The noise (unwanted sound) from fans of all sizes, operating in close proximity to people, can be a design constraint due to annoyance or, in the worse cases, health damage. Of the total noise, aeroacoustic noise - produced by unsteadiness in the air - often represents a significant source and is intrinsically linked to the aerodynamic features of the flow field. In this work, the aeroacoustics of low-speed fans are investigated using a compact mixed-flow fan as a test case. The low-speed regime is less developed compared to large-scale, high-speed machines and is increasingly relevant to applications such as micro air vehicles, small wind turbines, and other environmental comfort technologies found in buildings or vehicles. The test case fan Reynolds number is of the order of 104 which is a couple of orders lower than those generally found in gas turbines. Its main sources are therefore best identified experimentally in the absence of proven alternative methods. In order to do this, a way of quantifying fan noise is developed in tandem with control of the aerodynamic operating point. Following a study of sources of the significant broadband and tonal noise, a low-order noise prediction scheme is developed and applied to predict tonal noise with reference to Reynolds number effects. The new, duct-based rig and method has several advantages over the existing sound power measurement rig built to the ISO 5136 standard at Dyson. The approach, which makes no assumptions about the relative power of different modes, has resulted in a rig that is much shorter. Unlike the ISO rig, it is capable of accurate narrow-band tone measurements with sources which excite strong non-plane-wave duct modes (as the modal structure of the sound is determined) for the frequencies of interest. Tests have been carried out at different operating points with a range of geometry modifications produced with 3D printing techniques. In terms of tonal sources which particularly impact sound quality, the mixed-flow impeller alone produces tones due to very high sensitivity to inflow distortion of the mean flow (giving unsteady blade loading). This means that the product inlet must be designed very carefully to optimally condition the flow. Periodicity in the impeller outlet flow produces rotor-stator interaction tones even with a number of guide vanes chosen to satisfy the Tyler-Sofrin theory cut-off criteria. This is thought to be due to abrupt radius change after the guide vanes in the rig (while the theory assumes constant radius). In the product, abrupt radius change also occurs. The sensitivity of the broadband level to inflow turbulence was confirmed to be low in the rig, although the in-product inflow appears much less ideal. The main broadband noise source in rig tests is suggested to be impeller self-noise as only small reductions in rotor-stator interaction noise are achieved with far fewer vanes. The low-order modelling scheme to understand the fundamental unsteady loading noise mechanism compares well to experiments for sample rotor-stator interaction tones. The velocity fluctuations which induce this noise, measured experimentally with a 2D hotwire, are shown to increase in intensity as Reynolds number is reduced towards 104. This is due to a higher importance of viscosity which can give boundary layers that are thicker and liable to laminar separation. Surface treatments such as boundary layer trips could be used to prevent such separation and potentially reduce noise. Based on the thesis findings, further tests, simulations and possible design modifications are suggested to understand and reduce the important noise sources.

The study of turbofan aeroacoustics has become important in academia and industry as noise from other aircraft sources, as jet noise, have been reduced. The EESC-USP Fan Rig is a long-duct low-speed fan experimental setup recently built at the Department of Aeronautical Engineering of the University of São Paulo. The objective is to provide a facility for studying fan aeroacoustics with a flexible configuration that allows changes in operational conditions and geometry of the rig so that each of the noise sources can be treated separately. In this work, three experimental campaign were taken aiming to extend the knowledge of this workbench capabilities and to observe the effect that some parameters can have on noise generation. A performance campaign was carried out to characterise the effects of controllable parameters on the aerodynamic characteristics of the flow. Starting from unrestricted flow to 70% area constraint, and a range of fan speeds, several flow measurements that could be translated into performance quantities were taken: volume flow rate, fan total and static pressures, compression ratio, total and net power, and efficiency. The measured compression ratio ranged from 1.00 to 1.02, with maximum axial Mach of 0.13 and maximum total efficiency of 65%. The surge effect, an unstable configuration characterised by rotor blades stall was also observed. Significant differences in fan performance due to the installation of an Inlet Control Device (ICD) and the rotor-stator spacing were not found, except under surge conditions. A parametric campaign was carried out exploring the effects of fan rotational speed, fan loading and rotor-stator spacing. Acoustic measurements were taken using an array of 77 wall-mounted microphones to provide a baseline data set for future comparisons. Hereby, data was processed to obtain the modal decomposition and power spectrum for each configuration. The last proved useful to compare tonal and broadband noise for each configuration. Experimental results indicate that changes in fan rotational speed scale noise generation mechanisms proportionally, do not affect noise spectral shape, and in consequence, are not useful to distinguish noise mechanisms. Although throttling does not seem to exhibit a clear effect on fan noise, it turns out that it is a good approach for cross-comparisons of other parameters\' effect on fan noise, because of its direct modification on the flow structure within the duct. Results also showed that increasing rotor-stator spacing reduces both blade passing frequencies tone levels and the acoustic power of the interaction modes, which are in agreement with results obtained by similar test facilities. In this work a instrumented stator vane was designed using recently available technologies, as 3D printing and the use of MEMS microphones, to measure this pressure fluctuations. Phase-averaging and the signal from a hall sensor were used to separate broadband content in time series. Broadband level distribution were analysed for two span lines of the instrumented stator vane and for a reference microphone located in the inlet antenna. Broadband levels increased with the increase in fan speed and its distribution over these span lines maintained its shape for different speeds. Cross-correlation of the microphones were calculated and showed decay of zero-delay cross-correlation with increase in distance between microphones over the vane. And, finally, the integral length scale, obtained by the integration of zero-delay cross-correlation curve, showed decay with increase in fan speed. The data generated by this work showed good agreements with what was expected from the literature and will help as input data to the semi-analytical and semi-empirical models that are being developed in parallel by the research group. / O estudo da aeroacústica de fan tornou-se importante na academia e na indústria à medida que o ruído de outras fontes nas aeronaves, como o ruído de jato, foram reduzidas. O EESCUSP Fan Rig é um túnel de vento aeroacústico voltado para fans de baixa velocidade, que foi construído recentemente no Departamento de Engenharia Aeronáutica da Universidade de São Paulo. Seu objetivo é prover uma bancada experimental para o estudo dos mecanismos de geração de ruído de fan com uma configuração flexível que permita mudanças nas condições operacionais e geométricas de forma a isolar tanto quanto possível cada uma das fontes. Neste trabalho foram realizadas três campanhas experimentais visando aprofundar os conhecimentos sobre as capacidades da bancada e observar os efeitos no ruído que algumas variações paramétricas podem gerar. Uma campanha de performance de fan foi realizada para quantificar os efeitos dos parâmetros controláveis sobre o as características aerodinâmicas do escoamento. Partindo de escoamento sem restrição até restrição de área de 70%, e para diversas velocidades de rotação do fan, diversas medidas do escoamento foram feitas para que se pudesse calcular as métricas de performance: vazão volumétrica, pressão total e estática do fan, taxa de compressão, potência útil, potência elétrica de entrada e eficiência. Os resultados apontaram para uma taxa de compressão entre 1.0 e 1.02, com Mach axial máximo de 0.13 e eficiência máxima de 65%. Os efeitos de \"surge\", uma configuração instável caracterizada pelo estol das pás do rotor também foi observado. Diferenças significativas na performance do fan devido à instalação de uma Inlet Control Device (ICD) e pelo espaçamento entre rotor e estator não foram encontradas, com exceção em condições de \"surge\". Uma campanha paramétrica para estudo de ruído foi realizada explorando os efeitos da velocidade de rotação e carregamento no fan, espaçamento entre rotor-estator e condição de entrada do escoamento no duto. Os resultados mostraram que o aumento do espaçamento do rotor-estator reduz os níveis tonais nas frequências de passagem das pás (BPFs) a uma taxa de aproximadamente 4dB quanto o espaçamento é duplicado. Os resultados experimentais indicam que as mudanças nos mecanismos de geração de ruído com a velocidade rotacional do fan escalam-se proporcionalmente, não afetam a forma espectral do ruído e, por consequência, não são úteis para distinguir os mecanismos de ruído. Embora a variação no carregamento não pareça exibir um efeito claro no ruído do fan, verifica-se que é uma boa abordagem para comparações cruzadas, em conjunto com a velocidade de rotação, do efeito de outros parâmetros no ruído do fan, já que, desta forma, é possível fazer uma modificação direta na estrutura do escoamento dentro do duto. Os modos Tyler-Sofrin, esperados pela contagem de pás e aletas usadas no conjunto rotor-estator, foram identificados e a potência acústica desses modos de interação acompanham a potências dos respectivos tons no espectro, levando à conclusão que a maior contribuição para o ruído tonal é, de fato, a interação rotor-estator. Também neste trabalho, também foi projetada uma aleta de estator instrumentada, usando tecnologias recentemente disponíveis, como a impressão 3D e o uso de microfones MEMS, para realizar medições de flutuação de pressão na superfície superior da aleta. Um método de processamento de sinal foi desenvolvido, usando a técnica de \"phase averaging\" combinada com o sinal de um sensor Hall para separar o conteúdo de banda larga em séries temporais. A distribuição do nível de ruido banda larga foi analisado para duas linhas na envergadura da aleta instrumentada e em um microfone de referência localizado na antena de microfones. Os níveis de banda larga aumentaram com o aumento da velocidade do fan e a sua distribuição ao longo destas linhas de alcance manteve a sua forma para diferentes velocidades. As correlações cruzadas dos microfones foram calculadas e mostraram o decaimento da correlação cruzada de zero-atraso com o aumento da distância entre os microfones sobre a aleta. Finalmente, a integral do comprimento de escala, obtida pela integração da curva de correlação cruzada de zero-atraso, apresentou decaimento com aumento na velocidade do fan. Os dados gerados por esse trabalho se mostraram de acordo com o esperado na literatura da área e servem de dados de entrada para modelos semi-empíricos e semi-analíticos que vem sendo desenvolvidos paralelamente pelo grupo de pesquisa.