A New Empirical Model

A new empirical model for the acoustic
properties of loose granular media

N.N. Voronina
a
, K.V. Horoshenkov
b,
*
a
Institute of Building Physics, 21 Lokomotivnyi Pr., Moscow 127238, Russia
b
School of Engineering, Design and Technology, University of Bradford, Bradford BD7 1DP, UK
Received 3 December 2001; received in revised form 24 September 2002; accepted 2 October 2002
Abstract
This paper examines physical parameters of loose granular mixes and their empirical rela-
tions to the acoustic performance of these mixes. In this work a new classication of granular
media has been proposed which is related to the characteristic particle dimension and the
specic density of the grain base. It has been shown that this classication is a useful char-
acteristic for rapid evaluation of the acoustic performance of loose granular mixes. The
characteristic impedance and propagation constant have been measured for a representative
selection of grain mixes and used to develop a new empirical model. This model relates the
above acoustic characteristics to the characteristic particle dimension, porosity, tortuosity and
specic density of the grain base, which are routinely measurable parameters. A very good
agreement with the experimental data is illustrated in the frequency range of 2504000 Hz for
materials with the grain base of 0.43.5 mm and specic densities between 200 and 1200 kg/m
3
.
Unlike many theoretical models for the prediction of the acoustic properties of porous media,
the proposed expressions do not involve any special functions of complex argument, empirical
shape factors or sophisticated characteristics of porous structure. These are practical enough to
be of interest to acoustic and noise control engineers and material manufacturers.
# 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Sound propagation; Loose granulates; Porous media; Acoustic absorption
1. Introduction
In recent years the use of acoustic porous materials for indoor and outdoor appli-
cations has been stimulated by legislation in the area of environmental noise and
public health. Absorbers are now routinely used to improve the acoustic performance
Applied Acoustics 64 (2003) 415432
www.elsevier.com/locate/apacoust
0003-682X/03/$ - see front matter # 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
PI I : S0003- 682X( 02) 00105- 6
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +44-1274-233-877; fax: +44-1274-233-888.
E-mail address: k.horoshenkov@bradford.ac.uk (K.V. Horoshenkov).
of noise barriers, factory spaces, sports halls and auditoria. A large selection of
acoustic materials is currently oered for these uses, the majority of which are
brous layers and reticulated foams.
Recent work suggests that granular porous materials can be regarded as an alter-
native to many existing brous and foam absorbers in many indoor and outdoor
applications [1]. In granular materials good absorption can be combined with good
mechanical strength and very low manufacturing costs which is important in many
acoustic applications. There are many theoretical and empirical models which are
used to model sound propagation in granular porous media. However, recent results
for rubber granulates [2] suggest that some existing models for sound propagation in
porous media can fail due to the complexity of the porous structure of these mate-
rials. In this previous work four models [36] have been tested to predict the surface
impedance of loose and consolidated mixes of recycled rubber granulates. It has
been shown that in order to provide a tolerable t to the experimental data the
values of the ow resistivity and porosity in these models need adjusting by up to
70%. These results are of considerable concern, and suggest the need for developing
an improved model for the acoustic properties of granular media.
On the other hand, there is a general lack of experimental data on the character-
istic impedance and propagation constant in practical granular mixes. It appears
that many researchers report on routinely measurable acoustic surface impedance
and normal incidence absorption coecient, which, are in many cases, not particu-
larly helpful to obtain a clear insight into the physical mechanisms of the acoustic
absorption in the porous media. In this respect, the availability of independently
measured data on the acoustic characteristic impedance and propagation constant is
of great importance for developers of new models, which provide the basis for
benchmarks and validation of their work.
The purpose of this paper is to investigate experimentally the fundamental
acoustic properties of granular media and to use the experimental results to develop
a practical acoustic model, which is robust in a broad range of acoustic frequencies
and particle sizes. The following materials were investigated in this work: vermiculite
(phyllosilicate mica), granulated rubber from automotive tyres, perlite (expanded
silicone glass) and granulated nitrile foam.
The paper is organised in the following manner. Section 2 discusses the physical
parameters, which are required for modelling the acoustic properties of granular
media. Section 3 provides the methodology for the experimental investigation, which
was conducted on a representative selection of loose granular mixes. Section 4 pre-
sents the new empirical expression for the structural characteristic, which then is
used in Section 5 to predict the acoustic characteristic impedance and propagation
constant. Section 6 presents the conclusions.
2. Physical parameters of porous materials
Granular materials are often modelled as a rigid frame porous medium formed by
the rigid, interconnected particles and voids in which a slow compressional wave can
416 N.N. Voronina, K.V. Horoshenkov / Applied Acoustics 64 (2003) 415432
propagate. The sound speed and the attenuation of the compressional wave in the
porous medium are, therefore, functions of the size of pores and the proportion of
the open pores. These properties are largely related to the size, shape and the degree
of compaction of the particles, which constitute the rigid frame. The degree of
compaction is determined by the density of the granular mix and aects its porosity
and permeability (e.g. [7,8]). It is common to expect a considerable variation in the
acoustic properties of granular mixes, which are composed of dierently compacted
grains although the grains are identical in size [1]. The shape of particles largely
inuences the degree of compaction and, therefore, the porosity of the granular mix
[7]. As an example, particles of granulated rubber tend to take the form of irregular
parallelepipeds, particles of perlite are close to ellipses and particles of vermiculite
appear in the form of plates. In this respect, the denition of the characteristic
dimension can be confusing. A more general way to characterise granular mixes
with particles of dierent shape is to assume that the characteristic particle dimen-
sion is the diameter of a sphere which volume is equivalent to the mean volume of
the particles in a given mix. The way in which the characteristic dimension is dened
is of importance, because it is convenient to relate the acoustic properties of a loose
granular mix the to the characteristic dimension of its particles, D, and to the por-
osity, H 1 ,
m
,,
g
, both of which are routinely measurable characteristics. Here
,
m
is the density of the granular mix and ,
g
is the specic density of the grain
material. In many cases, the value of the latter parameter is signicantly inuenced
by the presence of the cracks and micro-pores, which also aect the acoustic per-
formance of the loose particle mix. The characteristic dimension of the particles can
be found provided that the number of the particles in a unit volume, V
g
, of the
granular mix is known, in which case D
V
g
,0.5233
p
. This method yields a 25%
accuracy for large grain mixes. For small grain mixes the accuracy of this method
deteriorates to around 20%, which is still an acceptable value for many applications
of engineering acoustics. The specic density of the granular mix is easily determined
from the principle of Archimedes.
When an acoustic wave is incident on a porous layer, the thermo-viscous eects in
the uid lling the voids between the particles are responsible for the energy loss in
the oscillating acoustic ow [913]. It has been shown that the thermal dissipation
eects in commercial porous materials are typically small (e.g. [14]). The viscous eects
are important only inside the viscous boundary layer and the viscous energy loss in the
acoustic model can be accounted for by introducing a dimensionless parameter

D,
0
c
j
10
4
1
where j is the dynamic viscosity of air, ,
0
is the equilibrium density of air and c is the
sound speed in air. The parameter can be used to classify granular mixes according
to the particle characteristic dimension, i.e. one can refer to large grain mixes for
52, medium grain mixes for 1 - - 2 and to small grain mixes for 41.
Recent results for porous materials with high porosity [15] suggest that the
acoustic properties of granular materials can be aected by the value ,
g
,,
0
. The
acoustic attenuation tends to increase with the reduced value of the grain density.
N.N. Voronina, K.V. Horoshenkov / Applied Acoustics 64 (2003) 415432 417
This can be related to two separate phenomena: mechanical friction between the
elements of the non-rigid frame in porous materials with low specic density and to
the absorption in the frame micro-pores. The friction phenomenon can be of
importance in the low frequency range, where the inertial eects are small and vis-
cous drag is relatively large. In this regime the shape of the particles is of relatively
small importance and the eect can be modelled using the expressions for the oscil-
lating ow drag experienced by a stack of identical spherical beads (e.g. [16]). The
inuence of the particle micro-porosity is likely to be pronounced in the higher fre-
quency range [17], where additional dissipation can take place due to the thermal
non-equilibrium in micro-pores. These two eects can be accounted for phenomen-
ologically by introducing a dimensionless parameter
M
,
g
10
3
,
0
. 2
where the factor of 10
3
is a dimensionless normalisation factor. The measured values
of the density, porosity, characteristic particle dimension and the dimensionless
parameters and M are provided in Table 1 for the eight granular mixes.
In addition to the above parameters, it is also common to include in an acoustic
model the measured values of ow resistivity, r, and tortuosity, q, which are closely
related to the macrostructure of the porous mix [9]. In this work the ow resistivity
have been measured at Bradford University using the standard method detailed in
[18]. The results for six material samples are provided in Table 2. In the special case
of an oscillatory ow past a stack of spherical beads, the tortuosity can be predicted
from the approximate expression [16]
q
2
1 1 H2H
1
3
However, for realistic mixes with irregular particle shapes expression (3) is rather
idealised. In this particular work the tortuosity was experimentally deduced using
Table 1
Basic physical parameters used in the empirical model for granular media
Material Density, ,
m
(kg/m
3
)
Porosity, H Characteristic particle
size, D (mm)
Parameter
Vermiculite, ,
g
1200 kg/m
3
, M 0.975
1 385 0.68 1.4 3.1
2 370 0.69 0.5 1.1
3 420 0.65 0.4 0.89
Rubber crumb, ,
g
1050 kg/m
3
, M 0.925
4 590 0.44 3.5 7.1
5 520 0.54 1.6 3.6
Perlite, ,
g
200kg/m
3
, M 0.163
6 80 0.60 2.2 4.9
7 44 0.78 0.5 1.1
Nitrile foam granulate, ,
g
165 kg/m
3
, M 0.358
8 15 0.91 1.2 2.29
two independent methods: from the upper-frequency data on the real part of the
refraction index [19] and the ultrasonic time of ight method [20]. The results, which
are provided in Table 2 suggest that the experimentally determined values of the
tortuosity can dier considerably from those predicted by expression (3). In the case
of vermiculite, the predicted values are consistently lower that the experimental
results (see Table 2), which can be attributed to the deviation of the shape of ver-
miculite particles from the assumed spherical shape.
The values of the tortuosity can also be deduced from the behaviour of the real
part of the characteristic impedance. At frequencies above some critical frequency,
f
cr
, the real part of characteristic impedance approaches asymptotically to its higher-
frequency limit [9]
W
cr
a
q,H. 4
and is relatively independent of the frequency. The larger the size of the grain base,
the lower the value of the critical frequency. It can be shown experimentally that for
large grain mixes ( 52) f
cr
- 500 Hz, so that the tortuosity can be deduced from
expression (4) in which W
cr
a
is a routinely measurable constant. Table 2 provides the
deduced values of the tortuosity for large grain mixes 1, 4, 5 and 6 and for med-
ium grain mix 2. Generally, there is a good agreement between the values of the
turtuosity, which were measured with the three experimental methods (see
Table 2). For small grain mixes ( 41) the proposed experimental method for
measuring tortuosity is likely to fail, because of the relatively high value of the
critical frequency (f
cr
> 4000 Hz), above which the reliable impedance data are
usually unavailable.
Table 2
Values of non-acoustic parameters used for modelling of the acoustic properties of porous media. The
experimental values of the tortuosity were deduced using the method [19] and are compared with the
bracketed values from the method [20]
Material Flow resistivity (Pa s m
2
) r Tortuosity, q
Exp. (14) Experiment Exp. (3) Exp. (4) Experiment
Vermiculite
1 7610 7580 1.11 1.72 1.58 (1.51)
2 56800 61000 1.11 1.78 1.63 (1.76)
3 107000 135000 1.13 1.48 (1.45)
Rubber crumb
4 3190 2800 1.27 1.11 1.13 (1.19)
5 9800 13600 1.21 1.29 1.26 (1.23)
Perlite
6 4280 1.50 1.48
7 32800 1.08
Nitrile foam granulate
8 1163 2800 1.03 1.32 1.31 ()
3. Methodology
An experimental investigation of the acoustic properties has been carried out
using the impedance tube method in the frequency range of 2504000 Hz using the
standard procedure detailed in ISO 10534-1:1996 and ISO 10534-2:1998. Samples of
granular materials have been tested in two independent laboratories to ensure the
reproducibility of the experimental data. The impedance tube in the University of
Bradford (BK 4206) is installed in the vertical position to allow the acoustic prop-
erties of non-consolidated mixes to be easily measured. The impedance tube in the
Institute of Building Physics in Moscow (BK 4002) is installed in the horizontal
position. In the case of the horizontally installed tube the investigated materials were
packed in a special attachment container and the front surface of the samples was
covered with a nylon mesh to hold loose granules together and to ensure that the
surface was at. Loose samples were compacted suciently to ensure good friction
between individual particles and the walls of the impedance tube. A separate set of
measurements has been carried out to conrm that the mesh has a negligible eect
on the acoustic properties of the investigated samples. The density of the granular
mixes was measured and kept constant in all the experiments to ensure the same
degree of compaction between dierent experimental set-ups.
The surface impedance W
s
of each sample has been measured for the doubled
thickness of the porous layer W
2s
, so that the characteristic impedance,
W W
a
iW
i
, and propagation constant, , o i[, in the porous samples can be
determined from the expressions W
s
Wcoth ,d and W
2s
Wcoth ,2d . Here
W
a
, W
i
, are real and imaginary parts of the characteristic impedance, and o and [
are real and imaginary parts of the propagation constant, respectively, and d is the
layer thickness. The experimental data for the above characteristics were applied to
develop and propose new empirical expressions for the acoustic properties of porous
granulates. The reproducibility of the experimental data between the two labora-
tories was within 10%.
4. Structural characteristic for granular materials
Experimental results for the characteristic impedance and propagation constant
have been used to determine the eects of the porosity and grain size on the struc-
tural characteristic Q. The structural characteristics Q has been introduced in pre-
vious work [5,15] and is included in the expression for the real part of the
characteristic impedance,
W
a
1 Q. f - f
cr
5
Fig. 1 shows the experimentally determined frequency dependence of the structural
characteristic Q for three granular mixes. The results conrm that the functional
behaviour of this characteristic is similar to that derived previously for rigid frame
porous media [5,15], where Q / 1 H , HD
k
p

, k 2f,c being the wave number
in air, f is the frequency and c is the sound speed in air. From the comparison of the
data for granular materials with dierent values of the parameter M (see Table 1) an
empirical expression for the structural characteristic has been deduced and is pro-
posed in the following form
Q
0.2 1 H 1 H
2
H
kD
p . 6
The above expression has been used to calculate the predicted values of Q, which
are shown in Fig. 1 and compared with the experimental data.
Since Q W
a
1, the above expression can be used to determine the transition
frequency f
cr
, which is calculated from
f
cr

200j 1 H
2
1 H
4
,
0
D
2
q H
2
7
using the values of the parameters provided in Tables 1 and 2 and the relation
Q
cr

q
H
1. The critical value Q
cr
corresponds to the frequency at which the beha-
viour of the real part of the characteristic impedance W becomes frequency-inde-
pendent.
For frequencies f 5f
cr
the real part of the characteristic impedance can be pre-
dicted by expression (4). For frequencies f - f
cr
, expressions (5) and (6) are su-
ciently accurate for a majority of practical applications.
Fig. 1. The experimentally measured and empirically predicted values of the structural characteristic as a
function of frequency.
5. Empirical expressions for the acoustic properties
Expression (6) for the structural characteristic can also be used to predict the
imaginary part of the characteristic impedance and real and imaginary parts of the
propagation constant. The expressions for these properties have been originally
proposed in [5] for materials with low porosity. These expressions have been mod-
ied to t the experimental data for granular materials and are provided below
o
kQH
1 A
8
[ k 1 QH 1 B 9
W
i

QH
1 C
. 10
Here A, B and C are coecients which depend upon the porosity, structural
characteristic and dimensionless parameters M and .
Fig. 2(a)(c) shows the experimentally determined values of the coecients A, B
and C as functions of the structural characteristic Q for materials 1, 4 and 6. The
results suggest that the coecient A is proportional to 1,1 Q and that the coef-
cient B is proportional to 1,
Q
p
[see Fig. 2(a) and (b)]. The results also suggest that
for a given value of Q the coecient A increases and coecient B decreases with the
increasing value of M. The results for the investigated granular mixes show that for
a xed value of Q the coecients A and C are proportional to 1 H and the
coecient B is proportional to 1,1 H.
These dependencies provide the basis to derive the interpolated expressions for the
three coecients, which are provided below
A
1 H M
1 Q
11
B
1
Q
p
1 H 1 Q
2
M
12
and
C
1 H
Q
p . 13
The solid lines in Fig. 2(a)(c) show the calculated values of the coecients A, B
and C for materials 1, 4 and 6 as functions of the structural characteristic Q.
Expressions (11)(13) provide a close t to the experimental results throughout the
considered range of values of the structural characteristic, porosity and dimension-
less parameter M.
Empirical expressions (6)(11) can also be used to predict the ow resistivity of
granular mixes, which is determined from the low frequency limit r
,
0
clim
f !0
W
a
o W
i
[ as
Fig. 2. Experimental and empirically predicted values of the coecients A, B and C.
r
4001 H
2
1 H
5
j
HD
2
14
The values of the ow resistivity which are predicted from the above expression
are shown in Table 2, where they are compared to the measured data. Good agree-
ment between the measured and predicted data is observed for materials 1, 2, 4 and
8. Expression (12) is less accurate in the case of materials 3 and 5, which can be
attributed to the high sensitivity of the ow resistivity to the material compaction.
Figs. 38 showthe experimental and predicted values of the characteristic impedance
and propagation constant for the eight materials used in the experiments. The agree-
ment between the experimental results and the proposed empirical model for all the
eight granular mixes is good throughout the considered frequency range. The model
does not involve any special functions of complex argument and is easy to implement.
The classication according to the value of the parameter is very useful to pre-
dict the behaviour of the real part of the characteristic impedance of a granular mix.
The results show that for large grain mixes with 52 (materials 1, 4, 5, 6 and 8 in
Table 1) the transition frequency f
cr
is low. In these cases the real part of its char-
acteristic impedance is relatively independent of frequency and can be predicted
accurately from expression (4). For these mixes the imaginary part of the char-
acteristic impedance is relatively small, W
i
- 1, throughout the considered fre-
quency range. The attenuation constant for these materials is limited and the phase
velocity is relatively high.
Fig. 2. (continued)
Fig. 3. The real (a) and imaginary (b) parts of the normalised characteristic impedance of vermiculite.
Fig. 4. The real (a) and imaginary (b) parts of the normalised characteristic impedance of loose rubber crumb.
Fig. 5. The real (a) and imaginary (b) parts of the normalised characteristic impedance of perlite and
nitrile granulate.
Fig. 6. The real (a) and imaginary (b) parts of the propagation constant for vermiculite.
Fig. 7. The real (a) and imaginary (b) parts of the propagation constant for loose rubber crumb.
Fig. 8. The real (a) and imaginary (b) parts of the propagation constant for perlite and nitrile granulate.
The transition frequency of small (materials 3 and 7) and medium grain materials
(material 2) is relatively high and is outside the considered frequency range (see
Figs. 3 and 5). The behaviour of the real part of the characteristic impedance for
these materials is frequency dependent and can be predicted closely by expression
(5). The attenuation coecient for materials 2, 3 and 7 is relatively large and the
phase velocity is relatively small (see Figs. 6 and 8). These properties are desirable in
the design of ecient acoustic absorbers. In this respect, the classication according
to the value of the parameter makes easier the correct choice of the optimal grain
mix.
6. Conclusions
An experimental investigation has been carried out to determine the characteristic
impedance and propagation constant in a representative selection of loose granular
materials. A new classication of granular media has been proposed which is related
to the characteristic particle dimension and the specic density of the grain base. It
has been shown that the proposed classication is a useful characteristic for pre-
liminary estimation of the acoustic performance of loose granular mixes.
The experimental results have been used to develop a new empirical model, which
can predict reliably the acoustic performance of loose granular mixes. The model
requires knowledge of the characteristic particle dimension, porosity, tortuosity and
the specic density of the grain base, most of which are routinely measurable para-
meters. The introduction of the specic density of the grain base is important and
can empirically account for the eects of friction between the elements of the non-
rigid frame in porous materials with low density and for the absorption in the par-
ticles micro-pores.
It has been shown that the tortuosity can be predicted or deduced from experi-
mental data. Unlike many other models, the proposed model does not require the
knowledge of the ow resistivity which values can be very sensitive to the compac-
tion state of a loose granular mix. The characteristics which the model predicts are
the real and imaginary parts of the normalised characteristic impedance and propa-
gation constant. These characteristics are required to predict the eciency of
acoustic porous absorbers and sound propagation over porous soils.
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