World Journal of

World Journal of Engineering 10(6) (2013) 535-542

Engineering

Automotive vibration and noise control using smart materials: a state of art and challenges
S. R. Kumbhar1, Subhasis Maji2 and Bimlesh Kumar3
1Research 2Director,

Scholar, School of Engg. and Tech., IGNOU, New Delhi 110068, India School of Engg. and Tech., IGNOU, New Delhi 110068, India 3Principal, J.T. Majan College of Engg., Faizpur 425424, India E-mail: kavitha_aucdm@yahoo.com; nirmalapasala@yahoo.co.in (Received 28 September 2012; accepted 19 April 2013)

Abstract In the past several years, there has been increased market place awareness of noise, vibration, and harshness performance in automobiles. The differentiation between the quality and reliability levels of automobiles has become less pronounced and, as a result, manufacturers have had to demonstrate superiority by focusing on NVH concerns. The automotive industry is currently spending millions of dollars on NVH work to develop new materials and damping techniques so that the damping treatments are lighter, cheaper, and more effective. Some of the methods used to control noise, vibration, and harshness includes the use of different carpeting treatments, the addition of rubber or asphalt material to car panels, gap sealant, and the injection of expandable foam into body panels. The aim of this study is to explore the feasibility of smart damping materials such as magnet orheological elastomers (MRE), piezoelectric materials, with its basic properties, for augmenting and improving the performance benefits of damping materials. This study also evaluates the noise and vibration benefits of smart damping materials as compared to conventional damping treatments. Key words: NVH, Smart materials, magnet orheological elastomer, piezoelectric, damping

Nomenclature
dB TL SPL PSD RMS PZT EFC decibel transmission loss sound pressure limit power spectral density root mean square ceramic consisting mainly of Lead, Zirconium, and Titanium elastomer ferromagnetic composite

1. Introduction
With increasing competition, the automotive industry is implementing improvements through
ISSN:1708-5284

innovative designs, lower cost parts, and more efficient manufacturing methods. Cost reduction is important to increase competitiveness, and cost reduction efforts by the manufacturers cascade down to the different tiers of suppliers. In regard to cost reduction of components, durability issues are often more important than Noise and Vibration Harshness (NVH), especially on low end vehicles. At the same time, noise control expectations from the end user are becoming more demanding. A customer will now use component performance and cost to develop a list of acceptable candidates, and then use NVH to determine where the business is

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awarded. This has prompted the automotive manufacturers to respond by placing still higher expectations on the suppliers, and stringent noise control specifications are now standard on many of the smallest components in the vehicle. The demand for cost reduction, noise reduction, and increased operator comfort together is requiring that improved or new approaches for vibration and noise isolation and attenuation in automobiles be developed (Matthew, 2004; Wang, 2010).

2. Sources of noise and vibration in vehicle

Exterior road traffic noise results from the combined contributions from a large number of different vehicles. Trucks are typically noisiest followed by buses and motorcycles while cars are the quietest. The contribution of cars to the overall traffic noise level is however great because of their large numbers (about 80% of the road traffic). For lower speeds, below 4050 km/h, engine noise including exhaust and intake noise dominates for cars or higher speeds, above 70 km/hr, tyre-road noise dominates the car exterior noise generation (Figure 1). For heavier vehicles the engine noise is dominant under most conditions. Internal vehicle noise is caused by airborne and structure borne noise from the engine and tyre-road interaction noise. If exterior noise is reduced interior noise will typically also be reduced. This is especially true for airborne engine noise and tyre-road noise. Engine noise --> combustion-induced noise + mechanical noise (1) Combustion noise -periodic variation of cylinder pressure acting on the engine structure.

(2) Mechanical noise -piston slap impacts and other mechanical impacts in gears and bearings. Most common sources of mechanical noise: (3) Piston slap which is generated when the piston moves from side to side during the engine cycle. (4) Timing gear rattle which is generated when the teeth of the gears impact. (5) It is coupled to torsional vibrations of the crankshaft. (6) Bearing noise which is generated by impact and vibration caused by fluctuating forces during the engine cycle. 2.1. Control techniques to vehicle noise and vibration Number of ways in which the final sound radiation may be influenced: (1) Reduction at the source of combustion forces and mechanical forces. (2) Reduction of the vibration transmission between the sources and the outer surface. (3) Reduction of the sound radiation of the outer surface. Engine Noise Control: Engine noise is caused by various types of force generation within the engine and is transmitted to the radiating outer surfaces. The transmission path properties are determined by the vibration modes of the structure. The properties of the outer surface will also influence the sound radiation. Number of ways in which the final sound radiation may be influenced: (1) Reduction at the source of combustion forces and mechanical forces.

Noise sources controlled by road speed Transmission noise Tyre noise

Noise sources controlled by engine speed

Air intake noise Engine structure noise Fan noise Exhaust noise

Fig. 1. Main vehicle noise sources.

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(2) Reduction of the vibration transmission between the sources and the outer surface. (3) Reduction of the sound radiation of the outer surface. (4) Reduction of combustion pressures is intimately coupled to changes in the combustion process or combustion chamber shape. Since any changes to the design of the combustion chamber or to the combustion process will also have an effect on engine performance and exhaust gas emissions this is a difficult path for a noise control engineer. Unfortunately most design changes which would reduce noise would also increase exhaust emissions. Piston slap can be reduced by redesign of the piston and cylinder or by oil film injection. Gear and bearing noise can be reduced by improved design of these components for instance attention to gear tooth profiles and bearing clearances. To reduce the transmission of vibrations to the engine outer surface the crank case and cylinder block can be redesigned. One example is strengthening and stiffening of the structure. Other more advanced redesigns can be made involving extensive simulation the dynamics using finite element modeling. 2.2. Passenger cabin NVH Noise and vibration in the passenger cabin come from many different sources of vibration. Figure 2 gives an outline of the mechanisms that generate noise and vibration inside the passenger cabin. These vibration sources can be classified according to the generating conditions and frequency bands. The broad classifications include engine vibration, gear noise, road noise, tire noise, and wind noise. Also, low frequency vibrations that become

problematic with spring expansion and spring compression are mainly road vibrations. Vibrations can be considered random vibrations or shock vibrations (road bumps or sharp drops). There are numerous mechanisms that can result in vehicle noise & vibration. Over the years noise & vibration from dominant sources, have been reduced significantly. For example, due to developments in the automobile vehicle design, contributions from dominant source such as the engine have reduced. Noise and vibration tend to be made-up of contributions from multiple sources (as shown in Table 1), all of which play important role, instead of single dominant source (Connelly, 2000). 2.3. Review of vehicle noise levels Exterior road traffic noise results from the combined contributions from a large number of different vehicles. Trucks are typically noisiest followed by buses and motorcycles while cars are the quietest. The contribution of cars to the overall traffic noise level is however great because of their large numbers (about 80% of the road traffic). For lower speeds, below 4050 km/h, engine noise including exhaust and intake noise dominates for cars or higher speeds, above 70 km/hr, tyre-road noise dominates the car exterior noise generation. For heavier vehicles the engine noise is dominant under most conditions.

3. Smart materials in automobiles engineering

Smart technologies, which encompass both smart materials and smart structures, are creating a sea change in engineering practice. Smart materials have one or more properties that can be dramatically

Phenomenon Vibration, noise source Energy transmission systems

In engine, high frequency vibration, noise Engine noise Exhaust, intake noise Engine vibration

Gear noise

Road noise

Wind and rain noise Wind, rain

Torque fluctuations Gear mesh clatter Road surface, tires

Exhaust pipe bending vibration Exhaust mounting system

Drive system bending vibration

Drive axis torsion vibration

Suspension system Body seal character

vibration transmission air Anti-vibration, propagation anti-noise measures

Engine and transmission mounting systems

Anti-vibration, anti-noise measures Body (vibration and noise characteristics)

Emission system Vibration noise inside the passenger cabin

Fig. 2. Diagram of mechanisms generating vibration noise inside the passenger cabin.

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Table 1. Vehical NVH contributing factors External Contributing Factors Tires Chassis Engine Suspension Power Train Wind Noise Body in White Internal Contributing Components Door Panels Seats Pillars Instrument Panel Package Tray Trunk Trim Acoustic System Components Floor System Dash Insulator Headliner Damping System Sealers Hood Blanket Outer Dash Fender Shields Wheel Well Insulators

altered. A wide variety of smart materials already exists, and is being researched extensively. These include piezoelectric materials, magneto-rheostatic materials (MR), electro-rheostatic materials (ER), and shape memory alloys. Some everyday items are already incorporating smart materials (coffeepots, cars, the International Space Station, eyeglasses) and the number of applications for them is growing steadily (Peter, 2006; Brian et al., 2008; Rutten, 2003; Duncan et al., 1996). Several different materials that have been developed allow designers to use them as actuators in a system. Two examples of these materials are piezoelectric materials and shape memory alloys. Rheological fluids can also be considered smart materials because they change properties based on an electric or magnetic field. Piezoelectric materials experience a dimensional change when an electrical voltage is applied to them. Conversely, these materials produce an electrical charge when a pressure is applied to them. The best known such material is lead-zirconatetitanate (PZT). The material can be bonded to a system or structure. If voltage coming from the material is monitored, it is operating as a sensor. If voltage is being supplied to the material in response to a feedback, the material is being operated as an actuator. The use of PZT for vibration isolation is limited due to the small strain capability of the material. A displacement amplifier would be needed when using PZTs for vibration isolation, and this increases the size, weight, and flexibility of the overall isolation system. A shape memory alloy (SMA) material possesses the interesting property in that a metal remembers its original shape and size and changes back to that shape and size at a characteristic transformation

temperature. These properties have been found in gold cadmium, brass, and nickel-titanium. The alloys inherent properties have become very useful to the medical field. Also, the SMAs ability to generate high forces at low frequencies allows the material to be used as an actuator. However, the use of SMA in engineering applications has been limited due to the limited temperature range in which it can be effective and because of the slow response time. Electro-Rheological (ER) and MagnetoRheological (MR) fluids have the ability to change their yield strengths. Because of this, researchers have tried to incorporate the two materials in semiactive designs. While ER fluid reacts to an electric field and MR fluid reacts to a magnetic field, the two fluids operate in similar way. Tiny metal fibers are suspended in the fluid, and when a field is applied to the fluid, the metal fibers form strands in line with the field path. These materials are particularly useful in vibration isolation systems. The vibration causes the strands of metal fibers to continually break. However, the field causes them to reform. It is this continual breaking and reforming of the strands of metal fibers that allows the fluid to dissipate energy from the system (Peter, 2006; Brian et al., 2008; Rutten, 2003).

4. Present research work in smart materials for vibration attenuation in automobiles

4.1. Piezoelectric material Kristina Jeric Kristina M. Jeric constructed a special test rig and validated the results of piezoelectric material for the purpose of achieving the objectives of evaluating the feasibility and noise, vibration, and harshness effectiveness. He presented the results for the transmission loss tests performed at the SAE J1400 standardized test facility of the Lear Corporation acoustical lab. The tests further included SAE J1400 tests, conducted at a transmission loss test facility, in order to evaluate the effects of smart materials on sound transmission loss. The test results indicated that, with the application of smart damping, it is possible to decrease vibration peaks by up to 22 dB, broadband vibrations by up to 11 dB, and broadband sound pressure levels by up to 4.7 dB SPL(Kristina, 1999). The test window was modified to test the undamped and smart damping plates that were used for the vibration and structure-borne noise tests. It

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was shown that the addition of smart damping can increase the transmission loss of the plate by up to 7 dB. It was also shown that this transmission loss can be achieved while adding a minimal amount of weight to the plate. The frequency response of the PZT plate in the test window was slightly different from the response generated by the vibration and acoustics test stand. The shunt circuits were therefore tuned again in the J-1400 test window as shown in figure 3. The shunt circuits were tuned for the same peaks as the vibration stand tests. The peak at 190 Hz was an even mode that was not chosen to be reduced. He has tested the PZT plate without shunting and with shunting to determine how much smart damping increases the transmission loss for 10010,000 Hz. The PZT plate, however, was only designed to increase the transmission loss from 100300 Hz. Figure 4 shows the test results for the entire frequency range.

140 1 120 Magnitude, gs/lb 100 80 60 40 20 0 100 150 200 Frequency, Hz 250 300 3 4 Unshunted Shunted 5

4.2. MR bushing schubert Schubert investigated the application of MR technology in the area of engine isolation. He developed a MR hydraulic bushing for automotive application. He designed MR bushing which retrofits an existing bushing with a pressure driven flow mode valve on the inertia track. He conducted various experiment and verified the RMS optimization methods on a simple spring mass damper test bed. Base excitation and rotating unbalance input experiment results show that the minimum of the RMS of absolute acceleration and force transmitted occur at similar damping ratios (Schubert, 2005). A MR valve was designed using a novel highly efficient valve design. This valve was implemented on a current hydraulic bushing. The dynamic stiffness of the MR bushing was simulated numerically using the previously obtained model of the bushing along with the known MR fluid parameters and valve dimensions. His study illustrated that sending current to the valve tended to decrease the amount of damping (by decreasing inertia track flow) and effectively increasing the low frequency dynamic stiffness. The limiting case was found to be when flow was completely choked by the MR valve and the bushing behaved as a single DoF isolator. It is suggested that to improve the bandwidth of the MR bushing the off-state notch frequencies could be increased as illustrated in figure 5. 4.3. MR fluid bushing Michal Henri Michael Henri fabricated a bushing using Magnetorheological fluid. He incorporated this MRF bushing; a semi-active bushing, in the suspension of an automobile (Michael, 2005). He observed that over the frequency range, the semiactive bushings vibration transmission was the same whether or not a magnetic field was present. The only variation he observed was between 69 Hz to 71 Hz. In this frequency range, the bushing gave
Dynamic stiffness (N/mm)

Fig. 3. Plate vibrations with unshunted and shunted PZTs.

45 40 35 30 25 20 15 10 5 0

TL (dB)

PZT plate (unshunted) PZT plate (shunted)

800 600 400 200 0

Max

Amperes

Off

Fig. 4. Transmission loss for test plate with unshunted and shunted PZTs.

10000 8000 6300 5000 4000 3150 2500 2000 1600 1250 1000 800 630 500 400 315 250 200 160 125 100 Frequency (1/3 octave band)

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

Fig. 5. Increase of the off-state notch frequency to improve the bandwidth of the MR bushing.

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4 Transmissibility 3 2 1 0 15

Without magnets

With magnets

f = 4% 65 115 165 Frequency (Hz) 215

Fig. 6. MRE response with a mass of 375 mg.

an average transmissibility of 1.268. When he applied the magnetic field, the transmissibility was reduced to an average value of 1.139; giving a 10% reduction in the transmission of vibration when the magnets were introduced into the system (figure 6). He then prepared magnetorheological elastomer and excited using sinusoid input. When the MRE is not cured in a magnetic field, its resonant frequency is lower than the equivalent MRE cured in a magnetic field. 4.4. Elastomer ferromagnet composite Nakul Verma Nakul Verma fabricated the elastomer ferromagnetic composite (EFC) for automotive vibration damping. He designed experimental apparatus where vibration was directly coupled through a magnetorheological material damper. The result shows a noticeable decrease in EFC test rig resonant frequency as a function of magnetic field strength (Nakul, 2006). Figure 7 shows a composite data plot of the normalized top electromagnet frequency response for the 0 V, 8 V, and 16 V sweeps.
5 4.5 4 3.5 Output (g) 3 2.5 2 1.5 1 0.5 0 200 400 Frequency (Hz) 600 800

4.5. Magnetorheologic semi-active isolator Gregory J. Stelzer Gregory J. Stelzer (Gregory, 2000) developed a new isolator design for automotive components that can provide substantial and cost-effective improvements in noise and vibration harshness performance. He investigated passive, semi-active, and active isolator designs and different types of smart materials. Based on his study, the most promising approach turned out to be a semi-active magnetorheologic isolator. This type of isolator was modelled and optimized to reduce noise transmission while maintaining durability performance for an automotive component. The new results that his study produced are: (i) a detailed nonlinear model of a magnetorheologic isolator and semi-active control system, (ii) detailed simulation studies showing the trade-offs between passive and semi-active isolator performance for automotive components, and (iii) a new isolator design that provides durability and isolation performance that cannot be achieved using a passive isolator alone. The isolator design was based on a compressor component mounted to the frame of an automobile, but the isolation technique also has other applications. These include engine mounts, suspensions, and pumps in automobiles, and applications where the isolator must be durable to withstand low frequency vibration and shock loading, and at the same time prevent transmissibility of high frequency vibration from the component to the mounting structure that causes noise inside the automobile. Figures 8 and 9 show the results generated from the single degree of freedom isolator model. Maximum relative displacement and the power spectrum of the transmitted force at 50 Hz are plotted against stiffness.

0v 8v 16 v PSD @ 50 Hz (N2/Hz)

8.000 7.000 5 6.000 5.000 4.000 3.000 2.000 1.000 0.000 0 10000 20000 30000 Stiffness (N/m) 40000
Passive results MR inactive results MR active results -- butterworth lowpass filter MR active results -- ideal low pass filter Baseline transmission

4 3 2 1 1 2 3 4 5

50000

Fig. 7. Top electromagnet frequency response.

Fig. 8. The effect of passive stiffness seen on transmitted force.

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Maximum relative displacement (mm)

541

30.0 25.0 20.0 15.0 10.0 5.0 0.0 0 10000 20000 30000 40000 Stiffness (N/m) 50000 Passive results Baseline displacement

Fig. 9. The effect of passive stiffness on maximum relative displacement.

A damping ratio of zeta = 0.1, common for natural rubber, was used with each stiffness. The trade off between relative displacement and transmitted force can be seen. In figure 8, an increase in stiffness results in increased transmitted force. However, in figure 9, the increase in stiffness lowers relative displacement significantly. Also, the baseline performance is set.

5. Conclusion
Nowadays many additional avenues are being explored, for example MR fluids are being developed for use in car shocks, damping machine vibration. ER fluids have mainly been developed for use in clutches and valves, as well as engine mounts designed to reduce noise and vibration in vehicles. Following are some of the challenges stated by researchers in the field of smart materials in automobile. (1) MR valve used in MR Fluid bushing does not meet the requirements of the cylinder deactivation application it is shown that increasing the compliance of the pumping chamber of the bushing by a factor of 4 could reduce the dynamic stiffness by approximately 50%. This could possibly be achieved by implementing a MR valve used to connect the pumping chamber to a much more compliant chamber. (2) In case of PZNT, further investigation is essential for evaluating alternative shunting techniques for better control of vibration in various structural and acoustical modes. A more complex structure such as a stripped car body, a

body-in-white, would be ideal for future research on the application of smart damping for automotive benefits. (3) MR Material magnetic field generation the energy density requirement associated with the electromagnet, more research will required to be focused on increasing electromagnet efficiency. Also in the interest of energy efficiency and size it would be prudent to examine rare earth magnets as a magnetic field source. (4) The filter used with the control algorithm needs to be improved. The problems resulting from phase lag were quite apparent. While an ideal filter may never be possible, development of a filter that minimizes phase lag would dramatically improve results when the filter is on. Further optimization of the coil design would allow the isolator to more effectively use the unique capabilities of the MR fluid and perhaps be reduced in size. Looking to the above challenges imposed, there is lot of potential of research in the smart materials for automobile noise and vibration reduction. Apart from above some other smart materials are also in research base in this field and researchers are working on the same.

Acknowledgments
Authors are very grateful to Dr. S. G. Joshi, Emeritus Professor, WCE, Sangli for their appropriate and constructive suggestions during preparation of this paper.

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