Speaker
Description
Prediction of structure-borne sound from building service equipment (BSE) in heavyweight buildings, as outlined in EN 12354-5, requires knowledge of the normalized impact sound pressure level of floors or walls that the BSE is connected to. Standard tapping machine measurements provide a straightforward method of obtaining this quantity for floors, but are not applicable to walls. For such cases, EN 17823 describes the characterization of stairs and stair isolating elements using complex, narrowband transfer functions according to ISO 10848-1 to determine the impact sound pressure level of the wall. A similar transfer function method forms the basis of EN 14366-1 for the acoustic characterization of piping systems, where injected power and the resulting sound pressure in the receiving room are linked following the power substitution method of EN 15657. However, typical piping systems installed on heavyweight structures typically fulfill the force-source condition. Under this condition, the high effort of narrowband transfer function measurements is not required: RMS values of force and sound pressure — or velocity — in third-octave bands are shown to be sufficient, significantly reducing measurement effort and reducing uncertainties. Furthermore, the proposed simplified approach is suitable for in-situ characterization of BSE.