Investigation of the Herschel-Quincke Tube Concept as a Noise Control Device for Turbofan Engines

Abstract

An innovative implementation of the Herschel-Quincke tubes concept for the reduction of noise from turbofan engines is proposed here. The approach consists of installing circumferential arrays of Herschel-Quincke (HQ) tubes or waveguides in the inlet of the turbofan engine. An analytical technique was developed to predict the effects of HQ tubes applied to circular inlets. The modeling technique involves modeling the tubes-inlet interfaces as finite piston sources that couple the acoustic field inside the inlet with the acoustic field within the HQ tubes. An optimization technique based on genetic algorithms was also developed to be able to design and optimize the system parameters. The accuracy of the model was validated with experimental data obtained from two types of turbofan engines. Analytical predictions are shown to correlate well with experimental data. The analytical model is then used to provide insight into the noise control mechanisms involved in the system. It is shown that the energy in an incident mode is in part reflected back to the fan and that some energy is also scattered into other higher-order modes. Thus, the suppression of a particular mode is due to the combination of the scattered contributions from the various incident modes. The effects of the system parameters were analyzed and parametric studies were conducted. Different configurations for the arrays of HQ tubes such as helical patterns or tubes at an angle with respect to the inlet axis were also investigated. The results show the great potential of the HQ tubes system to reduce noise from turbofan engines.