{"id":1989,"date":"2020-11-13T09:21:39","date_gmt":"2020-11-12T22:21:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.finiteelementanalysis.com.au\/?p=1989"},"modified":"2024-06-11T14:18:59","modified_gmt":"2024-06-11T03:18:59","slug":"take-your-acoustics-simulations-next-level-with-vrx-sound-rendering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.leapaust.com.au\/blog\/fea\/take-your-acoustics-simulations-next-level-with-vrx-sound-rendering\/","title":{"rendered":"Take your Acoustics simulations to the next level with Simulated Sound Rendering & Psychoacoustics"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Sound is an important part of the consumer experience for many products \u2013 think of the satisfying clunk of a well-built car door – but it is often a subconcsious experience that engineers and product designers don\u2019t properly consider until a problem occurs.<\/p>

Whether a product\u2019s sound is a core part of its functionality (think of a small but mighty pair of bluetooth speakers) or a side effect of its use (such as the wind whistling across your car\u2019s sunroof), in modern product development it is becoming increasingly important to be able to accurately predict the acoustic qualities of your designs before they\u2019re manufactured.<\/p>

Perhaps you\u2019ve run a simulation in Ansys Mechanical, Ansys Fluent, Ansys LS-DYNA or Ansys Motion, but did you know you can now render the predicted sound sources so that you can actually listen to and further analyse the predicted sound generated by your product?<\/p>

Ansys VRXPERIENCE Sound<\/span><\/a> allows acoustics engineers to create immersive 3D soundscapes based on site recordings, CAE simulation outputs or a virtual reality (VR) environment. Typically, engineers use VRXPERIENCE Sound to perform tasks such as:<\/p>

\u2022 Analysing sound quality
\u2022 Setup of psychoacoustic tests based on a listener panel to obtain statistics about the real perception of your sounds.
\u2022 Creating high-precision reproductions of 3d sounds and original timbres in a predefined space.
\u2022 Producing audio for simulators and VR platforms – available for cars, aircraft and trains
\u2022 Setup of jury testing for sound perception to measure user preferences, positioning & unpleasantness
\u2022 Listening to outputs of mechanical and\/or fluids simulations, and modify sounds to evaluate effects of level changes on components.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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In order to listen to the outputs of your mechanical or fluids (or multiphysics) simulation, then you must first produce an accurate simulation result \u2013 so let\u2019s revisit the most important considerations for any proposed acoustics simulation: what are we trying to achieve, what physics is relevant and what is the right computational approach?<\/p>

Typically, engineers implement Ansys Acoustics tools to adopt a virtual testing approach which lowers production times and reduces the risk of cost overheads associated with re-engineering a product that doesn\u2019t meet acoustic standards (when a problem is identified late in a product development cycle). Acoustics problems can often be classified as Flow-induced noise (Aero-acoustics) or Structure-induced noise (Vibro-acoustics), or a mix of both.<\/p>

Flow induced noise deals with inherently unsteady flow fields and can involve internal or external flow noise sources. Specific modelling approaches are recommended to accurately model flow noise sources, including appropriate meshing, boundary conditions, solver techniques and solver methodology depending on the type of noise being generated, accuracy required and available hardware\u2013 these are all discussed in this Flow-Induced Noise webinar recording<\/span><\/a> <\/strong>which includes industrial examples such as fan acoustics, blower acoustics, valve acoustics, high speed flows.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Prediction of sound propagation and structure-borne noise plays an important role in the design of many products. Examples include calculating transmission loss (TL) of a Silencer, noise caused by vibrating structural components, transmission of sound through thin panels.<\/p>

Solving these types of acoustic wave propagation problems can be done either coupled (with fluid and structural domains solved simultaneously) or uncoupled (with the structural analysis performed first, followed by the acoustics analysis). The coupled approach is used when both structural vibrations and acoustic waves have a mutual influence: for example, when simulating a thin speaker cone whose deformations will be influenced by the pressure waves. Conversely, an uncoupled approach is valid when the acoustic waves do not affect the vibration of the structure, as is often the case for larger or stiffer parts.<\/p>

To help determine whether a coupled or uncoupled approach is recommended for your application, this Structure-borne Noise webinar recording<\/span><\/a> <\/strong>is a valuable resource which considers:<\/p>

\u2022 Overview of FE formulation of Vibro-Acoustic Equations
\u2022 Material modelling
\u2022 Transfer admittance
\u2022 Vibro-Acoustics
\u2022 Random acoustic diffuse sound field analysis
\u2022 Visco-Thermal Acoustics
\u2022 Far Field Results Post Processing<\/p>

Another important consideration remains if you\u2019re dealing with large domains and\/or high frequencies, is when to use a Boundary Element method approach (which is available in Ansys LS-DYNA).\u00a0 As we know, the frequency range for audible noise is broad \u2013 spanning from ~20 Hz \u2013 20 kHz \u2013 and as the frequency range we want to simulate increases, so too does the model size (as the wavelength becomes smaller and smaller, we\u2019ll need a much finer mesh to resolve the wavelength, which can significantly increase the mesh & model size).<\/p>

Conventionally, at low frequency ranges up to ~1000 Hz, structures exhibit distinct mode shape or a distinct resonance frequency and a conventional FEA acoustic approach can be used. As we move to higher frequency ranges, it becomes more difficult to distinguish individual mode shapes (or natural frequencies occur very close together), and we require a very fine mesh in order to resolve these features.<\/p>

At mid frequency ranges \u2013 the Boundary Element Method (BEM) can be used to provide a useful option which bridges the gap of applicability between FEA (max ~1000 Hz) to a Statistical energy approach (SEA) used at much higher frequencies (above ~2000 Hz can take average energy within frequency bands), as shown below:<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Ansys Electromagnetic tools can be combined with Ansys Mechanical to address noise from electrical machines that may be caused by fluctuating electromagnetic forces.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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You may be *lucky* that the characteristics of your application will require simulation of a full multiphysics system to provide an accurate acoustics prediction. In this Multiphysics Acoustics webinar recording<\/strong><\/span><\/a>, the requirements and options to tackle multiphysics acoustics problems are discussed, including:<\/p>

\u2022 Coupling between flow pressure (CFD) and vibro-acoustics (FEM)
\u2022 Coupling between electromagnetic forces and vibro-acoustics for electrical machine
\u2022 Coupling between MEMS and Acoustics for Sensor Application
\u2022 Transfer of loading data from time domain to frequency domain
\u2022 Application Example: Prediction of windshield noise
\u2022 Application Example: Prediction of electric motor noise<\/p>

As one example of the complete workflow \u2013 starting with high-fidelity physics-based simulations (in this case, aeroacoustics using CFD) through to psychoacoustics analysis using VRX Sound \u2013 we recommend you watch the recording of this recent webinar from Frank Kelecy at Ansys who uses the example of drone propeller noise from a hovering quadcopter<\/strong> to demonstrate the entire workflow<\/span><\/a>, covering:<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Acoustics simulation is not a straightforward topic, but the potential benefits are significant and certainly worth the investment in considering the available approaches and deciding which is the best method to simulate acoustics for your particular application. And remember that once you have reliable simulation results, you can leverage the full power of VRXPERIENCE Sound to analyse sound quality and perception and iterate to explore the impact of design changes.<\/p>

If you would like to discuss the right approach for acoustics simulations in a specific project, contact LEAP to arrange a no-obligation chat by clicking here to speak with one of our simulation experts to help get started<\/span><\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Acoustic performance is an important part of a product experience, but can often be neglected by design engineers. Learn how to use Ansys VRXPERIENCE Sound to listen to a simulation of your products\u2019 sounds, based on a virtual prototype and CFD\/FEA simulation results and\/or experimental data. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":2007,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"neve_meta_sidebar":"","neve_meta_container":"","neve_meta_enable_content_width":"","neve_meta_content_width":0,"neve_meta_title_alignment":"","neve_meta_author_avatar":"","neve_post_elements_order":"","neve_meta_disable_header":"","neve_meta_disable_footer":"","neve_meta_disable_title":"","neve_meta_reading_time":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[144],"tags":[167,168,180,42,255,275,291,296,316],"class_list":["post-1989","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fea","tag-acoustic-analysis","tag-acoustics","tag-ansys-mechanical","tag-fea","tag-modelling-techniques","tag-psychoacoustics","tag-sound-analysis","tag-structural-analysis","tag-vibro-acoustics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.leapaust.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1989","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.leapaust.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.leapaust.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.leapaust.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1989"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.leapaust.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1989\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3162,"href":"https:\/\/www.leapaust.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1989\/revisions\/3162"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.leapaust.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2007"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.leapaust.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.leapaust.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.leapaust.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}