IDENTIFICATION AND QUANTIFICATION OF TRUCK TIRE NOISE SOURCES UNDER ON-ROAD OPERATING CONDITIONS

Abstract

Truck tire noise mecahnisms can be broadly grouped into six categories: tread band/element vibration, air pumping/organ-piping, sidewall vibration,scrubbing, tire carcass modal response, and gross air flow. While some of these mechanisms have been studied in isolation and mainly on roadwheels where surface curvature effects enter, little on-road quantification of noise sources for fully-treaded tires has been completed. This paper reports on a study to localize and quantify the noise source regions on blank, rib, and cross-bar tread truck tires under actual on-road, highway speed, operating conditions. An analysis of the sound levels and spectral content of the key regions as a function of tire type and surface texture was made to determine possible mechanisms and their sound intensity levels.