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This study focuses on grid refinement techniques for the direct simulation of aeroacoustics, when using weakly compressible lattice Boltzmann models, such as the D3Q19 athermal velocity set. When it comes to direct noise computation, very small errors on the density or pressure field may have great negative consequences. Even strong acoustic density fluctuations have indeed a clearly lower amplitude than the hydrodynamic ones. This work deals with such very weak spurious fluctuations that emerge when a vortical structure crosses a refinement interface, which may contaminate the resulting aeroacoustic field. We show through an extensive literature review that, within the framework described above, this issue has never been addressed before. To tackle this problem, we develop an alternative algorithm and compare its behavior to a classical one, which fits our in-house vertex-centered data structure. Our main idea relies on a directional splitting of the continuous discrete velocity Boltzmann equation, followed by an integration over specific characteristics. This method can be seen as a specific coupling between finite difference and lattice Boltzmann, locally on the interface between the two grids. The method is assessed considering two cases: an acoustic pulse and a convected vortex. We show how very small errors on the density field arise and propagate throughout the domain when a vortical flow crosses the refinement interface. We also show that an increased free stream Mach number (but still within the weakly compressible regime) strongly deteriorates the situation, although the magnitude of the errors may remain negligible for purely aerodynamic studies. A drastically reduced level of error for the near-field spurious noise is obtained with our approach, especially for under-resolved simulations, a situation that is crucial for industrial applications. Thus, the vortex case is proved useful for aeroacoustic validations of any grid refinement algorithm.

Direct measurements of the wavenumber-frequency spectrum of wall pressure fluctuations beneath a turbulent plane channel flow have been performed in an anechoic wind tunnel. A rotative array has been designed that allows the measurement of a complete map, 63×63 measuring points, of cross-power spectral densities over a large area. An original post-processing has been developed to separate the acoustic and the aerodynamic exciting loadings by transforming space-frequency data into wavenumber-frequency spectra. The acoustic part has also been estimated from a simple Corcos-like model including the contribution of a diffuse sound field. The measured acoustic contribution to the surface pressure fluctuations is 5% of the measured aerodynamic surface pressure fluctuations for a velocity and boundary layer thickness relevant for automotive interior noise applications. This shows that for aerodynamically induced car interior noise, both contributions to the surface pressure fluctuations on car windows have to be taken into account.

The accordion reed is an example of a blown-closed free reed. Unlike most oscillating valves in wind musical instruments, self-sustained oscillations occur without acoustic coupling. Flow visualizations and measurements in water show that the flow can be supposed incompressible and potential. A model is developed and the solution is calculated in the time domain. The excitation force is found to be associated with the inertial load of the unsteady flow through the reed gaps. Inertial effect leads to velocity fluctuations in the reed opening and then to an unsteady Bernoulli force. A pressure component generated by the local reciprocal air movement around the reed is added to the modeled aerodynamic excitation pressure. Since the model is two-dimensional, only qualitative comparisons with air flow measurements are possible. The agreement between the simulated pressure waveforms and measured pressure in the very near-field of the reed is reasonable. In addition, an aeroacoustic model using the permeable Ffowcs Williams-Hawkings integral method is presented. The integral expressions of the far-field acoustic pressure are also computed in the time domain. In agreement with experimental data, the sound is found to be dominated by the dipolar source associated by the strong momentum fluctuations of the flow through the reed gaps.