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This work presents an application of airborne source path contribution analysis with emphasis on prediction of wideband sounds inside a cabin from measurements made around a stand-alone engine. The heart of the method is a time domain source path receiver technique wherein the engine surface is modeled as a number of source points. Nearfield microphone measurements and transfer functions are used to quantify the source strengths at these points. This acoustic engine model is then used in combination with source-to-receiver transfer functions to calculate sound levels at other positions, such as at the driver's ear position. When combining all the data, the in-cabin engine sound can be synthesized even before the engine is physically installed into the vehicle. The method has been validated using a powertrain structure artificially excited by several shakers playing band-limited noise so as to produce a complicated vibration pattern on the surface.

Active noise control (ANC) technique with the filtered-x least mean square (FXLMS) algorithm has proven its efficiency and drawn increasingly interests in vehicle noise control applications. However, many vehicle interior and/or exterior noises are exhibiting non-Gaussian type with impulsive characteristic, such as diesel knocking noise, injector ticking, impulsive crank-train noise, gear rattle, and road bumps, etc. Therefore, the conventional FXLMS algorithm that is based on the assumption of deterministic and/or Gaussian signal may not be appropriate for tackling this type of impulsive noise. In this paper, an ANC system configured with modified FXLMS (MFXLMS) algorithm by adding thresholds on reference and error signal paths is proposed for impulsive noise control. To demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm, an experimental study is conducted in the laboratory.

Panel acoustic contribution analysis (PACA) is an advanced engineering tool to improve the NVH quality of vehicles. Using PACA areas of vehicle body panels are categorized according to their contribution to the total sound. Positive contribution areas increase the sound level as vibration amplitude increases, negative contribution areas decrease the sound level as vibration amplitude increases, and neutral areas have no significant effect on the sound level. This knowledge is important to guide vehicle NVH refinement. This paper presents the technical approach of PACA and the results of an experiment used to validate the PACA techniques. Vehicle application results to improve NVH quality and reduce weight are also included.