Objective evaluation of interior trim effects on sound quality and noise reduction of a coupled plate cavity system

• The effect of the interior trim materials on the sound loudness and sharpness of a plate–cavity system has been investigated.
• The sound pressure results calculated by the impedance mobility method are used to calculate the psychoacoustic metrics using psychoacoustic analysis method.
• Experiments were carried out on a simply supported aluminium plate which covers an open ended squared box with five thick walls and excited by a shaker.
• A good agreement between the analytical and experimental results is obtained which confirms the validity and feasibility of the proposed model.
• The results show that the interior trim has a large influence on the distribution of the sound loudness and sharpness inside the cavity in the middle and high frequency ranges.

In this study, the impedance mobility and psychoacoustic analysis methods are combined to develop a structural-acoustic model of a plate-cavity coupling system. The objective is to evaluate the effect of interior trim materials on sound loudness and sharpness of a plate-cavity coupling system. The impedance mobility method is applied to calculate the pressure frequency responses of the interior acoustic field for the plate-cavity coupling system. The sound pressure results calculated by the impedance mobility method are then directly used to calculate the psychoacoustic metrics using psychoacoustic analysis method. A good agreement was found between the experimental and analytical results. The results show that the interior trim has a large influence on the distribution of the sound loudness and sharpness inside the cavity in the middle and high frequency ranges.