Simcenter Testing Solutions Simcenter Testlab Sound Diagnosis

2019-08-29T16:35:26.000-0400
Simcenter Testlab

Summary

Details


Direct YouTube link: https://youtu.be/sM21jtaFj1w


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Simcenter Testlab Sound Diagnosis (formerly called LMS Test.Lab Sound Diagnosis) is used to replay sound recordings, apply real-time filters, and calculate sound metrics.

Getting Started

To get started with Simcenter Testlab Sound Diagnosis, go to “Tools -> Add-ins” in the main menu. Turn on “Sound Diagnosis” and press OK.

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Figure 1: Under ‘Tools -> Add-ins’ turn on ‘Sound Diagnosis’

Simcenter Testlab Sound Diagnosis can be run with 62 tokens. After turning the add-in on, a new worksheet is added to the workflow along the bottom of the Simcenter Testlab software as shown in Figure 2.

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Figure 2: ‘Sound Diagnosis’ Worksheet

Before clicking on the ‘Sound Diagnosis’ worksheet, select some time data for listening from the Navigator worksheet. Browse to a LDSF/throughput file, right click on it, and select ‘Add to Input Basket’ (Figure 3).

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Figure 3: Right click on time data and select ‘Add to Input Basket’

Move from the ‘Navigator’ worksheet to the ‘Time Data Selection’ worksheet. Change the Data Source to ‘Input Basket’ and press the ‘Replace’ button as shown in Figure 4.

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Figure 4: In ‘Time data selection’ select ‘Replace’ so time histories appear in DataSet

Time histories should now be showing in the DataSet area (upper left) of the ‘Time Data Selection’ worksheet.

Sound Diagnosis

After adding the time histories in the ‘Time Data Selection’ worksheet, now click on ‘Sound Diagnosis’ as shown in Figure 5.

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Figure 5: ‘Sound Diagnosis’ worksheet

Press the “Make Playlist’ button in the upper left corner as shown in Figure 6.

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Figure 6: Press ‘Make Playlist’ button to activate time histories

Time history recordings are now in the Playlist. Choose the ‘View’ checkbox to visualize time histories in the Strip Chart display as shown in Figure 7

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Figure 7: Click ‘View’ to see time histories in the Strip Chart

Listen by clicking on the ‘Play’ button (arrow icon) as seen in Figure 8. A cursor will track with the sound replay on any time histories displayed in the Strip Chart.

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Figure 8: Sound replay allows instant switching between different recordings

Instantly switch between time histories by clicking on box next to the desired recording. The box turns blue to indicate which recording is being replayed. After clicking on the blue box, the up and down arrow keys can also be used to switch which sound is being played.

It is convenient to instantly switch between sound recordings for comparison, especially for recordings that were acquired at different times, even months or years apart.

To view a live frequency spectrum while playing sounds, open a FrontBack display in the lower right of the screen as shown in Figure 9.

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Figure 9: Display a live spectrum of sound during replay


After opening the display, drag and drop from the display tree. Find the folder ‘Online Data -> Sound Diagnosis (Filtered) -> Instantaneous Spectrum’ and drag the icon labelled ‘Left’ into the newly opened FrontBack display.

If no folders are in the ‘Online Data’ folder, press the ‘Update Results’ next to Display.

When doing sound replay, the spectrum of the sound now updates in real-time in the FrontBack display.

Real-time Filters

It is also possible to apply filters to the sound in real-time while listening to the replay. This can be useful for identifying sound frequencies that affect the perception of sound.

To add filters, click on the buttons in the ‘Filters’ area on the middle left of the screen. There are several different types of filters that can be added as shown in Figure 10. There is no limit to the number of filters can be added.

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Figure 10: Create new filter by pressing corresponding button

Types that can be added include (from left to right) in the filter menu:

  • Lowpass – Define single frequency below which all frequencies pass, above which no frequencies pass
  • Highpass - Define single frequency above which all frequencies pass, below which no frequencies pass
  • Bandpass – Define two frequencies between which all frequencies pass
  • Bandstop – Define two frequencies between which all frequencies do not pass
  • Notch filter – Define single frequency and attenuation to remove
  • Tracking notch filter – Narrow filter, removes specified order
  • Tracking pass notch filter - Narrow filter, removes all content except specified order

For the tracking/order notch filters, if the time history contains multiple rpm traces, scroll to the right in the Filters area to specify the rpm trace to be used for the order filter.

To visualize the filter being used, drag and drop the ‘FRF filter’ icon from the ‘Online Data -> Sound Diagnosis FRF’ folder into the back of the FrontBack display.

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Figure 11: Visualize filter by dragging from folder ‘Online Data -> Sound Diagnosis FRF’ into back of FrontBack display

While listening, filters can be turned on and off by clicking on the “on/off” toggle icon next to a filter as shown in Figure 12. Cursors can be used to set the frequency values of the filters by toggling on the ‘Edit’ field. Only one filter can have the ‘Edit’ toggle on at a time.

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Figure 12: Toggle On/Off filters, use ‘Edit’ to control filter frequencies with cursors

The filter frequency cursors can be changed by moving them in the FrontBack display, even while replay is in progress.

Sound Metrics

Sound metrics, like decibel level, loudness in sones, sharpness, tonality, etc can be calculated and displayed in real-time.

In the FrontBack display, right click on the legend and select “Options…” as shown in Figure 13.

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Figure 13: Right click on Legend in FrontBack display and select “Options…”

In the ‘Curve Legend Options’ menu, select the middle tab called ‘Calculated Content’ as shown in Figure 14.

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Figure 14: Select the ‘Calculated Content’ tab

All available sound metrics are listed on the left side of the ’Curve Legend Options’ menu. Move the desired metrics from the ‘Available’ area to the ‘Selected’ area by pressing the arrow.

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Figure 15: Select Sound metrics from the ‘Available’ column (left) and put them in the ‘Selected’ Column (right)

In the ‘Curve Legend Options’ turn on unit label checkbox to see units like "sones" displayed with the single number values. The prefix field can be filled in so a label appears in the legend as well.

Metric values are shown for both the filtered and unfiltered sound spectrum as shown in Figure 16.

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Figure 16: Metric values for filtered and unfiltered are displayed simultaneously.

Metric values are shown for both the filtered and unfiltered sound spectrum. To overlay the unfiltered data with the filtered data, open the folder ‘Online Data -> Sound Diagnosis (Unfiltered) -> Instantaneous Spectrum’ and drag the icon labelled ‘Left’ into the FrontBack display.

Saving the Work

Use the button “Save Sound Diagnosis” in the lower left to save the Playlist, display settings, filter defintion, etc to a specific run folder within the Simcenter Testlab project. Using the “Load Sound Diagnosis” in the upper left to restore all settings and data.

Enjoy using Sound Diagnosis for listening and metric work!

 

Questions? Post a reply, email scott.beebe@siemens.com, or contact Siemens Support Center.

 

More Acoustic related links:

More Simcenter Processing links:

Other Articles:

KB Article ID# KB000042718_EN_US

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