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Experiments in Fluids, November 2013, 55:1627.
Fernando Carbajo Fuertes, Enrico Cecchi, Jeroen van Beeck, Christophe Schram.
Environmental and Applied Fluid Dynamics Department, von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics, Sint-Genesius-Rode, Belgium and
Wind Engineering and Renewable Energy Laboratory, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland.
Abstract
This work presents the development of an inexpensive measurement technique based on miniature microphones for the measurement of pressure fluctuations in a wide frequency range, starting from infrasound up to several kilohertz. Special emphasis has been put on achieving accurate calibration of the system at very low frequencies and good agreement with reference measurements have been achieved at frequencies as low as 1 Hz, therefore opening new low-budget research possibilities in many fields of fluid mechanics. The measurement technique proposed is specially indicated when the number of simultaneous pressure measurements is high since the sensors used are inexpensive, contrarily to common research equipment. One particular area in which this technique results useful is bluff-body aerodynamics. As an example of the potential of the technique, the structural response of a finite-square cylinder immersed in a turbulent flow is studied.
