The Effect of Upstream Edge Geometry on the Acoustic Resonance Excitation in Shallow Rectangular Cavities

The flow-excited acoustic resonance phenomenon is created when the flow instability oscillations are coupled with one of the acoustic modes, which in turn generates acute noise problems and/or excessive vibrations. In this study, the effect of the upstream edge geometry on attenuating these undesirable effects is investigated experimentally for flows over shallow rectangular cavity with two different aspect ratios of L/D = 1 and 1.67, where L is the cavity length and D is the cavity depth, and for Mach number less than 0.5. The acoustic resonance modes of the cavity are self-excited. Twenty four different upstream cavity edges are investigated in this study; including round edges, chamfered edges, vortex generators and spoilers with different sizes and configurations. The acoustic pressure is measured with a flush-mounted microphone on the cavity floor and the velocity fluctuation of the separated shear layer before the onset of acoustic resonance is measured with a hot-wire probe. The results for each upstream cavity edge are compared with the base case when square cavity edge is used. It is observed that when chamfered edges are used, the amplitude of the first acoustic resonance mode is highly intensified with values reaching around 5000 Pa (compared to 2000 Pa for the base case) and a clear shift in its onset of resonance to higher flow velocities is observed. Similar trend is observed when round edges are used. The amplitude of the generated pressure of the first acoustic resonance mode is amplified with values exceeding 4000 Pa and a delay in its onset of acoustic resonance is observed as well. Most of the spoiler edges are found to be effective in suppressing the pressure amplitude of the excited acoustic resonance. However, the performance of each spoiler depends on its specific geometry (i.e. thickness, height, and angle) relative to the cavity aspect ratio. A summary of the results is presented in this paper.