Acoustic flowmeter for the measurement of the mean flow

velocity in pipes
Wan-Sup Cheung,a) Hyu-Sang Kwon, Kyung-Am Park, and Jong-Seung Paik
Mechanical Metrology Division, Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science, P.O. Box 102, Yusong,
Taejon 305-600, Republic of Korea

共Received 5 June 2000; revised 25 July 2001; accepted 27 July 2001兲

This paper proposes a new technique for measuring the gas flow velocity averaged along the finite
length of a pipe as well as over its cross-sectional area. Unlike the conventional gas flowmeters, the
proposed technique exploits the one-dimensional plane waves that propagate uniformly across the
pipe cross-sectional area. When a fluid flows along the pipe, the plane waves are superposed with
the flow field such that the positive-going and negative-going plane wave components undergo the
change of their wave numbers. Such wave number variation due to the mean flow velocity has
provided a major motivation for developing a new way of measuring the mean flow velocity in the
pipe, which is referred to as the acoustic flowmeter. To examine the feasibility of the developed flow
velocity measurement method, including its theoretical backgrounds, experimental setups are
illustrated in this paper. Detailed experimental data for the flow velocity range of 2–27 m/s reveal
the linearity of the proposed acoustic flowmeter and its salient environmental robustness for the
different acoustic pressure patterns in the pipe and, furthermore, for different velocity profiles over
the pipe cross-section area. © 2001 Acoustical Society of America. 关DOI: 10.1121/1.1404379兴
PACS numbers: 43.20.Ye, 43.28.We 关LCS兴

I. INTRODUCTION
The measurement technology of gas flow velocity in
pipes has recently been an important issue in nationwide
natural gas pipelines, intake and exhaust gas pipelines of
automobiles, and ventilation ducts of large buildings. The
gas flow measurement has been a prime factor in the state
control of gas supply systems, for the production of quieter
and more fuel-efficient engines and in the environmental
noise reduction of large buildings. The flow measurement
principle in these industrial applications is still based on the
classical nozzle-type or hot-wire flowmeters.1 Unlike these
classical flow measurement methods, acoustical methods
have attempted to use the principle of the pipe or duct
acoustics2 to measure the gas flow velocity. Fundamentals
behind these attempts are based on the use of the incident
and reflected plain waves in the pipe. Potzick et al.3 sug-
gested the long wavelength acoustic flowmeter that uses the
two microphones installed in the pipe wall to measure the
standing waves excited by two frequency components 共fun-
damental and second-harmonic components兲. The specific
equal-amplitude conditions for the two microphones, which
are obtained by choosing the two harmonic components of a
sound source, were shown to give a way of measuring the
flow velocity in the pipe. This method requires a delicate
tracking and tuning technology of two harmonic sounds that
should satisfy the equal amplitude conditions according to
the flow velocity. The instrumentation for tracking and tun-
ing two harmonic sounds presents much difficulty in real
implementation. Unlike this tracking and tuning methodol-
ogy, Alves et al.4,5 suggested the use of the acoustical trans-
fer function between paired microphones spaced a finite dis-
a兲
Electronic mail: wansup@kirss.re.kr
tance apart. The phase change of the transfer function, which
depends on the flow velocity and its direction, was exploited
to estimate the Mach number of flowing fluid in the pipe.
Three different methods of estimating the phase change of
the standing wave and related Mach number using the single,
dual, and triple paired microphones were introduced recently.
Feasibility studies on these methods are in progress, includ-
ing experimental investigation to judge their effectiveness in
real flow measurements.
This work is also based on fundamental duct acoustics.2
Acoustic plane waves in the pipe present two excellent prop-
erties: the uniformly distributed propagation velocity normal
to the cross-section area and the outstanding repeatability of
the plane waves inside the pipe. The uniformly distributed
sound propagation property leads to the measurement of the
averaged flow velocity over the cross-sectional area. Further-
more, multiple velocities at multiple positions, locally mea-
sured within the finite length, enable us to obtain the mean
velocity along the length of the pipe as well as over the pipe
cross-section area. In fact, the acoustic plane waves in the
pipe are always accompanied by the superposition of the
‘‘incident’’ plane wave coming from the acoustic source with
the reflected one from the outside of the straight pipe. This
condition provides excellent repeatability of the acoustic
plane wave inside the pipe. The ‘‘effective’’ speed of sound
for the plane wave propagating in the same direction as fluid
flow is increased by the amount of the normal flow velocity.
Similarly, the ‘‘effective’’ speed of sound for the plane wave
propagating oppositely to the flow direction is decreased.
Both changes of wave numbers corresponding to each plane
wave can give an indirect measure of the averaged flow ve-
locity along the finite length of the pipe as well as over the
cross-sectional area. This understanding has already been in-
vestigated in experimental work.6 – 8 More improved mea-

2308 J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 110 (5), Pt. 1, Nov. 2001 0001-4966/2001/110(5)/2308/7/$18.00 © 2001 Acoustical Society of America

Redistribution subject to ASA license or copyright; see http://acousticalsociety.org/content/terms. Download to IP: 134.129.164.186 On: Fri, 19 Dec 2014 20:30:09
 surement techniques of flow velocity in the pipe are pro-
posed in Sec. II. In order to examine the proposed methods
experimentally, a new measurement device developed in this
work is also introduced in Sec. III. The experimental recon-
struction of acoustic pressure field in the measurement sys-
tem is addressed in Sec. IV. Experimental results are pre-
sented to demonstrate the success of this work and related
discussions are also added in Sec. V. In Sec. VI, major con-
tributions of this work are summarized and work in progress FIG. 1. Schematic setup of measuring the standing wave in the pipe.
is discussed.
B. Measurement method for the mean flow velocity in
the pipe
II. THEORETICAL BACKGROUNDS AND
From Eq. 共1兲, the periodic standing pressure pattern
MEASUREMENT TECHNIQUES
along the pipe is separated into the spatially dependent term
A general case of sound propagation in ducts2 may in- P(x) and the time-dependent P(t). Thus, the position-
clude the convective and scattering effects of the mean flow dependent acoustic pressure P(x) in the pipe at any instant is
with refraction by velocity gradients and temperature gradi- considered separately. Figure 1 shows the schematic view of
ents. But plane wave analysis is appropriate for many cases measuring the acoustic pressures of the standing wave pat-
of sound propagation in ducts where the wavelength of in- tern using multiple microphones installed on the pipe wall.
terest is large compared to their transverse dimension. A When each microphone is equally spaced by a gap ⌬, the
good example is the fluid conveying pipelines where flow acoustic pressures at three neighboring positions satisfy the

冋 册冋 册
measurements are needed. following relations:
⫹ ⫺ n⫺1 兲 ⌬
e ⫺ jk 共 n⫺1 兲 ⌬ e jk 共

冋 册
A. Acoustic plane wave propagation in the pipes P n⫺1
⫹ ⫺ n⌬ P⫹
e ⫺ jk n⌬
0
When an acoustic wave, whose wavelength ␭ is quite Pn ⫽ e jk ,
P⫺
large compared to the inner diameter D of the pipe 共i.e., P n⫹1 ⫹ ⫺ n⫹1 兲 ⌬ 0
e ⫺ jk 共 n⫹1 兲 ⌬ e jk 共
typically ␭⬎2D as recommended in ISO 10534-1兲,9 is gen-
erated in the pipe, it becomes a plane wave whose acoustic n⫽1,2,3,...,N⫺2 . 共3兲
pressure distribution is very nearly uniform10 over the cross
section after it is propagated more than a wavelength from In Eq. 共3兲, P n denotes the acoustic pressure at position x
the source. When the mean flow velocity field is superposed ⫽n⌬. By solving the incident and reflected waves 兵 P ⫹ ⫺
0 , P0 其

with the acoustic field in the pipe, the resultant acoustic pres- at x⫽0 from the first two acoustic pressures 兵 P n⫺1 , P n 其 and
sure is described as then substituting the incident and reflected waves into the
third pressure P n⫹1 , a spatial recursive from along the lon-
⫹ ⫺
P 共 x,t 兲 ⫽ P 共 x 兲 P 共 t 兲 ⫽ 共 P ⫹
0 e
⫺ jk x
⫹ P⫺
0 e
jk x i ␻ t
兲e . 共1兲 gitudinal position is obtained as
⫹⌬ ⫺⌬ ⫹ ⫹k ⫺ 兲 ⌬
P⫹ ⫺
0 and P 0 are the acoustic pressures of positively and nega-
P n⫹1 e jk ⫹ P n⫺1 e jk ⫽ P n 共 1⫹e j 共 k 兲. 共4兲
tively propagating wave components at position x⫽0. ␻ de- This spatial recursive form will be shown to play a central
notes the angular velocity of sound 共␻ ⫽2 ␲ f , f ⫽the excita- role in estimating the flow velocity in this paper.
tion frequency of an acoustic source兲 and k ⫹ and k ⫺ are the The range of Mach number considered in this work is
complex wave numbers corresponding to the positively and equal to or less than 0.1 共mean air flow velocity U
negatively propagating plane waves. The complex wave ⭐34.3 m/s兲. Consequently, the positive and negative wave
numbers are defined as numbers are approximated as k ⫹ ⬵k 0 (1⫺M ⫹M 2 ⫺M 3 ) and
k ⫹ ⫽ 共 1⫺ ja 兲 k 0 / 共 1⫹M 兲 , k ⫺ ⫽ 共 1⫺ ja 兲 k 0 / 共 1⫺M 兲 , k ⫺ ⬵k 0 (1⫹M ⫹M 2 ⫹M 3 ) by neglecting the fourth- and
共2兲 higher-order terms of the Mach number. Similarly, the phase
angle of the right-hand side of Eq. 共4兲 is also approximated
where M is the Mach number (M ⫽U/C), ␣ the acoustic as (k ⫹ ⫹k ⫺ )⌬⬵2k 0 ⌬(1⫹M 2 ). By substituting these ap-
pressure attenuation constant,2 and k 0 denotes the wave num- proximations into the spatial recursive equation 共4兲 and then
ber of the stationary fluid (U⫽0). In this work, the attenu- arranging them, the spatial recursive relation is rewritten as
ation constant is ignored because ␣ is close to 0.0014 in air 3 兲k ⌬ 3 兲k ⌬
( f ⫽500 Hz, D⫽0.1 m, C⫽343.3 m/s兲. When the fluid in the P n⫹1 e ⫺ j 共 M ⫹M 0 ⫹ P n⫺1 e j 共 M ⫹M 0

pipe flows in the positive x direction, Eq. 共2兲 indicates that

the wave number of the positively propagating plane wave
component decreases but that of the negatively propagating
one oppositely increases. It means that the change in wave
number for both plane wave components due to the flow
velocity can be obtained quantitatively from the variation of
the pressure pattern along the pipe. It has been a key idea in
developing a new method to measure the mean flow velocity.
⫽2 cos共共 1⫹M 2 兲 k 0 ⌬ 兲 P n . 共5兲
This presents a clear graphical understanding about the esti-
mation of the Mach number using the three consecutive
acoustic pressures 兵 P n⫺1 , P n , P n⫹1 其 . Let the Mach number-
dependent rotation angle be ␪ (M )⫽k 0 ⌬(M ⫹M 3 ). Then,
the sum of the (n⫹1)th acoustic pressure P n⫹1 rotated
negatively by ␪ (M ) and the (n⫺1)th acoustic pressure

J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 110, No. 5, Pt. 1, Nov. 2001 Cheung et al.: Acoustic flowmeter for mean flow velocity in pipes 2309

Redistribution subject to ASA license or copyright; see http://acousticalsociety.org/content/terms. Download to IP: 134.129.164.186 On: Fri, 19 Dec 2014 20:30:09
 FIG. 2. Phase vector diagram of the spatial recursive form for three neigh-
boring pressures.
P n⫺1 rotated positively by ␪ (M ) is found to be equal to the
nth acoustic pressure multiplied by 2 cos((1⫹M 2)k0⌬). Fig-
ure 2 illustrates this relation graphically. It shows that the
Mach number is related to the amount of phase shift for the
neighboring phase vectors P n⫹1 and P n⫺1 with respect to
the midposition phase vector P n . As the Mach number in-
creases, the amount of the phase shift gets larger. Of course,
the direction of the flow velocity is shown to determine the
direction of the phase shift for the neighboring phase vectors
by checking whether its direction is clockwise or counter
clockwise. The rate of the phase shift is proportional to the
gain factor k 0 ⌬. This means that one can adequately choose
the gain factor by varying either the excitation frequency of
an acoustic source (k 0 ⫽2 ␲ f /C) or the gap ⌬ between the
neighboring microphones. As a result, the sensitivity of the
phase shift for the given Mach number can be suitably tuned
in a real experiment.
C. Estimation of flow velocity
This section presents a way of estimating the best-fitted
Mach number for multiple acoustic pressure measurement
data along the pipe. As shown in Eq. 共5兲 and Fig. 2, the Mach
number-dependent rotation angle is described as ␪ (M )
⫽k 0 ⌬(M ⫹M 3 ). Let the angle-related cosine and sine com-
ponents be C M ⫽A M cos(k0⌬(M⫹M 3)) and SM
⫽A M sin(k0⌬(M⫹M 3)) where a scale factor A M
⫽0.5/cos(k0⌬(1⫹M 2)) from Eq. 共5兲. From the set of N mea-
surements 兵 P n ,n⫽0,1,2,...,N⫺1 其 , we obtain N⫺2 spatial
recursive forms between three neighboring data, which are
冥 冋册
described as
冤
共 P 2⫹ P 0 兲 j 共 P 0⫺ P 2 兲
P1
共 P 3⫹ P 1 兲 j 共 P 1⫺ P 3 兲 P2
•
•
•
•
冋 册
CM
SM
⫽
• •
P N⫺2
共 P N⫺1 ⫹ P N⫺3 兲 j 共 P N⫺3 ⫺ P N⫺1 兲
For the case of N⭓4, the best fitted coefficient vector x
⫽ 关 C M ,S M 兴 T is readily obtained using the well-known least-
squares method. Let the (N⫺2)-by-2 matrix at the left-hand
side of Eq. 共6兲 be A and the column vector at the left-hand
2310 J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 110, No. 5, Pt. 1, Nov. 2001
Redistribution subject to ASA license or copyright; see http://acousticalsociety.org/content/terms. Download to IP: 134.129.164.186 On: Fri, 19 Dec 2014 20:30:09
FIG. 3. Picture of experimental setup.
side by y. Then, the best-fitted coefficient vector x is always
obtained from the following normal equation:
冋 册
CM
SM
⫽ 关 AH A兴 ⫹ AH y, 共7兲
where the superscript H denotes the Hermitian operator and
关 • 兴 ⫹ the pseudoinverse.11 In this work, the singular value
decomposition method presented in MATLAB12 is used to ob-
tain the pseudoinverse. Given the best-fitted coefficient vec-
tor x⫽ 关 C M ,S M 兴 T , the Mach number is calculated from
M 3 ⫹M ⫽
1
k 0⌬
tan⫺1 冉 冊
SM
CM
. 共8兲
This third-order cubic equation gives a single real-valued
Mach number that is readily calculated from the algebraic
solution.13 This real-valued solution is used in this work but
two complex-valued ones are not considered because they do
not have physical interpretation. It is obvious that the mean
flow velocity obtained from the above-given estimation pro-
cedures is the best-fitted value for the locally measured
acoustic pressure data that are collected over the pipe length
between the first and final microphones. It should be noted
from Eq. 共8兲 that the ratio of the cosine component C M to the
sine component S M enables the Mach number estimation
without any knowledge of the Mach number-dependent scale
factor A M ⫽0.5/cos(k0⌬(1⫹M 2)).
•
•
.
• III. MEASUREMENT SETUPS
In order to examine experimentally the mean flow ve-
共6兲 locity measurement method introduced in Sec. II, experimen-
tal setups in Fig. 3 were built up. They consisted of two flow
velocity measurement setups using the nozzle-type reference
flowmeter and the acoustic flowmeter developed in this
work.
Cheung et al.: Acoustic flowmeter for mean flow velocity in pipes

FIG. 4. Schematic configuration of measuring instruments.
A. Measurement setup of reference flowmeter
The schematic drawing of the experimental setups is
shown in Fig. 4. In order to suck air into the pipeline, a
blower was used. The flow rate of Mach number M ⬍0.1 was
controlled with a main butterfly valve and a bypass valve
installed at the end of the downstream pipe. The reference
nozzles were used to measure the mean air flow velocity in
the test line of pipe diameter 100 mm. Three nozzles 共throat
diameter 23.4, 35.1, and 52.6 mm兲 with a differential pres-
sure gauge were calibrated in the gas flow standard system of
the Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science
共KRISS兲. The calibrated uncertainty of mean velocity mea-
surement for the three nozzles was found to be less than
⫾0.43% with a confidence level of 95%. The upstream
straight length of a nozzle is 20 times the pipe diameter,
which is enough upstream length for fully developed flow at
a nozzle. To measure the mean air flow velocity, the up-
stream pressure was measured using a U-type manometer
and the differential pressure of the nozzle was also measured
using the pressure gauge 共Rosemount Measurement Modal
1151兲. The output of the pressure gauge was read each half
second through the digital multimeter 共HP 34401A兲 that is
interfaced to a PC using the HP–IB interface.
B. Measurement setup of acoustic flowmeter
The instruments shown in Fig. 4 were used to measure
the flow velocity using the acoustic wave. The temperature
sensor was used to calculate the speed of sound flowing in
the pipe. The horn-type acoustic source that generates sound
in the pipe was installed at the upstream part of the flow
measurement section whose inner diameter is 0.1 m. In order
to generate a pure tone sound in the pipe, the signal genera-
tor 共HP 33120A with a phase lock/TCXO time base兲 was
chosen, which is interfaced to the PC using the HP–IB in-
terface. Its output is connected to the power amplifier 共B&K
2706兲 that provides an adequate current level for the horn
driver unit. A microphone array, which consists of seven eq-
uispaced 41 in. microphones 共GRAS 2633兲 and their pream-
plifiers 共GRAS 26AC兲, was also fixed just on the inner wall
of the measurement section. The gap between two micro-
phones was chosen to be 0.1 m (⌬⫽0.1 m). The multichan-
J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 110, No. 5, Pt. 1, Nov. 2001
Redistribution subject to ASA license or copyright; see http://acousticalsociety.org/content/terms. Download to IP: 134.129.164.186 On: Fri, 19 Dec 2014 20:30:09
nel microphone power supply 共Larson–Davis model 2210兲
was used to operate the seven-channel microphones and their
preamplifiers. The seven-channel acoustic pressure signals
were simultaneously converted into a digital time series by
using the HP-VXI data acquisition system 共dual HP E8402
A’s兲 that simultaneously converts all analog signals into 16
bit digital codes and records them digitally into the PC hard
drive.
IV. RECONSTRUCTION OF PHASE VECTORS
This section presents a way of estimating the phase vec-
tor of acoustic pressure at each acoustic pressure measure-
ment position from the acoustic pressure signals sampled in
the time domain. Let 兵p m (x n ,k⌬t); n⫽0,1,...,N⫺1 and k
⫽0,1,2,...其 be the set of digitally sampled acoustic pressure
signals in time domain 共⌬t⫽sampling time, N⫽number of
microphones, position x n ⫽n⌬兲. Given the single frequency f
of the acoustic source, it is quite straightforward to estimate
the phase vectors at the measurement positions by calculat-
ing the discrete Fourier series of the sampled pressure data,
as follows:
K 0 ⫺1
2
C n ⫽C 共 x n , f 兲 ⫽
K0 兺
k⫽0
p m 共 x n ,k⌬t 兲 cos共 2 ␲ f k⌬t 兲 ,
K 0 ⫺1 共9兲
2
S n ⫽S 共 x n , f 兲 ⫽
K0 兺 p m 共 x n ,k⌬t 兲 sin共 2 ␲ f k⌬t 兲 ,
k⫽0
where K 0 is the record length. The cosine and sine coeffi-
cients 兵C n , S n ; n⫽0,...,N⫺1其 enable us to reconstruct the
complex-valued phase vector P n at position x n ⫽n⌬, which
is given as
P n ⫽ P real共 x n 兲 ⫹ j P imag共 x n 兲 ⫽C n ⫺ jS n . 共10兲
Specifically, we chose an equiangle sampling technique, i.e.,
512 samples per ten periods 共51.2 samples per period兲. This
integer number of samples per ten periods was experimen-
tally found to enable more accurate estimation of the phase
vector than other sample sets of noninteger periods. Multiple
periods of sampled records were intentionally chosen to re-
duce both higher- and subharmonic components as much as
possible in reconstructing the phase vectors corresponding to
the single tone acoustic source. The set of reconstructed mul-
tiple phase vectors 兵P n ; n⫽0,1,2,...,6其 are used to estimate
the best-fitted mean flow velocity according to the proce-
dures described in Eqs. 共6兲–共8兲.
V. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
To achieve accurate measurement of the phase vectors
along the pipe, the calibration procedure of multiple micro-
phones is introduced and calibration results are illustrated.
The flow velocity obtained by the proposed acoustic flow
meter is compared to that measured by the nozzle-type ref-
erence flowmeter. Experimental results carried out to exam-
ine the performance of the acoustic flowmeter for different
flow conditions are also presented in the following.
Cheung et al.: Acoustic flowmeter for mean flow velocity in pipes 2311

FIG. 5. Spatial acoustic pressure distribution of the standing wave for a
500-Hz pure tone acoustic source.
A. Calibration of microphone array
When multiple microphones, specifically as in this
study, are used to reconstruct the standing wave pattern using
the phase vectors, finely calibrated responses of the magni-
tude and phase for each microphone are required.7,8 The first
microphone at the origin (x⫽0) was calibrated at 500 Hz by
comparing the primary standard microphone in KRISS. The
comparative calibration of other microphones with respect to
the first microphone calibrated was carried out using the
sound intensity calibrator 共B&K 3541⫹acoustic coupler UA
0914兲 whose paired ports 1 and 2 provide the equal sound
pressure with two microphones. The relative magnitude and
phase responses 兵H c,n ( f ); n⫽1,2,...,6其 of the six channels
were measured according to ISO 10534-2.14 The measured
magnitude and phase responses were used to compensate the
relative magnitude and phase responses using the correction
method for paired microphones suggested in ISO 10534-2.
Figure 5 illustrates the reconstructed standing wave pat-
tern for nonzero velocity, whose acoustic pressure levels and
phases are compensated by the calibration responses. The
symbol ‘‘䊊’’ denotes the measured phase vectors and the
solid line does the reconstructed phase vector using the least
squared-based standing wave reconstruction method.15 The
percentage error in Fig. 5 was calculated by normalizing the
difference between the measured and reconstructed phase
vectors by the root-mean-squared acoustic pressure over the
one wavelength. It was shown that the maximum error be-
tween the measured acoustic pressures and the best-fitted
model was about 0.2% for the magnitude and about 0.05° for
the phase difference, respectively. This error analysis of
acoustic pressure measurements, shown in Fig. 5, was made
to check each measurement set of seven phase vectors. Table
I illustrates the relative magnitude errors for three different
flow control-valve conditions 共‘‘closed’’ state U⫽12.7 m/s,
‘‘half-open’’ state U⫽8.6 m/s, ‘‘fully open’’ state U
⫽4.4 m/s兲. It shows that the standard deviation of the rela-
tive magnitude errors was less than 0.24% even for the flow
control-valve closed, i.e., the fastest velocity condition
2312 J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 110, No. 5, Pt. 1, Nov. 2001
Redistribution subject to ASA license or copyright; see http://acousticalsociety.org/content/terms. Download to IP: 134.129.164.186 On: Fri, 19 Dec 2014 20:30:09
TABLE I. Comparison of relative magnitude errors between the measured
and reconstructed acoustic phase vectors for three different flow control
valve conditions 共closed, half-open, fully open兲.
Microphones Fully open Half-open Closed
Channel 0 0.18% 0.24% 0.23%
Channel 1 0.08% 0.12% 0.16%
Channel 2 0.05% 0.14% 0.09%
Channel 3 0.05% 0.07% 0.09%
Channel 4 0.10% 0.23% 0.23%
Channel 5 0.12% 0.09% 0.14%
Channel 6 0.13% 0.19% 0.22%
Standard deviation 0.13% 0.18% 0.19%
among them. This measurement accuracy level had been
maintained throughout in this work.
B. Measurement results of mean flow velocity
In this experiment, a 500-Hz pure tone was chosen and
its sound level, averaged along the pipe, was 20 dB higher
than the acoustic flow noise level. This sound source level
was experimentally chosen to obtain the phase vectors with
the measurement errors bounded within the range of 0.2%, as
noted previously. Furthermore, the steady state of fluid flow
in the pipe was also maintained as recommended in ISO/CD
5167,16 the ratio of the root-mean-squared value of fluctuat-
⬘ to the time-mean value of the
ing pressure component ⌬ P rms
differential pressure ⌬ P mean was kept at less than 4%
⬘ /⌬ P mean⬇0.04).
(⌬ P rms
Each set of the phase vectors along the pipe, as noted in
Sec. IV, was acquired every ten-period interval of the 500 Hz
acoustic source such that 50 sets of the measured phase vec-
tors per second were obtained and used to estimate their
corresponding flow velocities. This reading rate of flow ve-
locity is very fast in comparison to the reading rate of one to
two samples per second typically used in gas flow velocity
measurements. To synchronize with the reading rate of the
reference flowmeter, 25 consecutive velocity measurements
of the acoustic flowmeter for 21 s were averaged to give one
sample of its flow velocity. In Fig. 6, the measured flow
velocities from the acoustic flowmeter are compared against
those measured with the reference flowmeter for 28 different
velocity measurement points in the flow velocity range of
2.5–26 m/s. Ten sampled data at each measurement condi-
tion were overlapped in Fig. 6. The standard deviation of
velocity errors between the measurements of the acoustic
flowmeter and the reference flowmeter was observed to be
0.096 m/s. These results may indicate that the linearity of the
acoustic flowmeter proposed in this paper is very acceptable
to real applications. The linearity is shown to be more accu-
rate than those of previous models by Potzick et al.3 and
Alves.4,5
The encouraging results presented previously lead to
further experimental attempts to examine what amount of
measurement accuracy the developed method can present for
different environmental conditions; more specifically, for dif-
ferent acoustic pressure patterns along the measurement po-
sitions and different flow velocity profiles over the pipe
cross-sectional area. Different acoustic pressure distributions
Cheung et al.: Acoustic flowmeter for mean flow velocity in pipes
 FIG. 6. Comparison of the measured velocities from the acoustic flowmeter
共y axis兲 against those measured from the reference flowmeter 共x axis兲.

along the pipe were made either by connecting two straight

pipes of different length 共0.4, 0.5 m兲 to the intake part or
removing three straight pipes 共0.4, 0.5, 0.5 m兲 from the in-
take part. These changes at the intake part make spatial shift
of the acoustic pressure pattern along the pipe. Their spatial
shift is related to the ratio of the half wavelength to the pipe
length added to, or removed from, the intake part. These
spatially shifted acoustic pressure patterns at the micro-
phones were exploited to examine their effects on the mean
flow velocity measurement. Figure 7共a兲 shows the experi-
mental results obtained from six different acoustic pressure
patterns in the flow measurement section. Ten samples are
plotted at each velocity position. The relative measurement
errors, i.e., the difference between both flowmeters normal-
ized by the reference one, are less than 2% in the velocity
range of U⫽7 m/s. The percentage error in the low velocity
range of U⬍5 m/s is larger, i.e., 3%–5%. The measurement
results even for different acoustic pressure distributions show
a small variation with the standard deviation of 0.112 m/s.
Those variations may indicate the measurement resolution of
the developed flowmeter. The mean value for different
acoustic pressure patterns show a ‘‘curved’’ bias from the FIG. 7. Relative flow velocity errors between the nozzle-type reference
zero in the velocity range of U⬍20 m/s. This biased feature flowmeter and the developed acoustic flowmeter measured from different
is regarded as one of the systematic errors for the developed experimental conditions: 共a兲 for different acoustic pressure patterns 共inner
flowmeter. An experimental approach to reduce the velocity diameter D⫽100 mm兲; 共b兲 for different flow velocity profiles.
bias from zero velocity is in progress.
A fundamental issue in flowmeters1 has been to achieve Fig. 7共b兲兴, and closely coupled double elbows out of plane
an averaged flow velocity over the pipe cross-section area. At 关denoted by ‘‘elbow-3’’ in Fig. 7共b兲兴—were chosen to gener-
the onset of this work, it became apparent that a salient prop- ate different velocity profiles unlike that of the straight pipe.
erty of the plane wave in the pipe, which is propagated uni- The flow velocity measurement results for five different ve-
formly over the pipe cross-section area with the speed of locity profiles are shown in Fig. 7共b兲. The relative measure-
sound, could be exploited to develop a gas flowmeter ex- ment errors are seen to be less than 2% in the velocity range
pected to be robust in measuring the averaged velocity over of U⭓7 m/s regardless of different velocity profiles. Even in
the cross-section area. To examine the robustness of the de- the low flow velocity range of U⬍5 m/s, the relative mea-
veloped acoustic flowmeter, experimental attempts were car- surement errors decrease in comparison to Fig. 7共a兲. It seems
ried out. In this work, four kinds of pipe elements—a gate to be a big advantage for the acoustic flowmeter that exploits
valve 关denoted by ‘‘elbow-1’’ in Fig. 7共b兲兴, a single elbow the uniformly distributed acoustic plane wave over the pipe
关denoted by ‘‘elbow-1’’ in Fig. 7共b兲兴, closely coupled across-sectional area to measure the mean flow velocity. The
U-shaped double elbows in plane 关denoted by ‘‘elbow-2’’ in measurements for different velocity profiles are seen to yield

J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 110, No. 5, Pt. 1, Nov. 2001 Cheung et al.: Acoustic flowmeter for mean flow velocity in pipes 2313

Redistribution subject to ASA license or copyright; see http://acousticalsociety.org/content/terms. Download to IP: 134.129.164.186 On: Fri, 19 Dec 2014 20:30:09
 less variation within a finite range than Fig. 7共b兲, whose
standard deviation is equal to 0.101 m/s. It may also be re-
lated to the measurement resolution of the developed flow-
meter. Still, the mean values for each velocity measurement
point reveal a ‘‘curved’’ bias from the zero in the range of
flow velocity U⬍12 m/s, similar to the results shown in Fig.
7共a兲. To understand and solve this bias feature, further ex-
perimental work is also in progress.
VI. CONCLUDING REMARKS
This paper has presented the theoretical background and
experimental verification for a new technique for the mea-
surement of the flow velocity averaged along the finite length
of the pipe as well as over the cross section. Experimental
data demonstrate the linearity of the proposed acoustic flow-
meter in the flow velocity range of up to 27 m/s. Its salient
robustness was demonstrated under the different acoustic
pressure patterns and different flow velocity profiles over the
pipe cross-sectional area. The results have encouraged this
research team to further refine the proposed technique to de-
velop a prototype for practical applications. Such refinement
will include the minimization of the measurement bias from
zero at the low flow velocity and the experimental verifica-
tion of the proposed method for the different frequencies of
the acoustic source.
The use of the multiple equispaced microphones in this
work has enabled the measurement of the mean flow velocity
in the pipe. The phase vectors of acoustic pressure along the
pipe are also shown to provide the incident and reflected
acoustic pressures that lead to the direct calculation of reflec-
tion coefficient, acoustic impedance, and acoustic absorption
coefficients as in ISO 10534. Therefore, the measured flow
velocity and the incident and reflected acoustic pressure
components in the pipe are expected to provide a way of
evaluating the acoustic performances of mufflers under real
flow conditions by using only the multiple microphones.
Since this method does not distort any acoustic field, it may
be more preferable than the nozzle-type gas flowmeter whose
installation in the pipe changes the acoustic property itself.
Related experimental setups to examine such an advantage
are under construction.
2314 J. Acoust. Soc. Am., Vol. 110, No. 5, Pt. 1, Nov. 2001
Redistribution subject to ASA license or copyright; see http://acousticalsociety.org/content/terms. Download to IP: 134.129.164.186 On: Fri, 19 Dec 2014 20:30:09
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This work was partially supported by the Korea Ministry
of Science and Technology and the Korea Research Institute
of Standards and Science 共Project Code Nos. 99-0407-100
and 00-0406-031兲. The authors would like to acknowledge
kind comments and appropriate suggestions made by Profes-
sor L.C. Sutherland.
1
R. W. Miller, Flow Measurement Engineering Handbook 共McGraw–Hill,
New York, 1983兲.
2
Noise and Vibration: P.O.A.L. Davis, Chapter 12. Fundamental Duct
Acoustics, edited by R. G. White and J. G. Walker 共Horwood, London,
1982兲.
3
J. E. Potzick and B. Robertson, ‘‘Long wavelength acoustic flowmeter,’’
U.S. Patent 4,445,389 共1984兲.
4
P. S. Alves and A. G. Doige, ‘‘Measurement of mean gas flow velocity in
piping using acoustic properties,’’ Noise-con 88, West Lafayette, IN, 1988,
pp. 469– 474.
5
P. S. Alves, ‘‘Three acoustic flow measurement methods,’’ Fourth Interna-
tional Symposium on Fluid Flow Measurement, Denver, CO, 1999.
6
Y.-D. Chun, Y.-H. Kim, and W.-S. Cheung, ‘‘The measurements of acous-
tic field and mean flow velocity in pipes using microphone array,’’ J.
KSME 22, 1761–1768 共1998兲.
7
W.-S. Cheung and J.-S. Paik, ‘‘A new acoustic flowmeter measuring the
mean pipe flow velocity,’’ in Ref. 5.
8
W.-S. Cheung et al., ‘‘Development of the mean fluid velocity measure-
ment technique using the sound field reconstruction,’’ KRISS Report No.
KRISS-IR-2000-015, 2000.
9
ISO 10534-1, Acoustics—Determination of Sound Absorption Coefficient
and Impedance in Impedance Tubes. 1. Method Using Standing Wave
Ratio 共International Organization for Standardization, Geneva, Switzer-
land, 1996兲.
10
L. L. Beranek, Acoustics, 2nd ed. 共The Acoustical Society of America,
1986兲.
11
G. Strang, Linear Algebra and its Applications, 3rd ed. 共Harcourt Brace
Jovanovich, 1988兲.
12
The Math Works, Inc, MATLAB Reference Guide 共Ver. 5.3兲, 1999.
13
M. R. Spiegel, Mathematical Handbook of Formulas and Tables,
Schaum’s Outline Series 共McGraw–Hill, New York, 1968兲.
14
ISO 10534-2, Acoustics—Determination of Sound Absorption Coefficient
and Impedance in Impedance Tube. 2. Transfer Function Method 共Inter-
national Organization for Standardization, Geneva, 1998兲.
15
W.-S. Cheung, M.-J. Jho, and Y.-H. Kim, ‘‘Improved method for the mea-
surement of acoustic properties of a sound absorbent sample in the stand-
ing wave tube,’’ J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 97, 2733–2739 共1995兲.
16
ISO/CD 5167-1, Measurement of Fluid Flow by Means of Pressure Dif-
ferential Devices Inserted in Circular Cross-section Conduits Running
Full. 1. General 共International Organization for Standardization, Geneva,
Switzerland, 1999兲.
Cheung et al.: Acoustic flowmeter for mean flow velocity in pipes