Efficient damping treatment for structure-borne noise reduction in vehicles

Viscoelastic material is often used in the automotive industry in order to reduce vibration levels at resonance frequencies by adding damping to the structure. Typically, around ten kilograms of viscoelastic patches are used in a passenger vehicle chassis. The design parameters of the placement of these damping patches are location, area, thickness, and the type of damping material. This paper aims at finding the optimal physical criterion to distribute the damping patches inside a vehicle structure with damping patches based on: 1) strain energy, 2) normal velocity, and 3) reactive shearing structural intensity (STI). The results are discussed based on the equivalent radiated power of the structure and the sound pressure at driver's ear position in order to find the damping patch distribution that produces optimal acoustic radiation and a smart, light-weight design.