Robust prediction metrics for structure-borne noise in timber buildings

An investigation of velocity-based vibration metrics for predicting structure-borne noise in timber buildings is presented in the paper. The purpose of the study is to derive a robust metric based solely on the vibration response and with a known correlation to the acoustic response in a room. Such a measure is useful for establishing simplified numerical prediction models and for making robust concept assessments. A set of 100 models, based on an example case of a massive-timber building, was generated as a statistical basis for evaluating the degree of correlation between noise and vibration metrics for sound transmission between storeys. The noise metric was calculated by spatial averaging of the sound pressure in the receiver room, while the vibration metric was calculated by spatial averaging of the normal-to-surface-direction velocity in the receiver room. The degree of correlation for linear regression between the noise and vibration metrics was evaluated for various frequency bands. Generally, a high degree of correlation was observed.