Journal of the Korean Physical Society, Vol. 43, No. 5, November 2003, pp.

727∼731

Level Gauge by Using the Acoustic Resonance Frequency

Sung Soo Jung,∗ Seung Il Cho and Yong Tae Kim

Acoustics & Vibration Group, Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science, Daejeon 305-600

Cheon-Woo Kim
Nuclear Environment Technology Institute, Daejeon 305-600

(Received 1 September 2003)

An acoustic level gauge which is based on the acoustic resonance in a waveguide was developed.
Its stability was tested by measuring the first resonance frequency spectrum, and good agreement
between the measured and the theoretically predicted values was obtained. As testing materials,
distilled water was used as the liquid and wheat flour, sugar, or salt as the loose materials. In
the cases of loose materials, the air-loose material contact surface could no longer act as a rigid
boundary. The measured resonance frequency was lower than the theoretical one because the sound
was able to radiate into the loose material and a virtual boundary was formed not at the real air-
material contact surface but at some location in the loose material.

PACS numbers: 43.20.Mv, 43.20.Ye

Keywords: Level gauge, Resonance frequency, Cepstrum, Impedance tube

I. INTRODUCTION II. BASIC PRINCIPLE

Various kinds of level gauges, mechanical, capacitive, The schematic diagram of an acoustic resonance level
optical etc., are widely used to measure the levels of liq- gauge is shown in Fig. 1. The main part of the acoustic
uids in reservoirs. In the case of acoustical methods, the level gauge is an acoustic tube (waveguide). The lower
ultrasonic level gauge is representative, and basically, a end of the acoustic tube is submerged in the tested liq-
pulse-echo method is used [1,2]. It is highly reliable but uid and is bounded by the liquid surface. The upper
has some difficulties when parasitic reflections caused by
foams, residues, surface ripple, and a steep temperature
gradient in the liquid occur. In order to reduce the para-
sitic reflections, a low-frequency acoustic level gauge was
proposed. It is hardly affected by parasitic reflections
because of its long acoustic wavelength.
Donlagic et al. [3] introduced a simple acoustic res-
onance level gauge and investigated its characteristics
under several experimental conditions. They used cap-
strum instead of a frequency analysis, but their experi-
mental device had some problems in the lid part of the
acoustic waveguide. Later, Danlagic proposed an im-
proved, but rather complex, method [4]. Independently,
Bardyshev et al. [5] recently proposed a double resonator
system, one for measuring the level and the other for ref-
erence. They analyzed measurement errors precisely, but
provided few data.
In this research, we developed an acoustic level gauge
and tested it for various liquid levels. Its resolution,
which is needed for checking the leakage of liquids, was
obtained. Especially, the levels for some loose materials,
such as wheat flour, sugar, and salt, were also estimated.
Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of the acoustic resonance level
∗ E-mail: jss@kriss.re.kr gauge.
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-728- Journal of the Korean Physical Society, Vol. 43, No. 5, November 2003
end is closed with a lid made of a rigid material. In
general, the acoustic impedance of the liquid is much
greater than that of the air. Therefore, both ends of the
gas-filled acoustic tube satisfy the acoustic rigid bound-
ary condition.
The sound waves, longitudinal waves, in a gas-filled
tube of length hg (=ha +hd ) are resonant at the frequen-
cies [3]
fn = c0 n/(2hg ), (1)
where c0 is the speed of sound in air and n is the num-
ber of resonances. All resonance frequencies can be used
to determine the liquid level, but the fundamental res-
onance frequency(n=1) should be used if the effect of
parasitic reflection is to be minimized.
The liquid level, hL , can be easily obtained by ex-
tracting hg from the total tube length h. Experimen-
tally, hL is determined by measuring the fundamental
frequency(f1 ) or oscillation period (T1 ):
hL = h − hg = h − [c0 /(2f1 )] = h − [c0 T1 /2]. (2)
The sound speed in a gas is a function of the temperature
(absolute temperature) θ and the molecular weight M
and is given as
p
c0 = γRθ/M , (3)
where R=8.341 J/(mol deg) is the universal gas constant
and γ is the ratio of heat capacities. For air and diatomic
gases, γ = 1.4. If the content of the gas in the tube is
changed, the sound speed will change. Since the gas in
the tube is well known, the sound speed mainly depends
on its temperature. For air and for an ordinary temper-
ature range, the sound speed can be simplified as [6]
c0 = 331.5 + 0.6t, (4)
where t is the temperature in celsius.
III. EXPERIMENTAL SET-UP
As shown in Fig. 1, the sound was generated by a sig-
nal analyzer (B&K 3550) and was propagated into the
tube by a compressional speaker after having been am-
plified by an amplifier (B&K 2706). Two kinds of upper
ends are considered, as shown in Fig. 2. The c-type is the
case where the upper end is closed with a rigid lid (diame-
ter of 100 mm) with a small opening (diameter of 20 mm)
for the speaker. The s-type is the case where the upper
end is closed with a rigid lid, but the side has an open-
ing for the speaker. Donlagic used the former method
with a membrane-type loudspeaker [4]. In that case, the
upper end might be a moving, not rigid, boundary due
to the movement of the loudspeaker membrane. In or-
der to eliminate that, we used a comperssional speaker.
The microphone (1/400 , B&K 4187) was flush mounted
Fig. 2. Speaker mount constructions: (a) c-type and (b)
s-type.
below the upper end, and the sound pressure in the tube
was measured. A small hole was bored in the vicinity
of the microphone to equate the gas pressure between
atmosphere and the interior of the tube. The hole was
closed by using a small rigid rod when the measurement
was started. The frequency spectrum and the cepstrum
were analyzed by using a signal analyzer (B&K 3550).
Sampling was 1000 times ensemble-averaged in the fre-
quency domain to improve the signal-to-noise ratio. Sev-
eral sound sources, such as random, pseudo-random, and
multi-sine, were considered.
The reservoir was an acrylic tube with a 5-mm thick-
ness, a 29-mm inner diameter (dr ), and a 900-mm length
(hr ). The tube was also made of acrylic with a 5-mm
thickness, a 10-mm inner diameter (dt ), and a 1000-mm
length (h). A needle valve was attached to the bottom
of the reservoir to control the precise liquid level. As
test materials, distilled water was used for the liquid
and wheat flour, sugar, or salt was used for the loose
material.
IV. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
Before measuring the level of the liquid, we investi-
gated the basic characteristics of an empty impedance
tube with a c-type speaker mount. The measured reso-
nance spectrum and the cepstrum for a tube length of
1000 mm are shown in Fig. 3. Several resonance peaks
are present and their frequencies could be well deter-
mined as shown in Fig. 3(a). The measured temperature
was about 22 ◦ C, and the theoretical first resonance was
expected at 172.35 Hz. The measured first resonance
frequency was 172 Hz. When the reading error is con-
sidered, this frequency difference corresponds to a level
difference of 0.5 mm. The s-type speaker mount tube was
also investigated, and the measured first resonance fre-
quency was 174 Hz. In this case, the frequency difference
of 1.65 Hz between the theoretical and the measured val-
ues corresponds to a nearly 1-mm level difference. How-
ever the error was caused not by a reading error, but by
the opening effect, as indicated by Donlagic [3]. There-
fore, when we used an s-type tube, a frequency correction
Level Gauge by Using the Acoustic Resonance Frequency – Sung Soo Jung et al. -729-

Table 1. Comparison of the theoretical and the mea-

sured fundamental resonance frequencies for a c-type speaker
mount.
hg Theoretical Measured Temp.
(mm) value (Hz) value (Hz) ( o C)
300 575.0 575.1 22.5
400 431.4 432.0 22.7
500 344.8 344.8 22.2
600 287.4 286.8 22.2
700 246.2 245.0 22.0
800 215.5 214.8 22.1

Table 2. Comparison of the theoretical and the measured

fundamental resonance frequencies for an s-type speaker
mount.
hg Theoretical Measured Temp.
(mm) value (Hz) value (Hz) (o C)
300 574.9 574.0 22.4
400 431.3 430.0 22.5
500 345.1 345.5 22.7
600 287.5 286.1 22.4
700 246.2 245.0 22.0
800 215.4 214.0 21.9
Fig. 3. Measured resonance spectra for an air-filled length
of 1000 mm: (a) frequency spectrum and (b) cepstrum.

was conducted. From a comparion of the two types of

tube, the c-type tube was better than the s-type tube.
Unlike the frequency spectrum, the cepstrum (oscilla-
tion period) peaks, except the first 2 peaks (in the vicin-
ity of 0.005 and 0.01 s) as shown in Fig. 3(b), were
not easy to determine. When the two experimental re-
sults were compared, the frequency spectrum was more
effective than the cepstrum to determine the level ex-
actly. For sound sources, three kinds of signals, i.e., ran-
dom, pseudo-random, and multi-sine, were used. Among
them, the multi-sine signal was the best one to get a sta-
ble frequency spectrum rapidly. From the pre-testing
results, the multi-sine sound source and frequency spec-
trum were accepted for all experiments, and only the Fig. 4. Measured first resonance frequency spectra for var-
first frequency peak (f1 ) was considered. Because the ious air-filled levels.
level of liquid was simply determined by extracting the
air-filled length from the total tube length, measuring
the level of liquid is equal to measuring the level of the that the c-type tube system was more stable than the
air-filled length. Therefore, the level of the air-filled tube s-type tube system.
was measured. The measured first resonance frequencies are com-
The frequency shift was investigated by varying the pared in Fig. (4) for hg of 500, 600, 700, and 800 mm.
level of distilled water in the air-filled tube length (hg ) Increasing the air-filled length moved the resonance fre-
from 300 to 800 mm in 100-mm steps. The theoretical quencies toward low frequency.
and the measured first resonance frequencies are com- In practice, measuring the liquid level is important,
pared in Table 1 for a c-type speaker mount and in Ta- but detecting the leakage is more important. In the
ble 2 for an s-type speaker mount. The measured values case of petroleum reservoirs, for example, most oil reser-
agreed well with the theoretical ones and showed again voirs in gas stations are buried under the ground. When
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Fig. 6. Measured resonance frequency spectra for wheat

Fig. 5. Comparison of the measured first resonance fre- flour, sugar, and salt.
quency spectra for air-filled levels of 601.0 mm and 600.8
mm.

the oil leaks, the surrounding soil will be contaminated.

Tremendous money will be needed to restore the soil
to its original state. Therefore, it is necessary to check
whether the oil is leaking or not, and a leakage test is di-
rectly related to the frequency resolution. In general, the
limitation of the frequency resolution comes from the dig-
ital spectrum analyzer, so the maximum resolution will
be deterministic. The maximum frequency resolution of
the frequency analyzer used in the present experiment
was 125 mHz and corresponded to level resolution of 0.2
mm. The measured resonance frequencies for hg of 601.0
and 600.8 mm at 22.2 ◦ C are compared in Fig. 5, and a Fig. 7. Measured reflection coefficients for wheat flour,
slight frequency shift can be seen. sugar, and salt.
Finally, the levels loose materials, such as wheat flour,
sugar, and salt, were measured. The measured first three
resonance frequencies are compared in Fig. 6. When the compared in Fig. 7. As we expected, the reflection co-
three loose materials are compared, the sharpest reso- efficient of wheat flour was the highest among them. In
nance peaks occur for wheat flour, which is a natural re- the vicinity 200 Hz, the reflection coefficient of sugar and
sult because grains of wheat flour are very fine and can salt were about 0.9 and 0.6, respectively. In this case, the
be stacked compactly. Whereas grains of the sugar and assumption of a rigid boundary condition was no longer
salt are bigger, so air exists between the grains. Thus, satisfied, so penetration of the sound into the material
suger and salt are like porous materials, and sound can made the air-filled length longer, there by adding to the
easily propagate. The average grain size of sugar was less effective length. Because of this effect, the first resonance
than 10 µm and that of the salt was bigger than that of frequencies of the three materials shift toward the lower
sugar. Therefore, the sound was able to penetrate more frequency than the theoretical one as shown in Fig. 6,
deeply into the salt than into the sugar. The first reso- and salt was the most affected. The sound reflection co-
nance frequencies of wheat flour, sugar, and salt with hg efficients were lower in the high-frequency range, which
of 810 mm were 209, 205, and 200 Hz, respectively, and means that the rigid boundary condition is more easily
disagreed with the theoretical value of 213 Hz. broken as the frequency is increased.
When the first three resonance peaks are compared,
the first ones are the sharpest because the sound en-
ergy is easily absorbed at high frequency than at low
frequency by porous materials. In order to verify the V. CONCLUSION
results of Fig. 6, we measured the sound reflection coef-
ficient by using an impedance tube and the transfer func- We developed a level gauge and investigated its stabil-
tion method [7]. The measured reflection coefficients of ity by measuring the resonance frequencies. In the case
the three loose materials with thicknesses of 200 mm are of distilled water, the air-water interaction surface acts as
Level Gauge by Using the Acoustic Resonance Frequency – Sung Soo Jung et al.
an acoustically rigid boundary, so the measured and the
theoretically predicted resonance frequencies agreed well.
In spite of its simplicity, the gauge has a high resolution.
In the case of an air-filled length of 601 mm, the level
resolution was 0.2 mm. Actually, the limit of the fre-
quency, or level, resolution comes from the digitalization
of the apparatus or signal processing. The levels of loose
materials, such as wheat flour, sugar, and salt, were in-
vestigated. Unlike the liquid, the air-loose-material con-
tact surface didn’t act as an acoustically rigid boundary.
The measured resonance frequencies were lower than the
theoretically predicted ones because the sound was able
to radiate into the loose material and a virtual bound-
ary formed in the loose material, but not at the air-loose
material contact plane.
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