Architectural

acoustics
ARCH-2203

SAIMA SULTANA

ASSISTANT PROFESSOR,

DEPARTMENT OF ARCHITECTURE

PRIMEASIA UNIVERSITY
Lecture _07
Room Acoustics
Sound Propagation
Reflection
Diffusion
Diffraction
Pattern of
Reflected Sound
Shading indicates area of distribution between rays shown
 Acoustic quality of a room depends on:
a) Size and shape of the room
b) Positioning of absorbent and reflecting surface of the room.
c) Reverberation time.
 Room size and shape Room should be like this
Than like this

▪ There is a limit to size of the room.

s
▪ With the same power spoken, a sound
will be heard faint in a gymnasium than s
at a class room.
▪ Limit of size is 3,000,00 cft or 8400m³
▪ The room can be made larger than indicated, at the expense of using
more absorbent materials.

▪ The best sound is received in the ‘near field’ where the direct sound
dominates over any reflections.

▪ This suggests that the distance between the speaker (or sound
source) should be as small as possible: a short, wide room is better
than the same area in an elongated form.
s
 Room size and shape

▪ Intelligibility is reduced beyond about 70° from the direction the speaker is facing, and this sets a limit to width.

▪ The length should be between 1.2 and 2 times the width of the room. A trapezoidal plan may have several advantages.

▪ In normal speech, 6–10 syllables are pronounced per second, which, on average, corresponds to 0.13 s per syllable.
The same sound may arrive at a listener first by a direct path and after a reflection again, with a time delay. If this delay
is within 0.035 s (35 ms), the second arrival will not be distinguishable from the first; it will reinforce it. If the delay is
more than about half the time per syllable (0.06–0.07 s), it will be perceived as a repetition of the same sound, i.e. an
echo. A delay between the two limits (0.035 and 0.07 s) may give a blurring effect.
 Positioning of absorbent and reflecting surface of the room

▪ Ideally, every listener in a lecture hall, ▪ Specular Reflection

theatre, or concert hall should hear the
▪ Specular reflection occurs when sound reflects off a hard, polished
speaker or performer with the same
surface. This characteristic can be used to good advantage to create an
degree of loudness and clarity. Since this
effective image source.
is obviously impossible by direct-path
sound, the essential design task is to ▪ In ancient Greek and Roman theatres, seats were arranged on a steep
devise methods for reinforcing desirable conical surface around the performers. The virtue of this arrangement is
reflections and minimizing and that the sound energy travels to each location with minimal attenuation.
controlling undesirable ones.

▪ Normally only the first reflection is

considered in ray diagramming since it is
strongest. Second and subsequent
reflections are usually attenuated to the
point that they need not be considered
except for the special situations of flutter,
echoes, and standing waves:
▪ The same effect can be accomplished by placing the sound source above the seats. This is not practical physically, but it
can be accomplished effectively by the use of a reflecting panel. The panel dimension must be at least one wavelength at
the lowest frequency under consideration.
▪ Echoes
▪ An echo is the distinct repetition of the original sound and is sufficiently loud to be clearly
heard above the general reverberation end background noise in a space.
▪ A clear echo is caused when reflected sound at sufficient intensity reaches a listener more than
60 ms (about 1/17 s). after he or she has heard the direct sound.

▪ Echoes, even if not distinctly discernible, are undesirable. They make speech less intelligible
and make music sound “mushy.”

▪ The relative undesirability depends upon the time delay and loudness relative to the direct
sound, which, in turn, are dependent upon the size, position, shape, and absorption of the
reflecting surface.
▪ Typical echo-producing surfaces in an auditorium are the back wall and the ceiling above the proscenium.

▪ Figure below shows these problems and suggests remedies. Note that the energy that produced the echoes can be
redirected to places where it becomes useful reinforcement. If echo control by absorption alone were used on the ceiling
and back wall, that energy would be wasted. The rear wall, since its area cannot be reduced too far, may have to be made
more sound-absorptive to reduce the loudness of the reflected sound.
 ▪ Flutter echo
Haas effect
▪ Flutter echo is usually caused by the inter-reflection of sound between opposite
Our brain blends together all of the parallel or concave surfaces.
sounds reaching our ears within 5- ▪ Flutter is normally heard as a high frequency “ringing “ or “buzzing” .
30 ms of the original. Our ear will
attend to their direction.
Reflections arriving approximately ▪ Flutter can be prevented by_
30-50 ms or more after the original 1. Reshaping to avoid parallel
will be perceived as separate surfaces,
sounds. This phenomenon is known 2. Providing sound-absorbing
as the Haas effect. treatment, or
3. Surface breakup with splayed
It is important to ensure the first elements.
reflections arrive at listener before
▪ A 1:10 splay (or tilt) of one of the
30ms to avoid echo perception.
walls will normally provide sufficient
It is these initial reflections that are flutter control.
most important to the brain in
determining the apparent size of the
listening room.
 Positioning of absorbent and reflecting surface of the room

▪ Diffusion
▪ This is the converse of focusing and occurs primarily when sound is reflected from convex surfaces.

▪ A degree of diffusion is also provided by flat horizontal and inclined reflectors. In a diffuse sound field, the sound level
remains relatively constant throughout the space, an extremely desirable property for musical performances.
▪ Focusing
▪ Concave domes, vaults, or walls will focus reflected sound into certain areas of rooms. This has several disadvantages. For
example, it will deprive some listeners of useful sound reflections and cause hot spots at other audience positions

▪ Creep
▪ This describes the reflection of sound along a curved surface from a source near the surface. Although the sound can be
heard at points along the surface, it is inaudible away from the surface.
▪ Dead Spot
▪ Under the canopy, the direct sound that reaches is faint and the reflecting sound does not reach. This space is known as
dead spot.

Dead spot

To avoid these acoustical problems, the positions of absorbents and reflectors will be like the following_
1. Absorbents should be at the end to prevent echo-formation.
2. Reflectors should be above the speaker so that Hass effect can occur.
 Reverberation time

▪ Reverberation time is the time taken by the original sound to reduce by 60 dB (For 100dB it should be 40dB, for 75 dB it
should be 15dB) after the original one is eased to operation.

▪ RT is 0.8 to 1 sec for speech / conference> Less RT

▪ RT is 2 to 3 sec for – concert / opera / church music > Much RT for blending of music.
 Ray-Diagram analysis

▪ Ray –diagram analysis is used to-

1. Study the effect of room shaping on sound distribution, and
2. Identify possible echo-producing surfaces.
▪ A ray diagram is an acoustical analogy to the regular or speculative reflection of light where the angle of incidence i of an
impinging sound wave equals the angle of reflection r.
Some Limitation of Ray-diagram
▪ Sound reflects in the manner indicated by ray-diagramming only when surface dimensions are large relative to the wavelength of
sound being considered.
▪ Normally the sources of speech or music will not radiate from a fixed position. Optimum room shaping therefore depends on a
careful balance of the best sound distribution from several source positions to the listening area.
▪ A detailed evaluation of diffusion or scattering of sound from room surfaces is not possible with ray-diagrams. Accordingly,
models allowing frequency-scaled acoustical studies are often used in design, particularly in rooms where music listening is
important.
▪ In spite of all these limitations, ray-diagramming is still an important design tool in establishing optimum room shape.
▪ The table below is a design guide that can be used with ray-diagram analysis to check general listing conditions.
▪ The difference in length between the reflected sound path and the direct sound path at any listening point is directly related to
the time difference which the ear detects.
▪ For example, it sound reaches the listener’s ear later than about 1/17 sec (0.06 sec) after the direct sound, it can be heard as
an echo.

▪ The sound path difference in feet from a sound delayed by 0.06 can be found as follows:
distance = velocity X time
distance= 1130 X 0.06 = 68 ft
distance= 340 X 0.06 = 20.4 m

sound path difference, ft Listening conditions

less than 28 Excellent for speech and music
28-40 good for speech, fair for music
40-50 Marginal
50-68 Negative
greater than 68 Echo if strong enough
 Ray-Diagram analysis

▪An inexpensive protractor for measuring angles,

pencil, and paper are all the equipment required for
ray-diagram calculations.

▪Shown beside is an auditorium section with path

differences calculated to a front and middle-rear
audience location from a typical source location.
 Ray-Diagram analysis

▪ In fig. a, the stage height and seating slope are arranged to provide
good sight lines, and the ceiling height is established by
reverberation requirements, aesthetics, cost, and so on.

▪ It can be seen that less than half of the ceiling is providing useful
reflection. Dividing the ceiling into two panels (fig. b) allows people
in the rear of the room to perceive the direct source plus two image
sources, and the useful reflecting area is increased by 50%.

▪ In fig. c, the shape has been further refined to include a lighting slot
and a loudspeaker grille.