NUMERICAL EVALUATION OF THE PERFORMANCE OF ABSORPTIVE LINER MATERIALS ON NOISE TRANSMISSION LOSS FOR PASSENGER TRICYCLE MUFFLERS
The prevalence of environmental noise pollution on local thoroughfares has increased significantly due to a notable increase in the popularity of passenger tricycles. Thus, the purpose of the current research intends to assess the effectiveness of absorptive liner materials in terms of noise transmission loss in passenger tricycle mufflers. For modeling, simulation, and analytical evaluation, ANSYS and COMSOL Multiphysics were the software packages utilized. The fluid was characterized as an ideal gas, with a fixed inlet flow velocity set at 10 m/s, while the gas temperature was varied between 20 and 200℃. The study reveals that the muffler incorporating absorptive liner materials, subjected to varying temperature treatments (ranging from 60 to 200℃), demonstrated superior performance compared to the muffler devoid of a liner, achieving improvements of 85.1% (Balsa LR), 80.8% (Ceramic), 87.5% (Rockwool), and 92.3% (Polyester), respectively. According to the study, when the muffler with the absorptive liner materials was exposed to different temperature treatments (60 to 200℃), it performed better than muffler without a liner. The results also show that there was an inverse relationship between the transmission loss and the flow resistivity and average fiber diameter metrics related to the absorptive liner materials. The numerical findings validate that the use of absorbent liner materials specifically, polyester into muffler systems improves efficiency by reducing the excessive noise produced during transmission. As a result, this study recommends using polyester, which was found to be the best absorbent material, as a liner in mufflers to effectively reduce noise in tricycles.
Absorption Rate, Acoustics, COMSOL Multiphysics, Liner Materials, Mufflers.