Applied Acoustics 70 (2009) 1041–1050

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

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

Experimental study on the noise reduction of an industrial

forward-curved blades centrifugal fan
Qi Datong *, Mao Yijun, Liu Xiaoliang, Yuan Minjian
School of Energy and Power Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an 710049, China

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

Article history: Many previous researches have concentrated on the noise of backward-curved (BC) blades and forward-
Received 1 August 2008 curved (FC) multi-blade centrifugal fans. In this paper, an experimental study has been carried out to
Received in revised form 1 January 2009 study the noise reduction of an industrial FC blades centrifugal fan. First of all, the performance and noise
Accepted 6 March 2009
characteristics of the FC centrifugal fan were tested to compare the similarities and differences from
Available online 7 April 2009
those of BC blades and FC multi-blade centrifugal fans. And then, some different volute geometric config-
urations were carried out in order to study the effects of inclined volute tongue, impeller blade-tongue
Keywords:
clearance, hub-volute clearance and their coupling effect to the performance and noise of the FC blades
Noise reduction
Centrifugal fan
centrifugal fan. The aim of many different experimental tests is to validate whether the effects of different
Forward-curved blades modifications to fan performance and noise are additive and to find a good impeller-volute matching to
Experimental study reduce the centrifugal fan noise without reducing performance. The experimental results show that a
good coupled modification not only could reduce the fan noise but also could advance the fan perfor-
mance and extend the operating range.
Ó 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Centrifugal fans are widely used for the ability to generate high
pressure. They are often found in heating, ventilation, air condi-
tioning systems and numerous other applications. But the lower
efficiency and higher noise level of centrifugal fans than those of
axial fans are the primary deficiencies of these machines.
Many experimental studies have been reported on the perfor-
mance of centrifugal fans. Cau et al. showed that a severely dis-
torted primary flow, with early flow separation on the suction
side, and poor matching between impeller outlet and volute ton-
gue induced the inefficiency of these fans [1]. Gong et al. tested
the detailed velocity field near the volute tongue of an FC multi-
blade centrifugal fan using PIV and drew a conclusion that the
matching between impeller outlet flow pattern and volute tongue
had a prominent influence on the flow loss in the volute [2]. Cao et
al. reported that volute width and hub-volute clearance had a sig-
nificant effect to the performance of centrifugal fan [3].
As concerns centrifugal fan noise, many investigators have stud-
ied its generation mechanism and control method. And most of
them focus their attentions on the FC multi-blade, BC blades and
radial blades centrifugal fans. With respect to the noise generation
mechanism of centrifugal fans, Velarde-Suárez et al. [4,5], Younsi
et al. [6] and Lin et al [7] studied the unsteady flow and aerody-
namic tonal noise of FC multi-blade centrifugal fans. In the other
* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: dtqi@mail.xjtu.edu.cn, xjtupower@gmail.com (Q. Datong).
paper, Sasaki [8] explored the influence of Karman Vortex Street
on the broadband noise generated from an FC multi-blade fan. Jeon
et al. [9–12] numerically studied the unsteady flow and aerody-
namic noise of a BC centrifugal impeller near a wedge to verify
the acoustic similarity law developed by Weidemann [13]. Ve-
larde-Suárez et al. determined the tonal noise sources in a BC cen-
trifugal fan using experimental measurement and numerical
simulation [14,15]. Feshe et al. reported that the broadband noise
of a BC centrifugal fan was induced by the flow separation in the
flow passage of the centrifugal impeller [16]. From all the studies
above, it can be concluded that the tonal noise of centrifugal fans
is mostly generated from the unsteady interaction between impel-
ler outlet flow and volute, and the broadband noise is mainly in-
duced by the flow separation in the flow passage of the
centrifugal impeller. A small concentrative region in the vicinity
of volute tongue is the predominant noise source of centrifugal
fans.
With respect to the noise control of centrifugal fans, some ear-
lier methods to BC blades and FC multi-blade centrifugal fans sum-
marized by Neise [17] were based on modifications of the volute
tongue in order to minimize the pressure fluctuations in this zone.
After that, Ohta et al. applied a hybrid-type noise control method
to reduce the tonal noise of a BC centrifugal fan [18,19]. Recently,
Velarde-Suárez et al. reported that a modification of the volute ton-
gue geometry was successfully applied to reduce the aerodynamic
tonal noise of an FC multi-blade fan [20]. Increasing impeller-ton-
gue clearance and inclining volute tongue are the widely used
methods for centrifugal fan noise control. And many researchers

0003-682X/$ - see front matter Ó 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.apacoust.2009.03.002
1042 Q. Datong et al. / Applied Acoustics 70 (2009) 1041–1050
Nomenclature
BPF blade passing frequency (Hz)
FC forward-curved
BEP best efficiency point
SPL sound pressure level (dB)
B volute width (mm)
b1 impeller inlet width (mm)
b2 impeller outlet width (mm)
D0 impeller inlet diameter (mm)
D1 blade inlet diameter (mm)
D2 blade outlet diameter (mm)
D3 vaneless diffuser outlet diameter (mm)
d blade-tongue clearance (mm)
h impeller blade thickness (mm)
have shown that an appropriate clearance could reduce centrifugal
fan noise, but if the clearance further increases, more noise level
reduction will be achieved with decreased efficiency and total
pressure. In order to obtain a more noise level reduction without
decreasing the centrifugal fan performance, some different meth-
ods may be combined. But whether the different noise reduction
and performance improvement methods are additive should be
validated.
To the best knowledge of authors, only few literatures have
been presented on the noise generation mechanism and control
method for the industrial FC blades centrifugal fan [21,22]. The dif-
ficulties are that the efficiency of FC blades centrifugal fan is lower,
but the noise level is higher than that of the FC multi-blade and BC
blades centrifugal fans with the same volute and impeller outlet
diameter.
In comparison with BC and radial blades centrifugal fans, the
FC blades centrifugal fan has a larger blade angle at the impeller
outlet. The impeller outflow absolute velocity of FC blades cen-
trifugal fan is much higher than that of BC and radial blades cen-
trifugal fans at the same volume flow rate, which will induce a
stronger pressure fluctuation on the volute tongue. Moreover,
the profile curvature of FC blade is usually larger than that of
BC and radial blades, which will result in an easier and earlier
flow separation on the suction surface of the FC blade. In com-
parison with FC multi-blade centrifugal fan, the industrial FC
blades centrifugal fan has less blades number. Turbulence flow
scale in the flow passage of FC blades centrifugal fan is larger
than that of FC multi-blade centrifugal fan. According to the anal-
ysis above, the lowest efficiency and highest aerodynamic noise
level of the FC blades centrifugal fan in all types of centrifugal
fans are caused by the poor design of the flow passage and
impeller-volute matching.
In the work reported here, an experimental study on the FC
blades centrifugal fan performance and noise has been per-
formed to compare the similarities and differences from those
of BC blades and FC multi-blade centrifugal fans. And then,
some different volute geometric configurations have been tested
in order to study the effects of inclined volute tongue, impeller-
tongue clearance, hub-volute clearance and their coupling effect
to the performance and noise of the FC blades centrifugal fan.
The fundamental object of the present work is to provide a case
study on the FC blades centrifugal fan performance and noise
characteristics. The second object is to understand whether
the effects of different modifications to centrifugal fan perfor-
mance and noise are additive. And the further object is to find
a good matching between impeller and volute to reduce the
noise without decreasing performance during the whole flow
rate range.
Q0 volume flow rate at BEP (m3/min)
Q1 volume flow rate at highest total pressure point (m3/
min)
Qmax maximum volume flow rate (m3/min)
Qmin minimum volume flow rate (m3/min)
R1 small radius of volute tongue (mm)
R2 large radius of volute tongue (mm)
Z impeller blade number
b1A blade inlet angle (°)
b2A blade outlet angle (°)
d1 shroud-volute clearance (mm)
d2 hub-volute clearance (mm)
h inclined angle of volute tongue (°)
2. Experimental device
The experimental measurement has been carried out in a hemi-
anechoic chamber of the National Engineering Center of Fluid
Machinery and Compressor, at Xi’an Jiaotong University. The useful
size of the hemi-anechoic chamber is 6.1 m long by 2.8 m wide by
3.6 m high. The inside surfaces are all lined with mineral wool
wedges that are 59 cm deep, which has a good absorption charac-
teristics at frequency above 150 Hz.
A standard test facility for the performance and noise of the
investigated fans has been made in the hemi-anechoic chamber
according to China Standards GB/T 2888-91: Methods of noise
measurement for fans, blowers, compressors and roots blowers,
and GB/T-1236-2000: Industrial fans performance testing using
standardized airways. Fig. 1 shows a sketch of the test facility with
its main elements and Fig. 2 shows the photograph of the test set-
up in the hemi-anechoic chamber. Before indraft into the fan, air
flows through a straightener in order to eliminate the flow distor-
tion at the fan inlet. At the inlet of the pipe, a flow regulation unit
permits to modify the fan volume flow rate.
A DYM3 aneroid barometer is used to measure the ambient
pressure and A WSB-A1 thermometer–hygrometer is used to mea-
sure the ambient temperature and humidity. The static pressure at
the sections A and B is measured with a YJB-150 compensate-type
micropressure meter and U-tube, respectively. The rotation speed
of the motor is managed by a SIMENS MicroMaster440 frequency
converter and the speed is measured by a photoelectric hand-held
digital tachometer SZG-441. The shaft power is measured by two
G26-W AC power meters.
In order to eliminate the experimental error due to ambient
parameter fluctuation, all the experimental performance data are
Fig. 1. Sketch of the test installation.
 Q. Datong et al. / Applied Acoustics 70 (2009) 1041–1050 1043

Fig. 2. Photograph of the test setup in the hemi-anechoic chamber.

transformed into the results corresponding to suction condition at

standard temperature and pressure (STP) using the MGS fan per-
formance acquisition and analysis system developed by Xi’an Jiao-
tong University [23].
As shown in Fig. 1, sound pressure measurements at 1 m away
from the fan exit have been made using a PCB 377A02 1/2 in.
microphone. The signals from the microphone were amplified by
a PCB 426D01 preamplifier and then managed by an LMS digital
data acquisition and analysis system SCADASIII 305. The data
acquisition frequency is chosen equal to 100 kHz per channel in or-
der to obtain a good resolution. Both the linear and A-weighted
sound pressure levels (SPLs) have been obtained with a fast Fourier
Transform (FFT). Before the experimental test, the microphone is
calibrated with a Larson Davis Model CAL200 sound level calibra-
tor, which provides a choice of calibration SPLs, 94 dB and
114 dB at a frequency of 1000 Hz.
The maximum uncertainties for different instruments are as
follows:
DYM3 aneroid barometer: ±200 Pa
WSB-A1 thermometer–hygrometer: ±2 °C and ±10%RH
Fig. 3. Sketch of original centrifugal fan.
YJB-150 compensate-type micropressure meter: ±0.8 Pa
SZG-441 photoelectric hand-held digital tachometer:
±0.05%(±1 rpm) three modified volute tongues are listed in Table 2. The modified
PCB 377A02 1/2 in. microphone: ±2 dB centrifugal fans are named No. V1, No. V2 and No. V3, respectively.
PCB 426D01 preamplifier: ±0.47 dB, with a confidence level of The second type modification is the hub-volute clearance. As
95%. shown in Fig. 5, three modified centrifugal fans have different
Larson Davis CAL200 sound level calibrator: ±0.1 dB and ±1 Hz. increments of hub-volute clearance DB = 5 mm (No. B1), 10 mm
(No. B2) and 15 mm (No. B3), respectively.
3. Tested centrifugal fan The final modified centrifugal fan consisting of the coupled
modifications of volute tongue geometry and hub-volute clearance
3.1. Original centrifugal fan is tested in order to validate whether the effects of different noise
reduction and performance improvement methods are additive.
An original centrifugal fan and its modified products are chosen
for the experimental measurement. The difference between the
original fan and its modified machines is just the volute geometry, Table 1
while impeller is the same. The shrouded impeller has 12 FC blades Original fan dimensions.
and rotates at 1450 rpm with a fluctuation level lower than 0.5% Vaneless diffuser outlet diameter D3 (mm) 725
for the whole flow range. At the outlet of the impeller blades, a Impeller blade outlet diameter D2 (mm) 630
vaneless diffuser rotates with the impeller. The profile of the origi- Impeller blade inlet diameter D1 (mm) 240
Impeller inlet diameter D0 (mm) 210
nal volute is composed of four 1/4 circular arcs. Fig. 3 shows the
Impeller inlet width b1 (mm) 110
sketch of the original fan and Table 1 summarizes the main dimen- Impeller outlet width b2 (mm) 57
sions of the original fan. The impeller blade-volute clearance is Impeller blade number Z 12
9.3% of impeller blades outlet diameter, which approximates the Impeller blade thickness h (mm) 2.5
value recommended by Simth et al. [24]. Blade inlet angle b1A (°) 38
Blade outlet angle b2A (°) 126
Volute width B (mm) 101
3.2. Modified centrifugal fans Shroud-volute clearance d1 (mm) 14
Hub-volute clearance d2 (mm) 19
Three different types of modified centrifugal fans are tested. The Volute tongue radius R1 (mm) 19
Volute tongue radius (% of R1/D2) 3.0
first type modification is carried out in the volute tongue, by
Impeller blade-tongue clearance d (mm) 58.5
increasing the impeller blade-tongue clearance and inclining the Impeller blade-tongue clearance (% of d/D2) 9.3
volute tongue, as shown in Fig. 4. Dimensions of the original and
1044 Q. Datong et al. / Applied Acoustics 70 (2009) 1041–1050

24

20

16

Linear SPL (Pa)

12

-4

-8
0 5000 10000 15000 20000
Frequency (Hz) Lin A
Fig. 6. SPL of background noise in the hemi-anechoic chamber.

A-weighted SPLs. The overall linear SPL of background noise is typ-

ically around 24 ± 2 dB. Noise in the low frequency strongly dom-
inates the SPL spectrum, mainly due to building-services and
vibration noise. SPLs in the high frequencies are generally below
4 dB, and the overall SPL of background noise is much lower than
the fan noise level.
Fig. 4. Sketch of inclined volute tongue.

4.2. Original fan performance curve and noise

Table 2
Detailed dimensions of inclined volute tongues. Fig. 7 shows the original fan total pressure and efficiency
against volume flow rate. Q0 = 50.8 m3/min refers to the volume
Inclined angle h (°) Radius R1 (mm) Radius R2 (mm)
flow rate at best efficiency point (BEP) and Q1 = 28.8 m3/min refers
Original 0 19 19 to the volume flow rate at highest total pressure point. Qmin =
No. V1 26 19 74
14.3 m3/min refers to the minimum volume flow rate and
No. V2 31 19 63
No. V3 20 19 56 Qmax = 67.5 m3/min refers to the maximum volume flow rate. The
centrifugal fan runs under part loading operating condition when
the volume flow rate is lower than Q1. Unstable flow can occur dur-
ing these conditions, at which the rotating stall associating with
flow separation on the suction surface of impeller blades could re-
sult in the centrifugal fan performance decreasing and noise
increasing [25].
In Fig. 8, the overall A-weighted SPL and A-weighted SPL at
blade passing frequency (BPF) have been represented as a function

Qmin Q1 Q0 Qmax
2250
2200
Total pressure (Pa)

2150
2100 Efficiency
2050 Total pressure
2000
0.7
Efficiency

0.6
Fig. 5. Sketch of modification of hub-volute clearance.

0.5
4. Result and discussion
0.4
4.1. Background noise 10 20 30 40 50 60 70
Volume flow rate (m3/min)
Fig. 6 shows a typical linear SPL spectrum of the background
noise in the hemi-anechoic chamber, as well as overall linear and Fig. 7. Original fan performance curve.
 Q. Datong et al. / Applied Acoustics 70 (2009) 1041–1050 1045

of volume flow rate, respectively. Both the lowest values of the
overall SPL and SPL at BPF correspond to the volume flow rate
Q1. And SPL at BPF evidently increases as the volume flow rate
far away Q1, but the overall SPL just slightly increases with the vol-
ume flow rate when it is lower than Q1. The SPL-volume flow rate
function of the tested FC centrifugal fan has an obvious difference
from the BC blades centrifugal fan [14] and FC multi-blade centrif-
ugal fan [4] tested by Velarde-Suárez. In his works, the lowest val-
ues of both the tested fans noise correspond to the BEP, but the
lowest value of present fan noise corresponds to the highest total
pressure point. Moreover, Velarde-Suárez has drawn a conclusion
from the FC multi-blade centrifugal fan tonal noise characteristics
that when the flow rate increases, the wakes become bigger and
tonal noise of the centrifugal fan also increases [4]. But for the
tested FC blades centrifugal fan, tonal noise-volume flow rate func-
tion at the volume flow rate less Q1 is not the same as the conclu-
sion of Velarde-Suárez. This difference is not owing to the rotating
stall of the impeller blades, although the performance drop is grad-
ual when the volume flow rate is less than Q1. Mongeau et al. [26],
Suzuki et al. [27] and Okada et al. [28] have experimentally studied

2250
100

95 2200
Overall
90 BPF
A-weighted SPL (dB)

Total pressure (Pa)

2150
85

80 2100
Original fan
75
2050 Modified fan No.V1
70 Modified fan No.V2
2000 Modified fan No.V3
65

60 1950
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 10 20 30 40 50 60 70
3 3
Volume flow rate (m /min) Volume flow rate m /min
Fig. 8. A-weighted SPL versus volute flow rate. Fig. 10. Effect of the volute tongue modifications to the total pressure.

100 100
A-weighted SPL (dB)

A-weighted SPL (dB)

90 90
Qmax Q0
80 80
70 70
60 60
50 50
40 40
30 30
1000 10000 1000 10000
Frequency (Hz) Frequency (Hz)
(a) (b)

100 100
A-weighted SPL (dB)

90
A-weighted SPL (dB)

Q1 90
Qmin
80 80
70 70
60 60
50 50
40 40
30 30
1000 10000 1000 10000
Frequency (Hz) Frequency (Hz)
(c) (d)
Fig. 9. A-weighted SPL spectra of original fan at four different volume flow rates: (a) Qmax; (b) Q1; (c) Q0; and (d) Qmin.
1046 Q. Datong et al. / Applied Acoustics 70 (2009) 1041–1050

0.75 100

0.70
95
Original fan

Overall A-weighted SPL (dB)

0.65 Modified fan No.V1
90 Modified fan No.V2
0.60 Modified fan No.V3
Efficiency

Original fan
Modified fan No.V1 85
0.55
Modified fan No.V2
Modified fan No.V3 80
0.50

0.45 75

0.40
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 70
10 20 30 40 50 60 70
3
Volume flow rate (m /min) Volume flow rate ( m /min)
3

Fig. 11. Effect of the volute tongue modifications to the efficiency.

Fig. 12. Effect of the volute tongue modifications to the overall A-weighted SPL.

the noise generated by rotating stall in centrifugal impeller and

draw a conclusion that the frequency of stall noise is usually accor-
dance with the following formulation:
nin
fi ¼
60
where n varies between 0.65 and 0.92, i is the number of stall cell
(usually 1 or 2), n is the rotational speed (r/min). Parrondo et al.
[29] also investigated the effect of flow rate on the pressure fluctu-
ations and noise in a centrifugal pump, and obtained a similar result
with the present FC blade centrifugal fan. And the explanation is
that minimum pressure fluctuation at design condition due to a
good matching between flow coming out the impeller and volute.
However, at off-design conditions the relative velocity at the impel-
ler outlet forms a large outflow deviation angle, which leads to
strong flow disturbances and aerodynamic noise.
Fig. 9 shows the A-weighted SPL spectra measured at the fan
exit for four different volume flow rates. Similarity to the other
works, the tested fan noise level is dominated by the tonal noise,
and the peaks at BPF (290 Hz for the tested fan) and its second har-
monic appear clearly in these four spectra. The noise peak value at
7720 Hz is generated from the frequency converter, which does not
change with the volume flow rate. Both the tonal noise and broad-

100 100
A-weithted SPL(dB)

90 90
A-weithted SPL(dB)

Original fan Modified fan No.V1

80 80
70 70
60 60
50 50
40 40
30 30
1000 10000 1000 10000
Frequency(Hz) Frequency(Hz)
(a) (b)
100 100
A-weithted SPL(dB)

90 90
A-weithted SPL(dB)

Modified fan No.V2 Modified fanNo.V3

80 80
70 70
60 60
50 50
40 40
30 30
1000 10000 1000 10000
Frequency(Hz) Frequency(Hz)
(c) (d)
Fig. 13. A-weighted SPL spectra of original fan and three modified fans at volume flow rate Qmax. (a) Original fan; (b) Modified fan No. V1; (c) Modified fan No.V2; and (d)
Modified fan No. V3.
 Q. Datong et al. / Applied Acoustics 70 (2009) 1041–1050 1047

2300 tongue could reduce the pressure fluctuation on the volute tongue,
but could not prevent the flow separation and inverse flow in the
2250 centrifugal fan. From the analysis above, we can conclude that
the modification of volute tongue could make a good reduction
Total pressure (Pa)

2200
2150
2100
Original fan
2050 Modified fan No.B1
Modified fan No.B2
2000
Modified fan No.B3
1950
10 20 30 40 50
3
Volume flow rate (m /min)
Fig. 14. Effect of hub-volute clearance to the total pressure.
band noise increase with the volume flow rate far away from the
highest total pressure point Q1. Although the SPL of broadband
noise of the tested fan at volume flow rate near Q1 is just a little
lower than that of tonal noise, the tonal noise dominates the over-
all SPL for the whole flow range.
4.3. Effect of volute tongue geometry
The modifications of volute tongue have affected to the total
pressure and efficiency, as shown in Figs. 10 and 11. The total pres-
sure of all modifications is slightly lower than that of the original
fan at volume flow rate more than Q1, and the efficiency of all mod-
ifications is slightly higher than that of the original fan at volume
flow rate less than Q0. The modifications of volute tongue have af-
fected to the overall A-weighted SPL, as shown in Fig. 12. All the
three modifications have a good noise reduction to the original
fan at the entirely flow rate range. The reduction value of the over-
all A-weighted SPL increases with the volume flow rate far away
from Q1.
Fig. 13 shows the A-weighted SPL spectra of the original and
three modified fans No. V1, No. V2 and No. V3 at the maximum vol-
ume flow rate Qmax. It can be seen that the SPLs of all three modi-
fied fans at BPF and its second harmonic are less than those of the
original fan, but the SPLs of broadband noise are almost the same
for all four centrifugal fans. It indicates that the inclined volute
of centrifugal fan tonal noise with little effect on the broadband
noise level, but with slightly decreasing the total pressure. In all
the modifications, modified centrifugal fan No. V1 has the highest
noise level reduction and lowest total pressure fall.
4.4. Effect of hub-volute clearance
The modifications of hub-volute clearance have affected to the
total pressure and efficiency, as shown in Figs. 14 and 15. With re-
spect to Fig. 14, not only the total pressure and efficiency of all the
modifications have an obvious improvement at volume flow rate
60 70 80 more than Q1, but also the maximum volume flow rate of all the
modifications has extended. According to the experimental results,
the bigger the hub-volute clearance is, the higher the maximum
volume flow rate is. As shown in Fig. 15, the efficiency of all the
modifications is higher than that of the original fan at the whole
flow range.
The modifications of hub-volute clearance have affected to the
overall A-weighted SPL, as shown in Fig. 16. At the volume flow
rate more than Q1, a good noise reduction is achieved. But at the
volume flow rate less than Q1, overall A-weighted SPL of all three
modified fans is slightly higher than that of the original fan. Figs.
17 and 18 show the A-weighted SPL of four centrifugal fans at
Q = 65.5 m3/min and Q = 32 m3/min, respectively. At high volume
flow rate, the SPL of broadband noise is nearly the same for four
centrifugal fans, and the overall noise reduction is due to the noise
reduction at BPF. But at low volume flow rate, the increase of the
broadband noise level results in that the overall noise level of all
three modifications is higher than that of the original fan. The in-
crease of the centrifugal fan broadband noise level at low volume
rate might be generated from the vortex flow in the centrifugal
impeller and volute casing. Modified fan No.B3 has the best
advancement of aerodynamic performance and noise reduction
in the all three modifications.
4.5. Coupling effect of volute tongue geometry and hub-volute
clearance
It is interesting to study the coupling effect of the volute tongue
geometry and hub-volute clearance to the fan performance and

100
0.75
Original fan
Overall A-weighted SPL (dB)

0.70 95 Modified fan No.B1

Modified fan No.B2
0.65 90 Modified fan No.B3

0.60
Efficiency

Original fan 85
0.55 Modified fan No.B1
Modified fan No.B2 80
0.50 Modified fan No.B3
75
0.45

0.40 70
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
3 3
Volume flow rate (m /min) Volume flow rate(m /min)
Fig. 15. Effect of hub-volute clearance to the efficiency. Fig. 16. Effect of volute width to the overall A-weighted SPL.
1048 Q. Datong et al. / Applied Acoustics 70 (2009) 1041–1050

100 100

A-weithted SPL(dB)
90 90

A-weithted SPL(dB)
Original fan Modified fan No.B1
80 80
70 70
60 60
50 50
40 40
30 30
1000 10000 1000 10000
Frequency(Hz) Frequency(Hz)
(a) (b)

100 100
A-weithted SPL(dB)

90

A-weithted SPL(dB)
Modified fan No.B2 90 Modified fan No.B3
80 80
70 70
60 60
50 50
40 40
30 30
1000 10000 1000 10000
Frequency(Hz) Frequency(Hz)
(c) (d)
3
Fig. 17. A-weighted SPL spectra of four different fans at volume flow rate Q = 65.5 m /min. (a) Original fan; (b) Modified fan No. B1; (c) Modified fan No.B2; and (d) Modified
fan No. B3.

70 2300

2250

60 2200
A-weighted SPL (dB)

Total pressure(Pa)

2150

50 2100

2050
Original fan
Original fan
40 Modified fan No.B1 2000 Modified fan No.V1
Modified fan No.B2 Modified fan No.B3
1950
Modified fan No.B3 Modified fan No.V1B3
30 1900
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
1000 10000 3
Frequency (Hz)
Volume flow rate(m /min)
Fig. 19. Total pressure of four different centrifugal fans.
Fig. 18. A-weighted SPL spectra of four different fans at volume flow rate
Q = 32 m3/min.

noise. A modified centrifugal fan No. V1B3, which combines the
modifications of the fan No. V1 and No. B3, has been tested to
understand whether the effects of different modifications to fan
performance and noise are additive.
Figs. 19 and 20 show the total pressure and efficiency of the ori-
ginal fan, modified fan No. V1, No. B3 and No. V1B3, respectively.
The total pressure and efficiency of the modified fan No. V1B3
are between those of the modified fans No. V1 and No. B3. And
the performance of modified fan No. V1B3 is better than that of
the original fan at the whole flow range. Fig. 21 shows the overall
A-weighted SPL of four different fans. Similarity to the perfor-
mance, the noise level of the modified fan V1B3 is between that
of the modified fans No. V1 and No. B3. And also, the overall A-
weighted SPL of the modified fan V1B3 is lower than that of the ori-
ginal fan at the whole flow range. From the experimental result
above, the modified fan No. V1B3 not only reduces the fan noise
but also advances the fan performance and extends the operating
range.
Moreover, both modifications of the volute tongue geometry
and hub-volute clearance have effects on the noise and aerody-
 Q. Datong et al. / Applied Acoustics 70 (2009) 1041–1050 1049

0.75 the whole flow range. But the insufficiency is that total pressure of
all the modifications is a little lower than that of the original fan at
0.70 high volume flow rate.
The modified fans No. B1, B2 and B3, which increase the hub-
0.65 volute clearance, show a good advancement in the fan total pres-
sure and efficiency for the whole flow range. Moreover, increasing
0.60 the hub-volute clearance could extend the maximum volume flow
Efficiency

rate of the centrifugal fan. And also, a good noise reduction

Original fan
0.55 achieves at the high volume flow rate, but the noise level of all
Modified fan No.V1
modified fans is higher than that of the original fan at the low vol-
Modified fan No.B3
0.50 ume flow rate.
Modified fan No.V1B3 The modified fan No. V1B3, which combines the modifications
0.45 of the fan No. V1 and B3, achieves a good balance between fan per-
formance and noise for the whole flow range. Not only total pres-
0.40 sure and efficiency of the modified fan are higher than those of the
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 original fan, but also the overall A-weighted noise level of the mod-
3
Volume flow rate(m /min) ified fan is lower 1–11 dB than that of the original fan at the whole
flow range.
Fig. 20. Efficiency of four different centrifugal fans. The case study shows that the effects of volute tongue geometry
and hub-volute clearance to this type centrifugal fan performance
and noise could not be simply added. But a good coupling modifi-
cation not only reduces the fan tonal noise but also advances the
95 fan performance and extends the operating range. It should be
Original fan interesting to extend this work by using numerical optimization
Modified fan No.V1 method to find an optimal impeller-volute matching.
90
Overall A-weighted SPL(dB)

Modified fan No.B3

Modified fan No.V1B3
85
80
75
70
10 20 30 40 50 60
3 J. Unsteady flow pattern characteristics downstream of a forward-curved
Volume flow rate (m /min)
Fig. 21. Overall A-weighted SPL of four different centrifugal fans.
namic performance of the centrifugal fan, but their coupling effect
could not be simply added. Geometrical configuration of the volute
tongue is sensitive to the noise level and aerodynamic performance
of the centrifugal fan. But the unsteady nonlinear flow in this re-
gion is very complex due to potential and viscous flow interaction.
The formulation SPL = f(d1, d2, h) could not be expressed as a simply
linear function, some optimal technique, such as orthogonal design
of experiment (DOE), response surface method (RMS), should be
applied to solve the minimal value of SPL, with the restriction con-
dition of not reducing the performance of the centrifugal fan.
5. Conclusions
Many previous studies have concentrated on the noise of BC
blades and FC multi-blade centrifugal fans. In this paper, an exper-
imental test is carried out to study the performance and noise
characteristics of an industrial FC blades centrifugal fan. Different
geometries of the volute tongue and hub-volute clearance modifi-
cations have been tested. The ultimate object of this work is to re-
duce the noise without decreasing performance during the whole
flow range.
The modification of volute tongue geometries, such as the mod-
ified fan No. V1, V2 and V3, show a good reduction of fan noise for
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