Heavy Industry & Machinery
Currently, there are very few in-situ measurement procedures available to evaluate the noise emissions of large machinery. Pressure based techniques often encounter difficulties adapting to industrial scenarios from controlled laboratory experiments. The presence of high background noise levels generated by surrounding equipment, along with the reverberant characteristics of most industrial sites, prevents the application of standard sound characterization techniques. In contrast, particle velocity measurements performed near a rigid radiating surface are less affected by background noise and can potentially be used to address noise problems even in such conditions. The vector nature of particle velocity, an intrinsic dependency upon surface displacement and sensor directivity are the main advantages over sound pressure based solutions. These key features enable identifying and quantifying noise emissions of problematic elements, despite high levels of background noise.