Additional sound sources are used as actuators in the vast majority of active noise reduction systems. One of the possible opportunities to extend the field of applications of active noise reduction systems is using active structures of variable sound insulation. The paper presents an analysis of ways of reducing noise with a structure of variable sound insulation consisting of a metal plate, active elements (Macro Fiber Composite), and a control system. The paper presents results of acoustic radiation simulations and measurements of sound intensity generated by the structure under the influence of stimulation by an acoustic wave. Simulations of mechanical vibrations and acoustic radiation for the plate were performed with the finite element method and ANSYS software. Simulation results made it possible to select locations for gluing the active elements and sensors. Analyses of the sound pressure level in the space to which the plate is radiating made it possible to determine dominant frequencies in the characteristics and, as a result, indicate vibration modes that can be reduced. Sound intensity measurements were performed with a three-way probe of USP mini Microflown. Results of simulations and measurements show that it is possible to achieve an improvement of the insulating power of a metal plate by approx. 10 dB.

This paper deals with the problem of the effect of discretization level and certain other parameters characterizing the measurement setup on accuracy of the process of determination of the sound radiation efficiency by means of the Discrete Calculation Method (DCM) described by Hashimoto (2001). The idea behind DCM consists in virtual division of an examined sound radiating structure into rectangular elements each of which is further assumed to contribute to the total radiation effect in the same way as a rigid circular piston having the surface area equal to this of the corresponding virtual element and vibrating in an infinite rigid baffle. The advantage of the method over conventional sound radiation efficiency measurement techniques consists in the fact that instead of acoustic pressure values, source (plate) vibration velocity amplitude values are measured in a selected number of regularly distributed points. In many cases, this allows to determine the sound radiation efficiency with sufficient accuracy, especially for the low frequency regime. The key part of the paper is an analysis of the effect of discretization level (i.e. the choice of the number of points at which vibration amplitude measurements are to be taken with the use of accelerometers) on results obtained with the use of the method and their accuracy. The problem of determining an optimum level of discretization for given excitation frequency range is a very important issue as the labor intensity (time-consuming aspect) of the method is one of its main flaws. As far as the technical aspect of the method is concerned, two different geometrical configurations of the measurement setup were tested.