Interactive Auralization of Powertrain Sounds Using Measured And Simulated Excitation

Interior vehicle sound is an important factor for customer satisfaction. To achieve an optimized product sound at an early stage of development, subjective evaluation methods as well as analysis and prediction tools must be combined to provide reliable information relevant to product quality and comfort judgments.

Binaural Transfer Path Synthesis (BTPS) is a well-known method to calculate interior noise and vibrations based on multi-channel input measurements. Recent enhancements of the BTPS method enable taking into account also simulated excitations, for example engine mount vibrations calculated using MBS and/or FEM simulations, allowing the prediction of interior noise even if the engine is not available in hardware.

Interactive evaluation of the generated sounds in a vibro-acoustic driving simulator helps to increase understanding of customer responses and perception of target sounds.

This paper describes the engineering tools and methods developed for vehicle product sound design and comfort judgments by means of a BTPS model of a Nissan vehicle.