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PHY 106 Physics Lab

Ecole polytechnique
Playing with acoustics
1 Introduction : Acoustic waves phenomena

Sound is a propagation in a fluid of a pressure disturbance. It is called an acoustic wave. Waves

are present everywhere in many domains of physics: surface waves or internal gravity waves in
the oceans, sound in solids, liquids or gases, electromagnetic waves (including light), flexural
waves in plates, beams, etc. All these wave phenomena originate after a localized perturbation in
space and time of a medium initially at equilibrium. Media can be three-dimensional, such as
space in case of electromagnetic propagation or oceans in case of internal waves, two-
dimensional, when considering water waves at the surface of a liquid, waves propagating in a
tensioned membrane, or one-dimensional, when considering a string or beam. In a clarinet, the
pressure fluctuations are produced by the reed in the mouthpiece and the wave travels through
a long and thing air column inside the instrument.

As the title of this experimental session suggests, we will consider acoustic, or sound waves. In
air, pressure perturbations propagate at a constant velocity referred to as the speed of sound.
The main objective below will be to measure the speed of sound. To do so, we will generate a
pressure perturbation and measure its time of travel between two locations, or make use of the
interactions of waves with boundaries.
You will first get acquainted with the electric measurement devices and sources. Then you will
perform experiments on the behaviour of travelling waves generated by impulse or harmonic
signals in a tube to finally focus on the behaviour of waves in a bounded medium.

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2 1 Preliminary experiments with a Low Frequency Generator (LFG)
and an oscilloscope
2.1 Experimental setup
For this set of preliminary experiments, only a Picoscope, a computer, and a coaxial cable are
necessary (see figure 1).

2.2 Experiments
1.2.1. Waveform visualisation
We propose at first familiarize yourself with the oscilloscope and its arbitrary wave generator
(AWG) that will be used all along this experimental work. Follow the steps described below:

 Plug the USB oscilloscope Picoscope and launch the Picoscope software.
 Plug a BNC cable to connect directly the AWG output to the channel A (Fig. 1).
 Open the AWG output window, select a sinusoidal output with an amplitude of 2V.
 Fix the frequency at 1kHz. As a result, the function generator will deliver to the
oscilloscope a sinusoidal voltage at a frequency of 1kHz.

Q1 ) Which horizontal scale factor (sec/div) on the oscilloscope one has to select to
visualise 5 periods of oscillations at this particular frequency of 1kHz?

1.2.2. Trigger adjustments

 Fix the vertical CHA calibre at ±1V.
 Select trigger1 repeat and modify the position of the trigger level at 0V (yellow square on
the graph).1
 We want to measure the amplitude of the signal. To do so, select add measurement and
Peak-to-peak as type of measurement.

1
Refer to the Picoscope manual for a brief explanation of the trigger concept with oscilloscopes.

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  We want to measure the frequency of the signal. To do so, select add measurement and
Frequency as type of measurement.

Q2 ) Modify the position of the trigger level by putting it above the maximum value of
the signal. What do you observe?

1.2.3 Creation of an impulse signal with the AWG

 In the wave generator window, select arbitrary wave generator (AWG) and edit the
wave.
 First create a wave full of zero, and with the pencil tool, click somewhere on the wave to
create one single value of maximum amplitude.
 Back in the main wave generator window, select 1Hz as frequency.
 Go into the trig menu; select type: “Simple edge"; source: “A"; slope: “Rising".
 Adjust the trigger level slightly above the zero of channel A.
 To obtain a graph on the display of the oscilloscope, press the green Go/Start capturing
button.

Q3 ) In order to visualize the signal over 100ms, which vertical (V) and horizontal (s)
scale factors should you choose? Provide the picture of the display that is obtained.

1.2.4 Listen to some sound

 Plug the AWG output to the inlets of the loudspeaker
 In the AWG window, select sinusoidal signal with and amplitude of 2V
 Vary the frequency between 50 and 20000 Hz and listen to the loudspeaker

Q4 ) Describe how the sound produced by the loudspeaker varies when the frequency is
increased.

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 Q4bis) Estimate the lowest and highest frequencies you can hear with your ears.

3 Measuring the propagation velocity of sound impulses in a tube

An acoustic wave, or sound, is a disturbance of the ambient pressure that propagates in the air.
This disturbance may be created by a vibrating object, a strong pressure fluctuation inside a
fluid vortex, or an explosion. In the present experiment, the perturbation will be created by a
vibrating loudspeaker at one end of a transparent tube. At the other end, an absorbing boundary
will be placed in order to prevent reflection of the waves.
This disturbance propagates at a characteristic velocity that will be estimated by measuring its
propagation time between two points separated by a known distance.

3.1 Experimental setup

The equipment is the following:
 The Picoscope
 The long transparent tube (Figure 3)
 The loudspeaker, inserted at one end of the tube (Figure 2)
 An absorbing termination, made of a foam of conical shape, connected at the other end of
the tube (Figure 3)
 One microphone fixed at the end of a slender bar, that can slide in the tube in order to
modify the position at which pressure is measured (Figure 3)
 One microphone inserted in the hole near the loudspeaker (Figure 2)
 One microphone amplifier, with jack inputs and BNC outputs. (Figure 2)

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3.2 Experiment
 Connect the AWG Picoscope output to the inlets of the loudspeaker
 Plug the jack cables of the microphones to the amplifier (Fig. 2) and plug the BNC cables
of the outputs to the channels A and B of the oscilloscope
 Turn the level of the amplifier at maximum and select sinus mode
 With the signal generator of the Picoscope program, generate some very short impulses
(The same as that generated in section 1.2.3 : Arbitrary wave at 1Hz with only one non-
zero value, with the maximum possible amplitude of 2V)
 Set channel A and B scale at ±2V
 Set time-base at 10 ms/div
 Select trigger single on CHA and a trigger level around 0.8V
 Press trigger and using the vertical rulers2 estimate the elapsed time between the
moments each microphone receive the generated impulse.

Q5) Using this setup and for various microphone distances, measure the travel time of
the pulses. Provide a screenshot of the captured signals in one case, and a table with
your measurements.

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Vertical rulers are initially on the left of the graph. Look for small squares on the bottom left and drag these
squares with the mouse.

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 Q6) Plot the travel time as a function of the microphone distances

Q7) From this plot, estimate the sound velocity.

4 Estimating the sound propagation velocity of harmonic waves in a

tube
Next, we wish to obtain the speed of sound from a sinusoidal wave. Let us first discuss the basic
principles of the measurement done in this part. Consider a semi infinite tube and a pressure
perturbation imposed at x = 0, whose time dependence is sinusoidal at a frequency F:

p ( x=0 , t ) =A cos(2 πFt )

This is illustrated in figure 4.

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If this perturbation propagates in the direction x > 0 at a constant velocity c, the pressure p(x, t)
obeys

[ ( )]
p ( x> 0 ,t )= A cos 2 πF t−
x
c
The latter is a harmonic pressure wave. Since it consists of the propagation of a pressure which
is constant in planes x = constant, this wave is referred to as plane wave. Since this wave is
produced in a tube that restricts propagation in one direction, it is called a guided wave3.

If we look at the equation above and freeze the time, we see a pressure perturbation of the form,

[
p ( x , t =constant ) =Acos constant−2 πF
x
c ] [
=A cos constant −
2π
λ
x
]
where

c
λ=
F
is the wavelength. As we see, the larger the frequency F , the shorter the wavelength λ (see figure
4).

The idea of this experiment is hence to generate a sinusoidal perturbation at a frequency F at

one end of the tube. At the other end, an absorbing foam is placed, so that no acoustic energy is
reflected back from this end, thus simulating a semi-infinite tube 4. Using two microphones, we
search for the distance at which they give us synchronized signals (in phase) (see figure 5). This
distance equals the wavelength or an integer multiple of the wavelength.

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The length of the tube is large compared to its other dimensions. The consequence of this choice of geometry is
that if we restrain the characteristic frequency of the pressure perturbation below a particular frequency

f c=
1.841 c
2πa
3.3 kHz where c= γR T
M √ is the sound velocity, a is the radius of the tube, so that f c ∼3 kHz , the

pressure does not depend on the cross-section coordinates. We are then faced with a one-dimensional wave propagation
phenomenon.
4
Note that in practice a perfectly absorbing boundary is hard to produce and some energy may be reflected
back, in particular at low frequencies. It is thus not recommended to do this experiment at frequencies below
1500Hz.

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4.1 Experimental setup
The necessary equipment for this section is very similar to the one used in the previous section:
 The transparent tube
 The loudspeaker, placed at one end of the tube.
 Two microphones, one fixed at one end of a long metallic rod, one fixed in the small hole
of the tube.
 The microphone amplifier.
 The absorbing termination of conical shape, inserted at the other end of the tube.
 The Picoscope.

4.2 Experiment
For a few different frequencies F between 1500 and 2500Hz, perform the following steps,
 Tune the AWG so that a sinusoidal signal at frequency F is generated. Plug the AWG
outlet into the loudspeaker inlets via a BNC cable.
 Oscilloscope tunings: ±2V, 500 µs/div, trigger A, level 0.5V, mode repeat
 Slide the rod so that the two microphones are at the same location.
 Display the signals on the oscilloscope. The two signals should be in phase
(synchronized)
 Slide the rod: a phase shift between the two signals should be observed.
 Measure the distance λ at which the signals are back in phase (for large wavelengths, it is
also possible to measure the distance at which the two signals become in phase
opposition and multiply this distance by 2)

Q8) Plot λ as function of F.

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 Q9) From this plot, estimate the speed of sound.

5 Identifying stationary waves in a tube

In this section, we will look at the importance of the boundary conditions on stationary waves
inside the tube.

In the tube waves are generated at the speaker and then they are reflected by the other end
(except when using the foam, which absorbs the traveling wave). Therefore at each position in
the tube the oscillating pressure results from the sum of the oscillations of the original wave and
the reflected wave. We obtain a standing wave when the superposition of the two waves
becomes independent of time, which is the case when the wavelength respects the boundary
conditions of the tube.

5.1 Experimental setup

The necessary equipment for this section is:
 The transparent tube.
 The loudspeaker inserted at one end of the tube.
 The microphone fixed on the long metallic rod.
 The microphone amplifier.
 A different termination inserted at the end of the tube depending on the measurement

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5.2 Experiment
We will now look at how the amplitude of the response varies with the input frequency. Insert
the open end to the tube. With the signal generator of the Picoscope program, perform a
frequency sweep from 500 Hz to 3 kHz with a frequency increment of 10Hz and an increment
time interval of 300ms. Measure the amplitude measured by microphone A. Choose 20s/div for
the time to track the amplitude over a long period of time.

Q10) How many maxima do you observe? What do these correspond to?

In an open tube, the frequencies giving the maximal response are given by:

2f n n
=
c L

where c is the velocity of sound and L the length of the tube.

Q11 ) Using this formula, justify the number of maxima you observed above.

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We will now try to observe a standing wave in the tube. A standing wave is a combination of an
incident wave (coming from the speaker) and its reflexion (travelling in the other direction). (A
nice animation can be found here : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standing_wave). The
superposition of both these waves combines into a wave which does not seem to move.

In an open tube (e.g. a clarinet) a reflexion still exists but with a fixed pressure value: when the
tube is open to the atmosphere the pressure at the open end is fixed at a constant value
(atmospheric pressure).

We will try to manually identify the frequencies corresponding to standing waves. Using the sine
wave generator, impose a sine wave at a given frequency. Measure the amplitude over 10s for
frequencies from 1090 Hz to 1170 Hz (incrementing by 10 Hz).

Q12) What do you observe? What is the frequency corresponding to a standing wave in the
tube (±10 Hz)? Provide some screenshots to explain what you see.

Choose the frequency corresponding to the standing wave.

Measure the amplitude of the microphone response A on the oscilloscope (Add measurement →
Peak to peak)

 Repeat this measurement for a large number of positions of the sliding microphone
(typically 30 along the tube). For each position, the distance from the loudspeaker is
noted x.

Q13) Plot A(x).

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Because the loudspeaker emits a sinusoidal signal and the resulting sound propagates at a
constant velocity, the shape of the amplitude as function of x also has a sinusoidal shape. The
shape A(x) results from the combination of the wave and all its reflections at boundaries.

Q14) How many nodes (points of minimal amplitude) and anti-nodes (points of maximal
amplitude) do you identify? What does this number correspond to?

Q15) With an open end to the tube, do we impose the pressure or the velocity?

We now change the boundary to a reflective end.

Q16) Do we now impose a pressure or a velocity boundary condition at the end of the tube?
What does this change to the standing waves you might observe?

Perform the same frequency sweep as before.

Q17) How many maxima do you observe? What has changed? Bonus: can you explain why?

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We will again try to manually identify the frequencies corresponding to standing waves. Using
the sine wave generator, impose a sine wave at a given frequency. Measure the amplitude over
10s for frequencies from 1000Hz to 1150 Hz (incrementing by 10 Hz).

Q18) What is the frequency corresponding to a standing wave in the tube (±10 Hz)?

 Measure the amplitude of the microphone response A on the oscilloscope (Add

measurement → Peak to peak)
 Repeat this measurement for a large number of positions of the sliding microphone
(typically 30 along the tube). For each position, the distance from the loudspeaker is
noted x.

Q19) Again plot A(x). Is there a difference to the previous experiment? Can you explain this
difference?

6 Appendix

7 A Relationship between quantities characterizing travelling

waves

Quantity Units
Velocity Distance/time ω λ
w= =f λ=
k T
Period Time 2π 1 λ
T= = =
ω f v
Angular Frequency Time-1 2π
ω= =2 πf =k v
T

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Frequency Time-1 ω 1 v
f= = =
2π T λ
Wavelength Distance 2π v
λ= = =vT
k f
Wavenumber Distance-1 2 π ω 2 πf
k= = =
λ v v

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