Numerical Analysis and Characterization of Surface Pressure Fluctuations of High-Speed Trains Using Wavenumber–Frequency Analysis

The high-speed train interior noise induced by the exterior flow field is one of the critical issues for product developers to consider during design. The reliable numerical prediction of noise in a passenger cabin due to exterior flow requires the decomposition of surface pressure fluctuations into the hydrodynamic (incompressible) and the acoustic (compressible) components, as well as the accurate computation of the near aeroacoustic field, since the transmission characteristics of incompressible and compressible pressure waves through the wall panel of the cabin are quite different from each other. In this paper, a systematic numerical methodology is presented to obtain separate incompressible and compressible surface pressure fields in the wavenumber–frequency and space–time domains. First, large eddy simulation techniques were employed to predict the exterior flow field, including a highly-resolved acoustic near-field, around a high-speed train running at the speed of 300 km/h in an open field. Pressure fluctuations on the train surface were then decomposed into incompressible and compressible fluctuations using the wavenumber–frequency analysis. Finally, the separated incompressible and compressible surface pressure fields were obtained from the inverse Fourier transform of the wavenumber–frequency spectrum. The current method was illustratively applied to the high-speed train HEMU-430X running at a speed of 300 km/h in an open field. The results showed that the separate incompressible and compressible surface pressure fields in the time–space domain could be obtained together with the associated aerodynamic source mechanism. The power levels due to each pressure field were also estimated, and these can be directly used for interior noise prediction.