is proposed and implemented to tests. The focus is the adjustment of speed of sound and it is beneficial in different applications such as the following. In low frequency noise control, the size of the absorber in at least one dimension is often related to the wavelength and it is often too long. With a reduced speed of sound one can reduce this size while keeping the overall volume constant. Along this line of thinking, the effect of cavity configuration on its acoustic properties is investigated by two steps. Firstly, the property of a waveguide consisting of several identical elements is studied. The number of element is chosen to magnify the effect of the configuration. It turns out the irregularity of the duct shape can slow down the speed of sound of the plane wave by increasing the acoustic mass. Secondly, the absorption performance of an MPPA backed with an irregular cavity is evaluated. The shape of the cavity is the same as the element in the first step. In advance, the parallel arrangement of two MPPAs backed with irregular cavities is investigated, in order to look into the effect of cavity shape on inter-resonator interaction. The final results indicate that cavity design is an effective method to enhance the noise absorption performance of the MPPA arrays in the low-frequency domain.