NIOSH Mining Laboratory
Acoustic Test Chamber |
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| Sound power measurements on a Fletcher HDDR roof bolter in the Acoustic Test Chamber |
The Acoustic Test Chamber at the NIOSH Pittsburgh Research Laboratory is a very large acoustic reverberation chamber. It is mainly used to assess experimental noise controls on machines by measuring total sound power before and after the controls are installed. Determining sound power level in a reverberant field is one of several methods available to calculate the noise emission of equipment. Per ISO acoustics standards for determining sound power in reverberant fields (ISO 3741/ ANSI S12.51 - precision grade measurements or 3743-2 - engineering grade measurements), the device under test should be a small percentage of the volume of the test chamber. This reverberation chamber has a volume of roughly 1,300 cubic meters, four times the size of what is considered to be a large chamber. Thus, the chamber is ideal for sound power level testing of the large equipment typically found in mining and construction environments. Further, a state of the art data collection, analysis, and reporting system allows for a significant amount of testing in a short period of time. Currently, NIOSH is NVLAP accredited for sound power level testing per the ISO 3741/ANSI S12.51 standard.
Site: Pittsburgh Research Laboratory
Equipment: Bruel & Kjaer PULSE Multi-Analyzer System