Submitted by – Vivek Khade

Nirav Parmar
Tejasvi Borade
Vidhi Chandekar
Prajakta Vaidya
Gauri Waikar

ACOUSTICS
ARCHITECTURAL BUILDING SERVICES
What is Acoustics?
✓ Acoustics is defined as the scientific study of sound which includes the effect of reflection, refraction
absorption diffraction and interference.
✓ It also deals with the properties of the sound waves, their origin, propagation and their action on
obstacles

What is Sound?
✓ Sound is an alteration of pressure that propagates through an elastic medium such as air which
produces and auditory.

Why Do We need Acoustics?

✓ Acoustics are fundamentally important to learning environments. Learning is intrinsically linked with
communication, and aural (sound) communication is acoustics. Similarly, learning is about concentration,
and external noise is a major distracting factor in education.
✓ The importance of acoustics is not limited to classrooms. Noise in corridors and public spaces can soar if
they are too reverberant (too much echo), with voices raised louder and louder to overcome the
background echo, just like shouting conversations at a noisy cocktail party or restaurant. So to come
over this problems of sounds we need acoustics.
Classification of sound
Sound waves are classified in 3 types.
1. Infrasound
2. Audible sound
3. Ultrasound

Infrasound
Sound whose wave frequency is too low (under 15-20 hertz) to be heard by
humans. Some animals, such as elephants and whales, emit calls at infrasound
frequencies.

Audible sound
All the frequencies residing between the limit of 20Hz and 20KHz can be
perceived by human beings. Therefore, these sound waves having frequencies
within the range of 20Hz and 20KHz are known as audible sound.

Ultrasound
Ultrasound is sound waves with frequencies higher than the upper audible limit
of human hearing. Ultrasound is not different from "normal" (audible) sound in
its physical properties, except that humans cannot hear it.
Behaviour Of Sound Enclosures :
An enclosed space is a room or area bounded on every of its sides. The materials for enclosure may be classified into
two:
Those that allow sound rays to pass through and Those that do not allow sound rays to pass through. On encountering
barriers posed by the enclosure, sound waves are likely to behave in the following ways:
•Reflection
•Absorption
• Refraction
• Diffusion
• Diffraction
• Transmission
Reflection
✓ This occurs when the wavelength of a sound wave is smaller than
the surface of an obstacle. In the case of an enclosed space, the
sound waves hit every side of the enclosure continuously until the
sound energy reduces to zero.
✓ The amount of waves reflected depends on the smoothness, size,
and softness of the materials of enclosure. The angle of incidence
of sound rays is equal to that of the reflected rays only if the
surface of the reflector is flat. But when it is curved, the angles
are different.
Absorption
✓ When sound waves hit the surface of an obstacle, some of
its energy is reflected while some are lost through its
transfer to the molecules of the barrier.
✓ The lost sound energy is said to have been absorbed by
the barrier.
✓ The thickness and nature of the material as regards its
softness and hardness influences the amount of sound
energy absorbed.

Refraction
✓ This is the bending of sound when it travels from one
medium into another medium.
✓ The difference in the composition of the two different
media bends the sound
✓ i.e. the angle of incidence changes into an angle of
refraction as it travels into the new medium.
Diffusion
✓ This is the scattering of waves from a surface. It occurs as
a result of the texture and hardness of the obstacle is
comparable to the wavelength of the sound.
✓ The direction of the incident ray changes when it strikes
the surface of the obstacle.
✓ Satisfaction is achieved when sound is heard in all
direction at equal level.
Diffraction
✓ When the wavelength of a sound wave is smaller or
equal to the size of the obstacle, the sound rays tend to
bend round the edge of the obstacle thereby turning the
edge to a sound source.
Transmission
✓ In this phenomenon, sound wave is carried by molecules
of the obstacle through vibration and re-emitted at the
other side irrespective of the medium.
✓ It can be structure borne, air borne or impact sound.
 SOUND TERMINOLOGIES
❑ Airborne sound — Sound or noise radiated directly from a source, such as a loudspeaker or machine, into
the surrounding air.
❑ Ambient noise — Total noise level in a specified environment.
❑ Audible frequency range — The range of the sound frequencies normally heard by the human ear. The
audible range spans from 20 Hz to 20,000 Hz, but for most engineering investigations only frequencies
between about 40 Hz and 11,000 Hz are considered.
❑ Decibel (dB) — (1) Degree of loudness. (2) A unit for expressing the relative intensity of sounds on a scale
from zero for the average least perceptible sound to about 130 for the average pain level.
❑ Diffraction — The process whereby an acoustic wave is disturbed and its energy redistributed in space as a
result of an obstacle in its path.
❑ Direct sound — Sound that reaches a given location by direct, straight-line propagation from the sound
source.
❑ Frequency — Repetition rate of a cycle, the number of cycles per second.
❑ Noise — Unwanted sound.
❑ Noise Reduction (NR) — The difference in sound pressure level between any two points along the path of
sound propagation.
 SOUND TERMINOLOGIES
❑ Reflection — Redirection of sound waves.
❑ Refraction — Change in direction of sound waves caused by changes in the sound wave velocity.
❑ Reverberant sound/reverberation — The sound in an enclosed space, which results from, repeated
reflections at the boundaries.
❑ Sabin — Unit of acoustic sound absorption, equivalent to the absorption by one square meter of perfect
absorber.
❑ Sound absorption — (1) The process by which sound energy is converted into heat, leading to the reduction
in sound pressure level. (2) The sensation perceived by the sense of hearing.
❑ Sound insulating material — Material designed and used as partitions in order to minimize the
transmission of sound.
❑ Sound insulation — The reduction or attenuation of sound by a solid partition between source and
receiver. This may include a building wall, floor, barrier wall or acoustic enclosure.
❑ Sound intensity — The sound flowing per unit area, in a given direction, measured over an area
perpendicular to the direction of flow; units are W/m2.
 FACTORS AFFECTING ARCHITECTURAL ACOUSTICS
Reverberation time:
• When the reverberation time is too high, the sound produced by the speaker will persist for a long period of time.
• Similarly ,when the reverberation time is low, sound dies quickly and becomes inaudible in a short amount of time.
• In order to improve the sound, reverberation time of a hall should be increased to an optimum value.

Loudness:
• Reverberation time of a hall is directly proportional to loudness.
• Low loudness results in existence of sound for a shorter period while high loudness results in existence of sound for a
longer period.
• Therefore sound produced by the speaker should be within audible range.

Structure Borne sound:

• Sound waves generated inside a hall are known as structure-borne sound.
• They are produced due to apparent motion of benches & footsteps & propagated through walls and floors
 FACTORS AFFECTING ARCHITECTURAL ACOUSTICS
Echelon effect:
• Unwanted sounds are produced when people walk on staircase or floors or hard paved paths due to poor finishing of the
floor surface, structural effects, etc.
• The above mentioned unwanted sound are termed as ‘echelon effect’ .

Echo:
• If the time interval between direct sound and reflected sound is less than 1/15 of a second, the reflected sound is helpful
in increasing loudness.
• But if the time interval is less than that, then the sound arrives later and will cause confusion .

Focusing due to Walls and Ceilings:

• Sound produced by speaker undergoes multiple reflections at ceilings and walls.
• Reflected sounds from ceilings and walls should not be focused on particular point, rather it should be distributed
throughout a hall.
• Generally a plane surface reflects sound uniformly but a curved surface does not. So reflection of sound from a curved
surface produces a harmful effect.
 ACOUSTICAL MATERIALS
Sound Absorbers:
These sound absorbing acoustical panels and soundproofing materials are used to
eliminate sound reflections to improve speech intelligibility, reduce standing waves and
prevent comb filtering. A wide variety of materials can be applied to walls and ceilings
depending on your application and environment. These materials vary in thickness and
in shape to achieve different absorption ratings depending on the specific sound
requirements.

TYPES :
• Acoustical foam panels
• White paintable acoustical wall panels
• Fabric wrapped panels
• Acoustical wall coverings
• Ceiling tiles
• Baffles and banners for ceiling
• Fiber glass blankets and roll
 ACOUSTICAL MATERIALS
Sound Reflectors:
❑ It is very important to provide as much natural
reinforcement for the unamplified voice as possible.
This applies equally in smaller rooms, classrooms,
meeting rooms etc, but is particularly important for
larger spaces where the distance between the speaker
and the listener is greater.
❑ Natural reinforcement is achieved by the strategic
placement of reflective surfaces. For example in
theatres it is common to place reflectors above the
stage, and to angle these to give useful reflections,
particularly to the back of the auditorium. Hard flat
surfaces can be considered to reflect sound in a similar
manner to they way that a mirror reflects light (i.e the
angle of incidence equals the angle of reflection.
 ACOUSTICAL MATERIALS
Sound Diffusers:
These devices reduce the intensity of sound by scattering it over an expanded
area, rather than eliminating the sound reflections as an absorber would.
Traditional spatial diffusers, such as the polycylindrical (barrel) shapes also
double as low frequency traps. Temporal diffusers, such as binary arrays and
quadratics, scatter sound in a manner similar to diffraction of light, where the
timing of reflections from an uneven surface of varying depths causes
interference which spreads the sound.

TYPES:
• Quadra pyramid Diffuser
• Pyramidal Diffuser
• Double duty Diffuser
• Quadratic Diffuser
VEER SAVARKAR AUDITORIUM, SHIVAJI PARK