Normalization and calibration of microphones in sound-intensity probes

Abstract

A system for normalizing and calibrating the microphones of a sound-intensity probe or a composite of such probes, with respect to a stable comparison microphone with known acoustical characteristics. Normalizing and calibrating are performed using an apparatus 57 consisting of a tube with a loudspeaker inserted in one end and a fixture for holding the microphones of the probe together with the comparison microphone in the other end. The comparison microphone has known acoustical characteristics supplied by the manufacturer. Two banks of quarter-wave resonators 83 and 84 are attached to the side of the tube to absorb standing waves. The sound-intensity probe can be either a two-microphone probe used for measuring a single component of the sound-intensity vector or a probe with four microphones in the regular tetrahedral arrangement used for measuring the full sound-intensity vector. The microphones in the probe are made to have a substantially identical response with the comparison microphone by determining the transfer functions between the microphones and the comparison microphone. The transfer functions and known acoustical characteristics of the comparison microphone are then used to correct the pressure measurements by the microphones, when they are used to measure sound intensity. This ensures that the sound-intensity measurements are accurate and that there is essentially no bias in determining the direction to a sound source from the direction of the sound-intensity vector.