Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Applied Acoustics
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/apacoust

Experimental and numerical vibro-acoustic investigation on a trimmed

car door to analyze slamming event
Carlo Alberto Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, Paolo Silvestri ⇑
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Energetics, Management and Transportation (DIME), Polytechnic School – University of Genoa, Via Opera Pia, 15A, Genoa 16145, Italy

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The closing sound of a car door is objectively not related to the intrinsic quality of the vehicle but it is an
Received 8 August 2019 important subjective parameter for vehicle evaluation. For automotive developers, it is very interesting to
Received in revised form 28 February 2020 deepen this phenomenon and to define a methodology to understand the influence of several parameters
Accepted 9 April 2020
on door-closing sound quality. The aim of this paper is to evaluate the possibility of analysing this phe-
Available online 23 April 2020
nomenon, called car-door slamming, using a numerical simulation approach. Simulation methods for
vibro-acoustic analysis are sufficiently robust and predictive in the case of simple systems, as it emerges
Keywords:
from a parallel investigation conducted on an elementary component like an annular disk. In simulating
Vibro-acoustic analysis
Trimmed car door
complex systems, as in the case of door slamming, where non-linearities may be significant, methods are
Car door slam not always reliable and sufficiently predictive. In the specific case, the main difficulty is to correctly iden-
BEM tify the dynamic behaviour of a trimmed car door, which is a very complex system. The paper reports an
FEM analysis and a comparison between the experimental and simulation results of the car-door slamming
phenomenon, highlighting the dependence of the quality of the numerical results on the particular sim-
ulation method adopted. The paper also reports an experimental and numerical vibro-acoustic analysis of
a trimmed car door isolated from the vehicle with no constraints (free-free condition) to ascertain its
dynamic behaviour in a simpler condition not coupled to the vehicle. The result shows a significant level
of system complexity even in this case.
Ó 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction ear and a non-linear stress-based method to study door-slam

Noise from closing a vehicle door has two main functions. First
of all, it indicates that the door was properly closed, which means
that it has to be loud enough to be heard by the passenger [1].
Moreover, it can contribute to the overall impression of the car.
This is very important because closing the doors is one of the oper-
ations a customer can do while he is examining a car in the seller’s
showroom. Kuwano et al. [2,3] have shown that cars with a pleas-
ant sound were mainly thought of as luxury ones.
In [4] the Authors investigate how different door elements radi-
ate sound during a door-closing event and how to optimise a door
structure to achieve specific sound target in order to ensure the
door-closing noise quality. They propose a systematic approach
used to characterise different elements of doors which contribute
to the overall door-slam noise quality.
In [5] door-slam durability evaluation for body closure struc-
ture is conducted using a CAE approach. The authors compare a lin-
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: p.silvestri@unige.it (P. Silvestri).
simulation in stress and fatigue life analysis.
In [6] the finite element analysis is used to determine the non-
linear car door structural response for durability purpose and a
comparison between tests and numerical results is reported.
In [7] the Authors develop a CAE procedure to qualify plastic
door trim assemblies under the vehicle door slam life test. They
show how it is possible to reduce product development time and
cost using simulation, by evaluating and improving the durability
of plastic door trim components at early design stage, before a pro-
totype is made and physically tested.
In the scientific literature there are not many studies where
numerical methods are used to evaluate the vibro-acoustic
response of the system to the door-slam phenomenon. Often the
study of noise is dealt with mainly through experimental
approaches, while it is more difficult to find reliable numerical
methods able to characterize well the problem. Developing a
vibro-acoustic model capable of reliably reproducing the dynamic
behaviour of the car door seems to be very difficult. Indeed, if this
element can be modelled relatively easily when it is in a not-
trimmed configuration (i.e., only the metal structure is taken into
account), to perform a numerical model of the car door in its real

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apacoust.2020.107380
0003-682X/Ó 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
2 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380
conditions when it is completely equipped (trimmed car door)
becomes very complex. The presence of gaskets (e.g. door seals),
panels, window mechanism, etc. leads to a complex modelling of
the whole system with a behaviour characterized by strong non-
linear contributions.
The complexity of this approach is also related to the fact that,
under the influence of an acoustic field the structures can start
vibrating, and this vibration is then coupled to the acoustic field.
A coupled vibro-acoustic simulation is needed to take into account
how acoustic sources might affect the structure [8,9].
The goal of the present research is to investigate, through
numerical and experimental approaches, the characteristic vibro-
acoustic aspects of the car-door slamming transient event, to make
progress towards the development of a numerical tool with predic-
tive capabilities.
The present investigation takes into account the results from a
preliminary vibro-acoustic activity on an elementary component
(steel annular disk) where aspects related to vibro-acoustics
numerical simulation were deepened. The reason why quite a sim-
ple system has been chosen to test the simulation methodology is
that it is characterised by a limited number of parameters which
define its dynamic behaviour. In this way the analysis and the
related results can be easily interpreted allowing us to better high-
light and compare the advantages and the limits of the various
vibro-acoustic analysis techniques applied. Moreover, in the litera-
ture studies on annular disk are present where vibro-acoustic
behaviour is explored [10,12] allowing for a better interpretation
of our results.
The information obtained from the preliminary analysis on an
elementary component is considered as a starting point for the
study of door slamming, with the goal to find the correct method-
ology. Annular disk results are often compared to those obtained in
the case of the trimmed car door to highlight how these are chan-
ged (in terms of accuracy and predictive characteristics) moving
from a simple system to one of greater complexity.
The method adopted requires the realisation of different struc-
tural and acoustic numerical models corresponding to both parts
and subsystems of the vehicle under examination. On the models,
where it is possible, validation and update processes are conducted
through a comparison with experimental data. The activity devel-
oped may therefore be split into two phases: the first one regards
the process of model synthesis, update and validation, while the
second one is focused on conducting numerical simulations to
evaluate system vibro-acoustic response and interpret the results
obtained. In order to validate the structural models of the compo-
nents and systems under examination, the conventional technique
of experimental modal analysis has been used, which is adequate
only for the conditions in which the system presents a sufficiently
linear behaviour. This is not verified in the conditions of the door
slam and therefore the method chosen does not allow us to con-
duct a complete validation. However, this approach can provide
an indication of the quality and reliability of the models developed
(restricted only to linear field responses), by assessing the degree
of correlation between experimental and numerical modal models
in a specific frequency band which is significant from the opera-
tional point of view. In the case of acoustic models, the acoustic
FRFs (Frequency Response Functions) were calculated and corre-
lated with the same experimental data. Even in this case, the vali-
dation method is theoretically still valid only for linear conditions.
In this paper, only the acoustics external to the vehicle has been
studied. The same methodologies of analysis may be used to study
the vehicle interior but that was excluded because it requires more
information for the realisation of the model; indeed, also the pas-
senger cabin of the vehicle has to be modelled (the identification of
a higher number of terms is required making the numerical model
definition more complex). However, the present activity is equally
significant to assess the predictive capabilities of the numerical
models in the presence of elements with considerable structural
complexity. The analysis of the door slam for a small car of seg-
ment A was performed. However, the method considered in this
paper is quite general and the considerations and conclusions
obtained in this case can be extended to other types of vehicles.
Preliminarily, the door in free-free conditions not coupled to the
vehicle was analysed with structural and acoustic analysis in order
to setup, upgrade and validate a more limited system and to make
the development of the system numerical model more feasible
[13].
The same investigation method applied to the elementary
annular disk component was followed also in this case, consider-
ing and comparing two numerical methodologies proposed in the
scientific literature: The Boundary Element Method (BEM), based
on the discretisation of the surface boundary elements, and the
Finite Element Method (FEM), based on the discretisation of the
three-dimensional space [14,15]. For this, two commercial soft-
ware systems, Siemens Virtual.Lab [16] and MSC Actran [17],
were used.
This step of the activity allowed us to evaluate, through har-
monic stationary simulations, how numerical methodologies are
able to reproduce vibro-acoustic behaviour of a trimmed car door
in a simplified condition, that is, in absence of the interaction with
the vehicle.
Finally, a transient nonlinear BEM uncoupled analysis [18] on
the vehicle to solve the natural door-slam transients was also per-
formed and compared with experimental results in an anechoic
room. In this case, the numerical-experimental correlation allowed
us to globally evaluate the reliability of the model considering both
the structural and the acoustic aspects in the presence of an oper-
ative excitation like the door slam.
The paper is organized as follows.
In Section 2 a structure identification in terms of modes of
vibration is executed both on the annular disk and on the car door
in free-free conditions.
In Section 3 a vibro-acoustic analysis of the annular disk and of
the car door in free-free condition is conducted in terms of acoustic
frequency response function.
In Section 4 a correlation between structural and acoustic
numerical results and experimental data is performed both for
the disk and for the car door.
In Section 5 an experimental and numerical activity about the
door slam is described.
Finally, in Section 6 conclusions and perspectives are presented.
The presented results have been organized and subdivided on
the basis of the different methodologies of analysis adopted in
the investigation and not according to the analysed component
(annular disk or trimmed car door module). This is meant to con-
vey a more compact but at the same time complete illustration
of the work.
2. Structural analysis
The procedure adopted for the study of the car door in free-free
conditions to check the reliability of the FEM structural model is
the same as that adopted in the annular disk case described later.
The door is suspended with rubber belts to reproduce free-free
conditions (Fig. 1). The measurements (both structural and acous-
tic) are performed in an anechoic room. The impact technique is
employed, using an instrumented hammer to apply and to mea-
sure the excitation of the structure. The response is measured
through accelerometers. Measurements are performed through a
‘‘rowing hammer” procedure, i.e. the position of the response point
is kept fixed and the excitation point is varied.
 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380 3

0.10
0.08
0.06 d
d
d
d
s
d
s
s d
f f
f
s d
d s
d
s
s
s
s
s
s
d

0.05 f
f

f
d

d
d
d
s
d d
v
f o
f
o
f d f
d d
d f
d
f
s
d
d
s
s
s
s
f
f
f
Fig. 1. Fully trimmed front right door with elastic suspension to reproduce free-free f d s f f f f d d f

conditions. 0.04 f
f
f
d
s
d
v
s
d d
d d
f
d
d
d
d
s
o

Log
g/N
f f d v d d d d d
f f v s d d f f d
f o v f f f o f v
o o f v d f f f v
0.03 d
v s
s
d d
d s
f
f
d
f
s
s
f v d f o o d
f f f f f d f
d s d f f f d
s v f d f f d
d f o o o f f

The response is acquired through 4 ICP three axial micro 0.02 d

d
d
f
v
o
d
s
f
f
d
f f
f
f

d f f o

accelerometers with a 5 mV/g nominal sensitivity and a very lim- s

d
d
s

s
f
f
o
o
o

ited mass, to avoid the addition of relevant loads to the system.

f d
f v
o o o
o

Acquisition and processing (FRF) of the signals are done using a

Siemens LMS Scadas acquisition front end [19,20]. In the present 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
study, 225 experimental points are considered and their position Hz
is shown in Fig. 2 (upper frame). As for the case of the disk, the Fig. 2. LMS Test. Lab model to extract the experimental modal shapes of the
sum function of the experimental FRF is performed to extract the trimmed car door module and FRF sum function (dotted trace), stabilisation
experimental modal shapes. The stabilisation diagram, where all diagram and MIF functions in the case of three references. (For interpretation of the
references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of
the modes identified by the extraction algorithm are reported,
this article.)
together with Mode Indicator Functions (MIFs), one for each of
the three references, are reported in Fig. 2 (lower frame).
MIFs are frequency domain curves calculated from FRFs to high- modal model). Indeed, it has been realized that additional refer-
light those frequencies at which the global response phase lags the ences were unnecessary since they did not improve the modal
excitation by 90 degrees. They are defined in a way such that they extraction algorithm.
exhibit maxima or minima in correspondence of natural In Table 1, frequencies and the description of the modal shapes
frequencies. are reported for the extracted modes.
In the annular disk case the FRF sum (defined as the linear sum- A FEM model of the door is created in MSC PatranÒ and, using
mation of all the measured FRFs and thus representative of the glo- the MSC NastranÒ solver, a structural linear analysis was carried
bal behaviour of the system) is well defined with sharp peaks at out to determine the modes of vibration [22].
certain frequencies indicating a marked linear behaviour of the The trimmed car door structural model is divided into different
system. On the contrary, the same function evaluated on the subsystems characterized by homogeneous dynamic properties.
acquired FRFs for the trimmed car door, is less initiated, with The most significant subassemblies are: untrimmed car door (door
trends far from second order linear systems ones, to indicate the in white with only stamped metal structure), window, window
considerable complexity of the system [21]. seals, window guide rails and plastic trim. Window electrical
This aspect has an effect on the phase of extraction of the motor with its gearbox and loudspeakers are treated as lumped
vibrating modes which leads to great difficulty in interpreting inertias. The entire resulting FE model is characterized by
the results returned by the identification algorithm. In this case 116,172 nodes, 113,414 elements and 44 welding joints. The com-
(differently from the steel annular disk which is a small damping plete trimmed car door weight is about 14 kg. Reference axes X, Y
structure and where a time domain algorithm is used) the best
results are obtained using a frequency domain algorithm, more
suitable for highly damped systems [21]. Furthermore, in this case Table 1
Multi-Reference Modal Analysis is adopted in order to properly Description of the modal shapes of the trimmed car door module.
extract all modal parameters from a set of FRFs, as the system is
Mode Frequency [Hz] Description
characterized by significant modal density in specific frequency
bands. More in detail, three-reference analysis is chosen and in 1 37.51 Local plate crushing mode
2 38.48 Flexibility of the entire door
the range 20–120 Hz the modal shapes are extracted (other poles 3 50.08 Flexibility of the entire door
in the stabilisation diagram do not provide well-initiated modes, 4 63.75 Torsion entire door
since their related modal shapes appear not to be consistent from 5 84.81 Local mode with external plate crush
a physical point of view, and then they are excluded from the 6 115.04 Mode with external plate crush
4 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380
and Z correspond respectively to longitudinal, transverse, and ver-
tical vehicle main directions.
Properties of each subsystem are kept constant in all the
numerical simulations conducted, in order to highlight the depen-
dence of results only from the solving method adopted.
Good agreement between the FEM and the experimental data is
found for all the modes of vibration. As an example, the compar-
ison of numerical and experimental modes is reported for some
extracted modes in Figs. 3–6.
Fig. 7 reports the Modal Assurance Criterion (MAC) matrix
related to the correlation between experimental and numerical
models for the first six modal shapes reported in Table 1. The
MAC shows the orthogonality or the parallelism (i.e. similarity)
between two vectors that in this specific context are the modal
shapes. The MAC value is between zero and one. If the MAC entry
is close to zero, it means that numerical and experimental modal
forms are different [21].
With reference to the annular disk case (where the correlation
FEM-TEST is very high with MAC values above 0.9 for modes of
vibration in frequency band 0–5000 Hz), the diagonal values in this
case are slightly lower and this underlines the inferior predictive
characteristic of the numerical model in the case of the car door.
Discrepancies can be attributed to components characterized by
a typically non-linear behaviour such as door plastic trim, window
gaskets, gearbox with its backlash, . . . they cannot easily to be
modelled without recurring to complex elements and their exper-
imental identification by means of a linear technique, such as
modal testing, in some cases can be unreliable. Nonetheless it is
believed that, for some operating conditions, these non-linear
sources must be taken into account for a correct interpretation of
the results obtained in the following analyses.
The modal analysis is performed up to 2400 Hz. In the high fre-
quency range, modal shapes are very complex and the wire frame
does not seem sufficiently well-resolved to prevent aliasing phe-
nomena. At higher frequency values there are modes of vibration
with deformations attributable to two sources: crushing of the
external sheet with increasing complexity at higher frequencies
(Fig. 8) and bulging at the window gasket (Fig. 9).
In both typologies, there is a low damping value that seems to
exclude that highly vibrating materials, aside from door sheets,
are involved in the vibrating mode.
The frequency contents of these modes appear to be present in
the acoustic FRFs and therefore they are believed to be significant
in the calculation of the acoustic solution. The activity carried out
on the car door led to dynamic experimental characterisation in
terms of transfer functions, the system’s own frequencies, modal
shapes and damping. The numerical model is sufficiently detailed
and can be used for higher level analysis (structural modification),
correlation and update of numerical models. Finally, the modal
Fig. 3. Third modal shape extracted for the trimmed door by means of numerical or experimental techniques, both superimposed on the undistorted shape (Experimental
frequency -> 50.08 Hz, FEM -> 53.12 Hz).
damping value (defined as the ratio between the actual viscous
damping value and the critical one, for each mode [21]) of the
free-free door obtained experimentally is shown in the graph in
Fig. 10, in the frequency band between 30 and 200 Hz, where it
is relatively high. This seems to be justified by the modes of vibra-
tion affecting the entire car door (both the metal structure and the
elements of the set up) with deformations which introduce high
dissipation. Instead, in the presence of frequencies >1000 Hz, lower
values of the damping parameters are obtained.
In this case, by analysing the deformation, there are modal
shapes in which the majority of mode kinetic energy is associated
with the stamped metal structure with crushing features affecting
the outer metal sheets, whereas trimmed plastic and gaskets are
less involved. Hence, these modes involve areas of the car door
characterized by low internal damping materials and this leads
to lower dissipation.
Tuning a structural model of a door in free-free conditions with
a good correlation level over a sufficiently wide frequency range
seems a difficult goal to achieve. This limitation will inevitably
condition the vibro-acoustic models.
The same methodology of structural analysis has led to coher-
ent results on the elementary component and a high degree of cor-
relation was found between the experimental, numerical and
analytical solutions [10,11]. Indeed, the annular disk is easier to
identify since it is a homogeneous steel structure, characterized
by a practically linear behaviour; these particular features has
allowed to easily obtain a reliable and complete modal model
which includes both ‘‘out of plane” and ‘‘in plane” modes [10,11].
Fig. 11 shows, for an ‘‘out of plane” mode with one circumferen-
tial nodal line, the comparison between its experimental modal
shape and its corresponding numerical one, which is represented
in a reduced mesh model characterized by the same nodes and
degrees of freedom of the experimental grid. The measured and
numerically predicted natural frequencies are very close each
other (fTEST = 3007 Hz ffi fFEM = 3059 Hz).
In the following, a quantitative comparison between the simu-
lation results and experimental data is reported, both for the ele-
mentary component (annular disk) and for the complex one
(trimmed car door). Tables 2 and 3 report relative percentage error
and MAC index respectively referred to natural frequency and
modal shape for the first six extracted modes of vibration; for
the elementary annular disk they are listed together with experi-
mental natural frequency and a short description of their modal
shape.
By comparing the information reported in Tables 2 and 3, it can
be assessed how the relative percentage error on the predicted nat-
ural frequencies is always lower for the annular disk case in com-
parison with the trimmed car door one. On the other side, the MAC
values, which give a level of correlation between the experimental
 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380 5

Fig. 4. Modal shape with torsion entire door – Experimental frequency -> 63.75 Hz, FEM -> 67.41 Hz.

Fig. 5. Modal shape more local where the sheet in the lower area can be moved (local mode with external plate crush) – Experimental frequency -> 84.81 Hz, FEM -
> 91.29 Hz.

Fig. 6. Modal shape with deformations of crushing of the plate and bending of the door – Experimental frequency -> 115.04 Hz, FEM -> 119.66 Hz.

3. Vibro-acoustic analysis of the car door in free-free condition

The vibro-acoustic analysis renders it possible to extract the FRF

Fig. 7. MAC matrix of the modal shapes extracted from experimental and from FEM
analyses.
and numerical modal shapes, are always greater for the annular
disk with respect to the trimmed car door. This underlines the
great difficulty encountered in correctly modeling the considered
industrial component due to its dynamic complexity.
between the excitation points on the door and the response mea-
sured with a microphone located, according to the standards, at
1 m from the door and 1.65 m from the ground [1–3]. The results
are obtained both experimentally and numerically. The simulation
analysis is performed creating BEM and FEM models. The BEM cal-
culation method is based on a reformulation of the acoustic prob-
lem in terms of boundary elements [23]. Following this approach,
the boundary is discretized, lowering at the same time by one
the dimensions of the problem. Two distinct, but formally equiva-
lent, BEM are available in the literature: a direct one that involves
the modelling of the actual physical variables and an indirect one
that is expressed in terms of non-physical single- and double-
layer potentials. The indirect method is not as widely used as the
direct one in most areas of engineering applications since the vari-
ables that are approximated in the indirect method are non-
physical surface layer potentials. In practice, with the direct BEM,
the fluid is present on one of the faces of the mesh BEM, while with
the indirect one, the fluid is present on both sides of the mesh BEM
(vibrating structures). Direct BEM is able to solve a closed domain
and the related system of equations is not symmetric; pressure and
velocity are available directly; otherwise in the indirect BEM one is
6 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380

Fig. 8. Modes of vibration extracted at the highest frequencies of the analysis with marked crushing modal deflection of the external sheet.

Fig. 9. Modes of vibration extracted at the highest frequencies of the analysis with marked modal deflection in correspondence with the window seal.

Fig. 11. Comparison between experimental modal shape (left) and numerical one
(right) of an ‘‘out of plane” mode with one circumferential nodal line.

ity; to analyse, using a unified and systematic approach, boundary

Fig. 10. Experimental modal damping coefficient.
allowed to solve the interior and exterior problem at the same time
and the resulting system of equations is symmetric [23–25]. Only
the indirect method was considered in this study as it is considered
more flexible and fits for automotive application where both inte-
rior and external solution computation are often required.
The FEM calculation method is based on a representation of the
geometry and the unknown variables in terms of shape functions
and nodal variables and the approximate solution of a system of
differential equations is sought over a volume domain. This choice
is mainly motivated by the requirements of generality and flexibil-
value problems related to domains of various shapes subjected to
miscellaneous boundary conditions [14,25–26].
Differently from the structural case, where FEM/experimental
comparison is conducted on the modal shapes and thus on the
whole measurement geometry, here the FEM/experimental corre-
lation is evaluated by means of acoustical FRFs; they are calculated
only on a limited number of points of the entire structural geome-
try and considering only one acoustic response measurement point
(output). In detail, two points on the trimmed car door are chosen
as a reference for the excitation of the system (input), in such a
way that they could excite with enough energy all the significant
structural modes.
The points considered for the comparison were those denoted
by 38 (corresponding to the external plate of the door) and 100
(corresponding to the stroke-end stop), as shown in Fig. 12.
Both points were solicited in the Y direction (normal to the
plane of the door) through an instrumented hammer [21]. The
experimental results in the case of the trimmed car door module
 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380 7

Table 2
Error analysis for the first six modes of vibration of the annular disk and modal shape description (i,j stand for number of circumferential and diametral nodal lines).

f [Hz] Test Df(FEM-TEST)/fTEST [%] MAC Modal shape description

Mode 1 1319 1.17 0.95 0,2 out of plane
Mode 2 2838 1.06 0.92 4 nodes in plane
Mode 3 3007 1.73 0.94 1,0 out of plane
Mode 4 3438 1.32 0.93 0,3 out of plane
Mode 5 4691 1.33 0.95 1,1 out of plane
Mode 6 6081 1.23 0.90 0,4 out of plane

Table 3 3.1. Numeric calculation with I-BEM coupled and uncoupled method
Error analysis for the first six modes of vibration of the trimmed car door.

Df(FEM-TEST)/fTEST [%] MAC Two types of acoustic BEM coupled and BEM uncoupled analy-
Mode 1 7.43 0.71 sis were performed on the isolated car door model. In the BEM cou-
Mode 2 7.66 0.70 pled method, the acoustic emission solution takes into account
Mode 3 6.07 0.75 both the vibration of the structure, that is actually the source of
Mode 4 5.74 0.72 the phenomenon, and the interaction between the fluid and the
Mode 5 7.64 0.53
Mode 6 4.01 0.6
structure itself [14,25].
A BEM uncoupled analysis has limits as it is generally applicable
only if the thickness of the structure under consideration is large
enough to avoid fluid structure interactions (this happens in the
case of the annular disk where uncoupled and coupled results
are practically coincident, since interactions between mechanical
and acoustical response are not significant).
The acoustic mesh must be obtained taking into account aspects
related to the maximum frequency of the phenomena that are
expected using criteria present in the technical literature [23–
25]. Some studies suggest verifying the condition that eight times
the minimum length of the elements are always lower than the
wavelength associated with a specific phenomenon to be analysed
(to ensure a minimum fixed number of elements for wavelength)
[26].
In some cases, it is convenient to degrade the acoustic mesh by
Fig. 12. Activity on the door in free- free conditions – Acoustic FRF (p/F) obtained
reducing the number of nodes and elements to avoid high compu-
applying impact excitation on Points 38 and 100. tation times (morphed mesh). Once the acoustic mesh is obtained,
a mesh field corresponding to the experimental one must be built.
In the case of the annular disk the elements of the acoustic
are reported hereafter only for excitation on point 100. The plots mesh have the same dimensions as those present in the structural
report the comparison between the structural behaviour of the one (see Fig. 14), while a morphed process is necessary for the car
door (FRF sum) and its acoustic one (FRF between excitation and door to limit the number of degrees of freedom.
microphones response). A weak correlation of the frequency peaks As a first step for BEM and FEM simulations on automotive phe-
may be observed in Fig. 13, to underline that acoustic response is nomenon, the structural mesh of the car door is imported in Sie-
mildly related to global structural dynamic behaviour. Similar mens Virtual.Lab environment [16]. The acoustic field point
results are obtained in the case of excitation on point 38. represented by the virtual microphone is set at the point where

Fig. 13. FRF sum function and acoustic FRF of point 100 in Y direction.
8 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380
Fig. 14. Annular disk acoustic mesh for BEM analysis (left) – Field point mesh built around the disk and acoustic FEM model realised in LMS Virtual.Lab: from the meridian
section one can see the convex mesh that contains the annular disk (not visible in the image).
it was placed during the experimental tests, i.e. at a distance of 1 m
from the recipient and at a height of 1.65 m from the ground to
reproduce the experimental conditions as faithfully as possible.
The selected excitation points were positioned on the model in
the nodes 38 (on the outside of the door) and 100 (close to the door
lock) of the experimental model shown in Fig. 15. The next step is
to simulate a skin mesh (surface mesh) that is suitable for analysis
with frequency up to 2500 Hz.
The quality of the mesh skin obtained, using a colour map that
relates a colour relative to the highest computable frequency to
each element of the mesh, was verified.
As a last step, all the modal shapes of the structure were trans-
ferred to the skin. As an example, the structural mode at 50 Hz
transferred to the skin is shown in Fig. 16.
Vibro-acoustic analyses were then performed with the aim of
displaying acoustic FRFs (pressure/force curves) at the point corre-
sponding to the virtual microphone in relation to an impulse exci-
tation in the Y direction. A BEM uncoupled analysis was also
performed and an Acoustic Transfer Vector (ATV) approach was
adopted in both cases. ATVs are input–output relations between
the normal structural velocity of the vibrating surface and the
sound pressure level at a specific field point position which allow
to shift from vibration of a structure to pressure and to acoustic
power [27].
3.2. Numeric calculation with FEM method
A calculation was made in the LMS Virtual.Lab environment
using the FEM method and the same field point and excitation
points adopted in the previous analysis. This solution involves
Fig. 15. Maximum frequency map set by the skin used for the BEM.
Fig. 16. The structural mode at 50 Hz transferred to the skin.
inserting a convex air volume that wraps the door [28,29] called
‘‘infinite elements vibro-acoustic” which has the function of simu-
lating the presence of a medium (air in this case) between the
studied solid and the microphone mesh [16,17]. In order that the
external solid performs its task, it must necessarily be convex,
including the entire solid in question, and without discontinuities.
This option was made possible by using the ‘‘mesh wrapper” and
‘‘convex mesh” command [16]. Two convex meshes with different
element size (defined as the mesh element characteristic length)
were initially created. The first volume created has an element size
of 50 mm that would allow a maximum frequency of about
1000 Hz. In Fig. 17, convex meshed volumes with element size of
50 mm and 15 mm are shown.
The problem with this model is that above 1000 Hz the solution
converges with difficulty. For this reason, a solid mesh was created
around the door with finer elements allowing us to reach higher
frequencies (up to 3000 Hz). By contrast, of course, this type of
solution requires more computational effort. For point 38, the com-
parison of FRF of the model with the two different element sizes is
reported in Fig. 18.
From this comparison, it is noticed that the second simulation
gives a solution adequate also at high frequencies, while the first
one, with the coarser mesh, has a worse quality in the obtained
solution. The following Fig. 19 shows the numerical model devel-
oped in LMS Virtual.Lab.
The FEM model developed in MSC Actran [17] is reported in
Fig. 20. The structural and convex grids are characterised by ele-
ment sizes of 7 mm and 25 mm respectively, which are sufficient
to compute frequencies up to 2000 Hz, with an acceptable level
of accuracy.
4. Correlation between numerical results and experimental
data
The results in terms of acoustic FRFs (in the range 30–2000 Hz)
obtained through the I-BEM-coupled, I-BEM-uncoupled, FEM-
 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380
Fig. 17. Convex meshed volume with element size of 50 mm (left) and 15 mm (right).
Fig. 18. The comparison of FRF of the model with the two different element sizes.
Fig. 19. Door imported in the LMS Virtual.Lab environment for the vibro-acoustic
study.
coupled methods are presented and then compared with the ones
of the experimental analysis in Figs. 21–24.
The results obtained with the different computational methods
seem to be sufficiently coherent among them and the differences
among them are due to the diverse approaches adopted. The high-
est discrepancy is noted between the FEM and BEM methods, and
within the BEM methods differences are apparent between the
9
coupled method and the uncoupled one, where the first also con-
siders the fluid–structure interactions, with particular attention
to the influence of the fluid on the structure itself.
Vibration modes frequencies identified by experimental modal
analysis generally do not correspond to significant peak frequen-
cies in the acoustic FRFs; this is probably attributable to fluid–
structure interaction which may lead to a shift of acoustical reso-
nances (corresponding to maximum acoustic energy emission) fre-
quency with respect to structural ones.
Differences between the same acoustic method applied using
the two software systems may be related also to diverse algo-
rithms used for transferring vibration solution from structural to
acoustic mesh.
Observing the previous figures, it can be noted that there is not
an approach which is much more predictive and reliable with
respect to the others and the correlation with experimental results
is encouraging and comparable among all the considered numeri-
cal methods. This seems to further highlight the system’s complex-
ity linked to the strongly non-linear behaviour.
Table 4 lists correlation values, defined as the normalized com-
plex product of the measured and numerical FRF values, in order to
assess the degree of agreement between different numerical
approaches and the experimental data in the evaluation of the
acoustic FRFs showed in Figs. 21–24.
From the values reported in Table 4, for the specific acoustic
FRFs previously considered, it can be noted that the Coupled I-
BEM method gives the highest correlation index.
Computation times required by the various software systems
have been evaluated and they are reported in Table 5.
The computer used has an i7 processor clocked at 2.4 GHz and
16 GB of RAM. The computation time results seem to be consistent
with the computational complexity of the two BEM and FEM
numerical approaches. In particular, the maximum size of the
mesh elements (assuming eight points per wavelength) influences
the calculation times [26,30].
The BEM calculation times are considerably larger than those of
the FEM. For the same mesh density, the FEM produces a sparse
and symmetric system matrix, while the BEM leads to complete
and asymmetric matrices to be reformulated for each frequency.
A deterministic approach like the BEM method allows an accurate
prediction of the acoustic field for structures of any type only for
low frequencies. Higher ones require a much denser surface mesh,
making the method unacceptable in these cases [14]. Moreover, in
the BEM the integrals are particularly complex and may contain
singularities that can increase the complexity of the numerical
10 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380

Fig. 20. The numerical model developed in ACTRAN.

Fig. 21. FRF acoustic in 30–2000 Hz of point 38 in the case of LMS Virtual.Lab I-BEM Fig. 23. FRF acoustic in 30–2000 Hz of point 38 in the case of LMS Virtual.Lab FEM
uncoupled (blue curve) and experimental (red curve). (For interpretation of the coupled (blue curve) and experimental (red curve). (For interpretation of the
references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of
this article.) this article.)

Fig. 22. FRF acoustic in 30–2000 Hz of point 38 in the case of LMS Virtual.Lab I-BEM Fig. 24. FRF acoustic in 30–2000 Hz of point 38 in the case of MSC Actran FEM
coupled (blue curve) and experimental (red curve). (For interpretation of the coupled (blue curve) and experimental (red curve). (For interpretation of the
references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of references to colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of
this article.) this article.)
 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380 11

Table 4
Correlation values for trimmed car door
acoustic FRFs.
Correlation [%]
Uncoupled I-BEM 60
Coupled I-BEM 63
FEM-Virtual.Lab 57
FEM-MSC Actran 55
algorithm used for the calculation and at the same time lower the
accuracy of the numerical solution.
Also during the activity on the disk, comparisons about the
computation time required by the different vibro-acoustic solu-
tions were performed and they are reported in Table 6. In this other
case, the computer adopted is the same as the one for the car door
and the spectral lines to be computed were 5000, with a frequency
resolution of 1 Hz, in order to obtain a bandwidth of 5000 Hz [16].
Table 6 shows that, also for the disk, the I-BEM (coupled or
uncoupled) method is more burdensome than the FE method. As
already mentioned for the car door, the ‘‘Boundary Element”
method (BEM) makes possible an accurate forecast of the acoustic
field for structures of any type only at low frequencies. On the con-
trary, the FE method is exclusively influenced by the number of
degrees of freedom and therefore is more appropriate for high
frequencies.
It is now interesting to show the results of the investigation
conducted on the annular disk, to highlight the reliability of the
developed approach in the case of an elementary component.
Harmonic stationary acoustic simulations relating to the modal
emissions of the system were conducted according to both BEM
and FEM methods.
Once the analysis is started, one can visualise the acoustic pres-
sure field maps for all modes of vibration in order to compete with
both the experimental results and the numerical ones. Using the
same field point as reference, the modal acoustic emissions
obtained with the different numerical simulation methodologies
were evaluated and the results were comparable in all cases.
A high degree of correlation was found between the experimen-
tal and the numerical fields. The numerical solutions obtained with
the different methods (FEM and BEM) are very similar in terms of
values and trends of the calculated acoustic quantities. Therefore,
only differences are found in the computation times and not in
the quality and reliability of the results according to the test data.
In the FEM case, despite the two different convex meshes as
degrees of freedom and regularity of the volumes, (the one in Sie-
mens Virtual.Lab has smaller bending radii that could make the
calculation of the acoustic emission more critical), the results were
similar in the two cases.
The simulation results for the first out of plane modal shape
obtained for a unitary impulse excitation are reported in Fig. 25,
as an example; it will be shown in Table 7 that MAC values are high
for the first three modal emissions (related only to out of plane
modes of vibration) in the experimental and numerical cases. In
Tables 8 and 9 the values of natural frequencies and of the peak
values of acoustic pressure in dB are shown for comparison.
In this kind of analysis, only the out of plane modes of vibration
are considered, since they are the only ones relevant for the acous-
tic emissivity of the component.
The values are very close to each other and the percentage error
is contained. The small differences between the diverse methods
analysed could be correlated to the type of acoustic mesh used
(that is obtained in all cases by a mutation of the structural one),
from the algorithm for the transfer of the modal forms and from
the numerical approximations of the calculation. The deviations,
however, do not seem excessive when compared with the toler-
ances admitted in industrial applications (considering that numer-
ical calculations are often analysed not to evaluate the absolute
levels, but the trend of the system as a result of its variations
and structural changes). On this elementary component (i.e. the
annular disk), however, it is possible to say that the numerical
methods have provided very similar results between them.
In Table 7, the MAC values calculated on the modal emissions in
the experimental and numerical case (BEM and FEM) with which it
is possible to obtain a correlation index in the different cases are
reported. The values between the FEM/BEM numerical cases are
high while lower values are obtained when comparing the FEM/
BEM results with the test case. This could be due to an imperfect
anechoic environment where the measurement was conducted.
From this simulation, it is also possible to extract FRFs for the
individual virtual microphones placed in the field points. In addi-
tion to the comparison of the colour maps, the correlations
between the acoustic FRFs obtained through experimental and
numerical procedures were evaluated. The comparison is per-
formed on two microphone points shown in Fig. 26 (points 132
and 129) individuating the excitation point. The same points were
chosen both in the experimental and in the numerical case. The
comparison between the FRFs extracted at points 132 and 129

Table 5
Computation times required by the various software systems for the car door simulations.

Mesh Skin Mesh Infinite Element Note Time [h and min]

I-BEM coupled 13,284 nodes – Modal approach 26 h and 20 min
I-BEM uncoupled 13,284 nodes – Modal approach 19 h and 10 min
FEM-Virtual.Lab – 67,155 nodes Modal approach 18 h and 50 min
FEM-Virtual.Lab (convex mesh less dense) – 28,456 nodes Modal approach 8 h and 50 min
FEM-MSC Actran (ellipsoid denser) – 46,489 nodes Modal approach 16 h and 30 min
FEM-MSC Actran (ellipsoid less dense) – 24,618 nodes Modal approach 9 h and 50 min

Table 6
Activity on the annular disk – Computation times.

Mesh Skin Mesh Infinite Element Note Time [hours and min]
Coupled I-BEM 6656 nodes – Modal approach 3 h and 10 min
Uncoupled I-BEM 6656 nodes – Modal approach 2 h and 23 min
FEM-Virtual.Lab – 70,956 nodes Modal approach 2 h and 41 min
FEM-MSC Actran – 35,627 nodes Modal approach 1 h and 21 min
12 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380
Fig. 25. Acoustic mapping in acoustic pressure field points for the first vibration
mode of the annular disk at 1334 Hz.
up to 5 kHz are reported respectively in Figs. 27 and 28, as an
example.
From these graphs, it can be noticed that in the experimental
case there is some background noise that is not present in the
numerical case. The numerical FRFs with zero damping have high,
but not infinite, peaks. The theoretical maximum value is not
reached because the frequency resolution of the numerical model
means that there is never a sample in the exact function corre-
sponding to one of the natural frequencies of the system and so
this avoids attaining the asymptotic level.
Table 10 shows the correlation level for the FRFs reported in
Figs. 27 and 28. It can be noted how the numerical methods
applied to the elementary component are enough predictive, pre-
senting smaller errors in comparison with the trimmed car door.
This seems to underline how, in the trimmed car door case, the
error is attributable to the complexity of the component itself
and not to the methodologies adopted, which were proved to be
reliable and accurate in the case of the annular disk.
5. Activity about the door slam
This activity represents the final phase of the study on the car
door. The tests were executed according to a procedure that may
vary from firm to firm since a unified norm does not exist. The ref-
erence location for positioning the acoustic head is the stroke-end
stop between the door-closing hook and the clamp of the chassis.
The point of listening-in is located at a transversal distance of
1 m and a height of 1.65 m from the reference as in Fig. 29. The
acoustic head used for the measurements has two microphones
identified by the measurement system as two different acquisition
channels representing respectively the right and the left ear. The
door used is the passenger side front right door. The car used
was fully trimmed. The door closes due to elastic bands in the inte-
rior of the car which are elongated by the door opening and are
loose when the door is closed (in such a way as to not have a final
acceleration). Three tests were performed with the same spatial
setting of the measuring instruments but with different closing
speeds: 1.20 m/s, 0.67 m/s and 0.46 m/s.
Table 7
MAC values for the first three modal emissions in the experimental and numerical cases.
MAC MAC
BEM vs Test FEM vs Test
Mode 1 0.78 0.77
Mode 2 0.75 0.76
Mode 3 0.73 0.72
In the first two cases, the three doors with their windows, the
rear hatch, and the front passenger’s side window on the passenger
side are closed. Only in the third test, the driver’s side windows
(rear and front) including that of the test door are maintained
open, leaving the doors, the tailgate and the rear passenger’s side
window closed. Speed equal to 1.2 m/s is in the norms as a stan-
dard speed for making noise measurements on door slamming
and so in the following both for experimental and numerical activ-
ity only this velocity value is considered. In order to achieve this
closure speed, the rubber belt is preloaded with a given opening
angle h. Tolerance on speed variations from the target is extremely
low (0.01 m/s). The sampling rate of the microphones signals
adopted was 48 kHz and 7 valid sound tracks are taken.
By reworking the acoustic tracks obtained from the experimen-
tal test, a graph of the acoustic pressure over time is obtained and
shown in Fig. 30.
The results obtained through a time–frequency analysis (Short
Time Fourier Transform – STFT, [31]) are presented in Fig. 31. It
is possible to evaluate the harmonic contents of the pressure signal
during the different instants of the door slamming. Analysing the
waterfall diagram in the 0–2400 Hz frequency range the significant
contributions are found exclusively under 2000 Hz.
5.1. Numerical model and results
In order to study the movements and speeds of all car nodes, the
analysis to be carried out is non-linear mainly due to two factors:
 large displacements (large deformations) occur (geometrical
non linearities);
 there are non-linear materials such as plastics (physical non
linearities).
As far as the activity on the virtual model is concerned, MSC
Nastran is used for the solution of the structural part [32]. The
force in the point of contact between the door and the stroke-
end stop is computed through a transient non-linear computation.
The linear speed at the extremity of the door in proximity of the
lock is assumed to be 1.2 m/s, corresponding to an angular speed
of the door of about 1.2 rad/s. An initial speed was associated to
every point of the door coherent with the reference system used
(a cylindrical reference system whose origin is the lower hinge
and the z axis is the axis of rotation of the door). Two different time
steps are used:
- during the approach phase of the door to the car: time
step = 0.01 s for 8 steps;
Table 8
Frequencies of the first three acoustic modal emissions of the annular disk.
Experimental Numerical (BEM) Numerical (FEM)
Mode 1 1319 Hz 1334 Hz 1334 Hz
Mode 2 3007 Hz 3059 Hz 3059 Hz
Mode 3 3438 Hz 3484 Hz 3484 Hz
MAC MAC
BEM vs FEM FEM (V.Lab) vs FEM (Actran)
0.98 0.98
0.98 0.97
0.97 0.97
 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380 13

Table 9
Pressure Peak Values in dB for the annular disk.

Experimental Numerical (BEM) Numerical (FEM) Numerical (FEM) Fine Mesh

Mode 1 106.8 dB 106.4 dB 106.3 dB 106.1 dB
Mode 2 113.2 dB 114.8 dB 115.0 dB 114.9 dB
Mode 3 118.1 dB 116.5 dB 116.4 dB 116.4 dB

Fig. 28. BEM analysis – FRF extracted at point 129 of the microphonic field point of
the annular disk (red: experimental; blue: numeric with modal damping and green:
Fig. 26. Excitation on annular disk (point 1 on the structural mesh) and the acoustic numeric without modal damping. (For interpretation of the references to colour in
response on the field mesh (points 129 and 132 on the field point mesh). this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)

Table 10
Correlation values for annular disk acoustic FRFs.

Response Correlation [%]

point 132 No modal damping 87.9
point 129 89.3
point 132 Modal damping (from exp. modal analysis) 88.0
point 129 89.5

Fig. 27. BEM analysis – FRF extracted at point 132 of the microphonic field point of
the annular disk (red: experimental; blue: numerical with modal damping and
green: numerical without modal damping). (For interpretation of the references to
colour in this figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)

- during the phase of contact with the stroke-end stop and of

subsequent vibration of the system: time step = 0.0002 s for
1,350 steps.
The ‘‘closed door” condition was defined using the contacts (the
contact between the stroke-end stop is of glued type and the bod-
ies are considered ‘‘glued” when the minimum distance between
two points of contact is lower than 0.01 mm).
The result of transient analysis permits us to individuate the
field of door displacements, velocities and accelerations versus
time. As an example, the velocity field at the instant t = 0.88 s of
the impact between the hook and the frame stroke-end stop is
reported in Fig. 32.
In Fig. 33, the structural contributions to the acoustic radiation
come mainly from the door and in a small part from the elements
adjacent to it but not from the entire side of the car. The transient
non-linear structural (SOL 400) computation results are imported
in the time domain Virtual.Lab environment for the uncoupled
BEM acoustic analysis.
An acoustic skin mesh is created (with dimensions chosen to
guarantee the reliability of the results up to 2000 Hz) correspond-
Fig. 29. Measurement layout for door slam test.
ing to the structural side of the car and on this through a mesh
mapping procedure the structural solution is transferred. In order
to make the simulation consistent with experimentation, a reflect-
ing floor corresponding to the actual one was created, since the
experimental tests are performed in a semi-anechoic chamber.
Indeed, from a physical point of view, it reproduces a rigid, 100%
reflecting body which imposes a zero normal velocity condition. It
can be regarded as an acoustical symmetry plane which allows to
mimic the semi-anechoic chamber hard floor.
To better visualise the sound radiation, two perpendicular
planes are inserted on each other, where it is possible to evaluate
the distribution of the acoustic pressure for each instant and then
to display the animation of the radiation over time. The radiation
displayed on these planes at a given time is shown in Fig. 33.
14 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380
Fig. 30. Microphone time history during door slam at 1.2 m/s (raw signal).
Fig. 31. Waterfall of the STFT of the pressure signal evaluated at the reference.
Fig. 32. Results of the transient analysis visualised in the LMS Virtual.Lab
environment: velocity field at t = 0.088 s (in correspondence of the impact): even
if the visualisation shows the door slightly open, the considered time instant and
the results are related to door completely closed.
Fig. 33. Acoustic radiation projection on 2 planes corresponding to the stroke-end
stop for a fixed instant after the door closing.
The developed model is characterized by a very high number of
nodes and therefore it is very expensive from the computational
point of view. For this reason, in the activity reported in the paper,
it has been decided to proceed with the development of a second
Fig. 34. BEM acoustic mesh and microphonic field point adopted as reference.
BEM model in which only the radiation emitted by the door and
part of the vehicle around it, but not the whole side, is considered.
Another reason for the development of the second model is that
only the part of the vehicle adjacent to the car door contributes
to the acoustic radiation. This can be deduced from the results of
the structural transient analysis reported in Fig. 32, where it can
be noted that the only significant response vibration levels are
localized around the door.
A reflective surface (in green) with the aim of simulating reflec-
tions from the floor is also introduced.
In this case, the results of the transient structural analysis are
also transferred to new reduced acoustic mesh and a solution is
computed in LMS Virtual.Lab time domain BEM environment
(Fig. 34). It is also possible to extract the time history of the acous-
tic pressure as a function of time, and its related FFT (Fig. 35) by
positioning a virtual microphone exactly at the position of the
acoustic head where experimental data are available.
Results of correlation between experimental and numerical
results are reported up to 1000 Hz, both in fine and third-octave
bands. In both cases, it is noted that during the event there are pre-
cise instants where components in a frequency band near 50, 270
and 1000 Hz are excited and they are close to the frequencies of
some modal shapes of the isolated car door.
Correspondent peaks individuated in both the spectra are char-
acterized by shifts in frequency values which may originate from
modal structural model definition; then, these shifts might be fur-
ther amplified in the transient acoustic response of the system,
since in this kind of analysis it is thought that non-linearities are
more relevant considering door slamming event is a transient phe-
nomenon with shock operational excitation. In Fig. 36., FFT analy-
sis low frequency results are reported in third-octave bands in
order to have a comparison of the acoustic response energy not
only on single spectral lines, but as average values referred to
specific frequency bands.
An encouraging numerical/experimental correlation is achieved
only for certain third-octave bands at lowest frequencies. For some
of them (the ones with central frequency equal to 40, 50 and
63 Hz) the offset is less than 3 dB, which in automotive field sim-
 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380
Fig. 35. Pressure FFT recorded by the microphone (upper frame -> experiments, lower frame -> numerics).
Fig. 36. Pressure FFT in six third-octave bands in low frequency range: green:
experiments; blue: numerics. (For interpretation of the references to colour in this
figure legend, the reader is referred to the web version of this article.)
ulations is an error under the acceptability threshold with respect
to acoustic numerical analysis.
In high frequency bands, the simulation seems to be less predic-
tive, by overestimating acoustic response level of the system; this
might be ascribed to energy dissipation phenomena characterized
by strong non-linear features which are not sufficiently detailed in
the model possibly capture the actual dissipation phenomena.
6. Conclusions
On the basis of a parallel activity on a simple component
where aspects related to vibro-acoustic numerical simulation
were analysed, the Siemens Virtual.LabⒸ and MSC ActranⒸ soft-
ware were used in a systematic way for the vibro-acoustic anal-
ysis of specific complex application cases; in particular, the
behaviour of the ‘‘trimmed car door” is explored in detail and
the results of numerical codes are compared with those coming
from the experimental measurements. The agreement is encour-
aging, particularly at low frequencies, whereas at high frequen-
cies discrepancies are noted, due to the complex dynamics of
the system under examination. The difficulty of an optimal tun-
ing of a model is already found on a structural level and this
aspect conditions the characteristics of the acoustic derivative
models. The present study highlights the differences between
the BEM and FEM computation methods, analysing the accuracy
15
aspects related to parameters of the numerical model and com-
putation times. Indeed, differently from the annular disk, in this
application the numerical methodologies provide result some-
times not very correlated with experimental ones; this seems
to be due to the criticalities of the structural model (unique in
all cases) that are considered differently from the different
numerical acoustic methods. The best results in this specific
application appear to be provided by the coupled BEM approach
for the frequency ranges considered. In the FEM approaches, an
influence of the convex surface that surrounds the system is pre-
sent: a minimisation of this (in terms of degrees of freedom)
makes it less regular and therefore even if the calculation time
decreases, the results may be less accurate. In conclusion, in this
article the limits of the numerical approach have been high-
lighted, even though the system is very complex already at the
structural level. This is the case of the trimmed car door for
which it is very difficult to identify structural behaviour and
even more acoustical one.
The future developments of this study will take into considera-
tion hybrid approaches where experimental sub-models are inte-
grated (for example, the modal model extracted on the door)
with numerical models (for example referring to sub-assemblies
of the whole vehicle) to improve the predictive characteristics of
the method. In addition, experimental measurements will be con-
ducted with specific microphone arrays for the identification of
various sound sources, distributed over the complete door, to bet-
ter identify the door slamming phenomenon and to have more
information for model updating.
Author statement
Paolo Silvestri and Carlo Alberto Niccolini Marmont Du Haut
Champ both applied the methodology presented in the paper car-
rying out the experimental activity and developing the simulation
models.
Both analyzed and discussed the obtained results and both con-
tributed to the writing of the paper (writing-reviewing and
editing).
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared
to influence the work reported in this paper.
16 C.A. Niccolini Marmont Du Haut Champ, P. Silvestri / Applied Acoustics 166 (2020) 107380
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge FIAT Research Centre,
Italy, for support in the experimental activity.
References
[1] Parizet E, Guyader E, Nosulenko V. Analysis of car door closing sound quality.
Appl Acoust Elsevier 2008;69:12–22.
[2] Kuwano S, Fastl H, Namba S, Nakamura S, Uchida H. Subjective evaluation of
car door sound, Proc. Sound Quality Symposium SQS 2002.
[3] Kuwano S, Fastl H, Namba S, Nakamura S, Uchida H. Quality of door sounds of
passenger cars. In: Proceedings of the ICA. p. 1365–8.
[4] Bhangale R, Mansinh K. Investing Factors Affecting Door Slam Noise of SUV and
Improved Performance by DFSS Approach, SAE Technical Paper 2011-01-1595,
2011, https://doi.org/10.4271/2011-01-1595.
[5] Song G, Tan C. Door Slam CAE Method Investigation, SAE Technical Paper 2015-
01-1324, 2015, https://doi.org/10.4271/2015-01-1324.
[6] Husic J, Gopal M. Non-Linear Dynamic Analysis of a SuperPlugTM Door Module
Response to a Door Slam Event, SAE Technical Paper 1999-01-0406, 1999,
doi:10.4271/1999-01-0406.
[7] Su H, Dunn C, Krajcirovic A. CAE Virtual Door Slam Test for Plastic Trim
Components, SAE Technical Paper 2003-01-1209, 2003, doi:10.4271/2003-01-
1209.
[8] Miccoli G, Bertolini C, Bihhadi A. Comparative analysis of different
deterministic methods for the simulation of exterior noise acoustic transfer
functions. AIA-DAGA Conference, Merano 2013.
[9] Vansant K, Bériot H, Miccoli G, Bertolini C. An update and comparative study of
acoustic modeling and solver technologies in view of pass-by noise simulation,
8th ISNVH Conference, Graz; 2014.
[10] Lee MR, Singh R. Analytical formulations for annular disk sound radiation
using structural modes. J Acoust Soc Am 1994;95(6):3311–23.
[11] Lee H, Singh R. Acoustic radiation from out-of-plane modes of an annular disk
using thin and thick plate theories. J Sound Vib 2005;282(1–2):313–39.
[12] Lee H, Singh R. Self and mutual radiation from flexural and radial modes of a
thick annular disk. J Sound Vib 2005;286(4–5):1032–40.
[13] Hörnlund M, Papazoglu A. Analysis and measurements of vehicle door
structural dynamic response Master’s dissertation. Sweden: University of
Lund; 2005.
[14] Atalla N, Sgard F. Finite element and boundary methods in structural acoustics
and vibration, CRC Press Taylor & Francis Group, United Kingdom – ISBN
9781138749177.
[15] Beer G, Watson JO. Introduction to finite and boundary element methods for
engineers. Baffins Lane, Chichester, England: John Wiley & Sons Ltd; 1992.
[16] LMS Virtual Lab R16 On-Line Help, Leuven, Belgium; 2016.
[17] MSC Actran On-Line Help, Mont-Saint-Guibert, Belgium; 2016.
[18] Ciskowski RD, Brebbia CA, editors. Boundary elements in
acoustics. Southampton/London: Computational Mechanics Publications and
Elsevier Applied Science; 1991.
[19] Lucifredi A, Silvestri P, Strada S. Experimental modal analysis and virtual
model of an altazimuthal carousel parabolic trough pointing device for solar
energy applications, (2011) 8th International Conference on Condition
Monitoring and Machinery Failure Prevention Technologies 2011, CM 2011/
MFPT 2011, 1, p. 599–613.
[20] Lucifredi A, Silvestri P, Tripepi F. Development of criteria for vibration
qualification of mechanical components through LMS Test Lab mission
synthesis software, (2010) 7th International Conference on Condition
Monitoring and Machinery Failure Prevention Technologies 2010, CM 2010/
MFPT 2010, 1, p. 578–589.
[21] Ewins DJ. Modal testing: theory and practice. United Kingdom: Research
Studies Press; 1984.
[22] MSC Nastran/Patran On-Line Help, Newport Beach, CA; 2016.
[23] Ali A, Rajakumar C, Yunus SM. On the formulation of the acoustic boundary
element eigenvalue problems. Int J Num Methods Eng 1991;31:1271–82.
[24] Banerjee PK, Butterfield R. Boundary element methods in engineering
science. London: McGraw-Hill; 1981.
[25] Amini S, Harris PJ, Wilton DT. Coupled boundary and finite element methods
for the solution of the dynamic fluid-structure interaction problem. In: Brebbia
CA, Orszag SA, editors. Lecture notes in engineering 77. Springer-Verlag; 1992.
[26] Marburg S, Nolte B (editors). Computational Acoustics of Noise Propagation in
Fluids – Finite and Boundary Element Methods, ISBN 978-3-540-77448-8
2008.
[27] Citarella R, Federico L, Cicatiello A. Modal acoustic transfer vector approach in
a FEM–BEM vibro-acoustic analysis. Eng Anal Boundary Elem
2007;31:248–58.
[28] Barbieri R, Barbieri N. Finite element acoustic simulation based shape
optimization of a muffler. Appl Acoust 2006;67:346–57.
[29] Davidsson P. Structure-acoustic analysis: finite element modeling and
reduction methods. Ph.D. dissertation, Division of Structural Mechanics,
Lund Institute of Technology, Lund University, Lund, Sweden; 2004.
[30] Sakuma T, Yasuda Y. Fast multipole boundary element method for large-scale
steady-state sound field analysis. Part I: setup and validation. Acustica-acta
Acustica 2002;88(4):513–25.
[31] Ferrari ML, Silvestri P, Pascenti M, Reggio F, Massardo AF. Experimental
dynamic analysis on a T100 microturbine connected with different volume
sizes, J Eng Gas Turbines Power 2018.
[32] Negrello F, Silvestri P, Lucifredi A, Guerrero JE, Bottaro A. Preliminary design of
a small-sized flapping UAV: II. Kinematic and structural aspects. Meccanica
2016;51(6):1369–85. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11012-015-0309-7.