Volume 103, Issue 2, February 1998
Index of content:
- SELECTED RESEARCH ARTICLES 
103(1998); http://dx.doi.org/10.1121/1.423235View Description Hide Description
Ultrasonic waves reflected from the front and back surfaces of a thin layer are often not separated in the time domain, and interfere. The spectrum of the resulting interference signal depends on (a) the thickness of the layer and the elastic moduli and density of the layer and the surrounding material (substrates), and (b) properties of the layer/substrate interface which can be described in terms of the interfacial stiffness. In this paper the effect of interfacial stiffness is isolated by considering the ultrasonic wave interaction with a solid layer compressed between two substrates of the same material. Since the layer and the substrate have identical properties the effect of impedance difference on the layer reflection vanishes. An aluminum system is selected for the experiment; the contacting surfaces are roughened and varying pressure is applied to model imperfect interface changes. It is shown both theoretically and experimentally that the contact pressure increase results in increase of the interfacial stiffness and spectral minima shift to higher frequency. A simple analytical expression relating the reflection minimum position to the interfacial stiffness is derived and shows good agreement with experimental results. It is shown that in the high-interfacial-stiffness limit the resonance minima positions are given by the condition In the limit of low interfacial stiffness the first minimum shifts to zero and higher order resonances are given by Since the resonance minima measurements can be done with high precision it is proposed to use the frequency minimum shift for determination of interfacial stiffness and, consequently, the quality of the interfacial contact.
Development of a new standard laboratory protocol for estimating the field attenuation of hearing protection devices. Part III. The validity of using subject-fit data103(1998); http://dx.doi.org/10.1121/1.423236View Description Hide Description
The mandate of ASA Working Group S12/WG11 has been to develop “laboratory and/or field procedure(s) that yield useful estimates of field performance” of hearing protection devices (HPDs). A real-ear attenuation at threshold procedure was selected, devised, tested via an interlaboratory study, and incorporated into a draft standard that was approved in 1997 [J. D. Royster et al., “Development of a new standard laboratory protocol for estimating the field attenuation of hearing protection devices. Part I. Research of Working Group 11, Accredited Standards Committee S12, Noise,” J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 99, 1506–1526 (1996); ANSI S12.6-1997, “American National Standard Methods for Measuring Real-Ear Attenuation of Hearing Protectors” (American National Standards Institute, New York, 1997)]. The real-world estimation procedure utilizes a subject-fit methodology with listeners who are audiometrically proficient, but inexperienced in the use of HPDs. A key factor in the decision to utilize the subject-fit method was an evaluation of the representativeness of the laboratory data vis-à-vis attenuation values achieved by workers in practice. Twenty-two field studies were reviewed to develop a data base for comparison purposes. Results indicated that laboratory subject-fit attenuation values were typically equivalent to or greater than the field attenuation values, and yielded a better estimate of those values than did experimenter-fit or experimenter-supervised fit types of results. Recent data which are discussed in the paper, but which were not available at the time of the original analyses, confirm the findings.