An acoustic transformer composed of horns and its application

Abstract

A new acoustic transformer was developed by connecting three horns to improve radiation performance in the frequency region below 500 Hz. The proposed acoustic transformer was evaluated by numerical analysis using the commercial computer program SYSNOISE and by experiment. The acoustic transformer is composed of three horns, one of which was used in an inverted form. A design model was developed by use of Webster's horn equation and showed that the transformer can improve radiation efficiency. This was confirmed by numerical calculation using SYSNOISE. An acoustic projector was designed by use of the developed transformer and a piezoelectric unimorph-type actuator. The sound pressure measured at the mouth of the constructed acoustic projector was compared with the sound pressures evaluated at the same location by numerical calculation to investigate the differences between the numerical simulation model and the actual acoustic projector. Sound pressures generated by several acoustic radiators were calculated numerically and compared with the measured and calculated sound pressures of the developed acoustic projector to evaluate the effects of use of the proposed acoustic transformer. The comparative evaluation shows that the proposed acoustic transformer can provide up to a 10 dB gain over use of a horn in the narrow band low-frequency region from 100 to 200 Hz. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.