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Once the design of a door sheetmetal and accessories is confirmed, the acoustics of the door system depends on the sound package assembly. This essentially consists of a watershield which acts as a barrier and a porous material which acts as an absorber. The acoustical performance of the watershield and the reverberant sound build-up in the door cavity control the performance. This paper discusses the findings of a design study that was developed based on design of experiments (DOE) concepts to determine which parameters of the door sound package assembly are important to the door acoustics. The study was based on conducting a minimum number of tests on a five factor - two level design that covered over 16 different design configurations. In addition, other measurements were made that aided in developing a SEA model which is also compared with the findings of the results of the design study.

Damping treatments have been used in reducing structure-borne noise in vehicles for many years. Although sheet based heat bondable mastic products (often called melt sheets) are quite common in the industry, sprayable products have several advantages and have been cited in the literature. This paper discusses findings of numerous structure-borne noise studies that were conducted on sprayable materials with different base-chemistries. The analyses show that a waterborne product is the most advantageous damping treatment in an automotive assembly process. The results also reveal that application of this product provides effective damping treatment as well as reduces structurally radiated noise.

Constrained layer damping (CLD) is a well known technique to efficiently damp low frequency vibration. CLD employs a viscoelastic material sandwiched between two very stiff, typically metal, layers. While effective over essentially flat surfaces, CLD has not been applicable to cylindrical shapes. In order to damp low frequency vibration in metal pipes, users have been forced to rely on extensional layer damping, typically consisting of thick layers of extruded or molded rubbers. This paper discusses a novel product to damp cylindrical articles such as metal pipes with a constrained layer heat shrink tubing. This product utilizes a stiff heat shrinkable polymeric jacket bonded on the inside with a viscoelastic layer. When shrunk on a metal pipe or rod, a CLD system is produced. The product is typically thinner than an extensional layer damper and is more effective. It also meets the other physical and environmental requirements for a pipe covering.

This paper discusses an empirical method for predicting the Sound Transmission Loss (STL) performance of Sound Barrier Assembly (SBA) materials that are commonly used in the automotive industry. The prediction method is based on basic STL theories of single and double-wall systems, in conjunction with the double wall resonance and the standing wave resonance between the two walls. In addition, a practical technique for determining the acoustical influence of the decoupler in a double-wall system is proposed. When all these considerations are put together properly, one gets a much clearer picture of the STL characteristics of typical double wall systems, and understands how the barrier and decoupler together affect the STL performance. The validity of the empirical prediction method is substantiated by comparing predictions with measured results of more than 60 samples.

This paper discusses the importance of a dissipative sound package system in the automotive industry and how it works. Although this is not a new technique at this stage, it is still a challenge to meet the subsystem target levels that were originally developed for parts based on the barrier decoupler concept. This paper reviews the typical construction of a dissipative system and then emphasizes the importance of different layers of materials that are used in the construction, including what they can do and cannot do. The paper also discusses the importance of the proper manufacturing of a part.