DivisionofTechnicalEducationandManagementStudies

AppliedEngineeringScience ESC103

PassExamQuestion Spring2009
Sound

Fall 2002
(a) A person standing a certain distance from an airplane with four equally noisy jet
engineers is feeling a sound level intensity bordering on pain. 120 dB.
(i) What sound level intensity would this person experience it the captain shut down
all but one engine?
(ii) With all engines running, how far should the person move so that the decibel level
at the new location is 70dB
(b) Two piano strings are supposed to be vibrating at 132Hz but a piano tuner hears three
beats every 2.0s when they are played together.
(i) If one is vibrating at 132 Hz, what must be the frequency of the other (is there
only one answer)?
(ii) By how much (in percent) must the tension be increased or decreased to bring
them in tune.

Spring 2005
a) A person standing a certain distance away from five equally loud speakers feels a loudness
at a level of 100dB.
(i) What loudness (in decibels) will the person experience if all but one of the
speaker got disconnected from the amplifier?
(ii) With just one speaker running, how close should the person approach for the
loudness to be at the same level as before the speakers got disconnected?
b) A fisherman sitting in his boat hears the sound of an explosion through the bottom of his
boat and 2.5 seconds later, hears the sound of the same explosion through the air. Given
that the speed of sound in air is 343m/s and the speed of sound in sea water is 1560m/s,
calculate how far away did the explosion occur.





Spring 2008
a) Calculate the time it takes a explosion occurring 500 meters away to reach your location
when the atmospheric temperature is -15
o
C
b) A tube 75 cm long and closed at one end is made to resonate at its lowest frequency.
i. Calculate the lowest resonant frequency
ii. What are the next two resonant frequencies it will produce?

c) An applied engineering student wished to
determine the location of an internal crack in
a cast iron block. The student places a
microphone, connected to an oscilloscope, on
the surface of the block and strikes the block
sharply with a hammer at a point 10 cm away
from the microphone. On the oscilloscope
the student observes three signal spikes as
the block is struck the 2nd and 3rd each
occurring 214.3 microseconds and 535.7 microseconds respectively after the first spike.
i. Explain the presence of the three signal spikes
ii. If sound travels at 3500m/s through cast iron, how long after impact does the first
spike appear?
iii. At what depth is the crack located and what is the thickness of the block?


Spring 2008
a) Explain the difference between loudness and intensity of sound
b) Explain what is significance of the threshold of hearing?
c) Why is a logarithmic scale the preferred scale for measuring loudness sound?
d) A person standing a certain distance away from five equally loud speakers feels a loudness
at a level of 100dB.
(i) What loudness (in decibels) will the person experience if all but one of the
speaker got disconnected from the amplifier?
(ii) With just one speaker running, how close should the person approach for the
loudness to be at the same level as before the speakers got disconnected?

Spring 2007

a) Explain the characteristics of sound.
b) Calculate the first two harmonics for an organ pipe 3.5 meters long
c) Calculate the speed of sound at 28oC.
d) A student detonates a small explosion out at sea while a second student monitors the
sound 2500 meters away on some sensitive listening device. The second student standing
some distance away hears two distinct sounds 5.543 seconds apart.
i) Explain the presence of two sounds.
ii) Given that the temperature of the atmosphere was 28oC, calculate the speed
of sound in sea water
iii) On closer examination of the monitoring equipment, the students observed that
there was a faint sound occurring exactly 0.150 seconds after the first sound.
Calculate the depth of the sea at this location

Spring 2007
A technician standing 50meters away from a bank of six (6) identical loudspeakers observes a
sound of 103decibels.
a) If all but one loudspeaker gets disconnected, what would be the decibel level he would
observe?
b) How far, and what direction relative to the loudspeakers, should he move for the loudness
to return the same level as before (103dB)?
c) With only one loudspeaker on the first bank operating, a second bank of loudspeakers
identical to the first was switched on 175 meters from the first bank of speakers.
Assuming that they were connected to the same amplifier what location should he stand
between the two sets of speakers to observe the same loudness for each set of speakers






Spring 2007
a) Two dog whistles when blown individually are each inaudible to the human ear. However
when blown together produces an audible note of 5500Hz.
i) Explain how this is possible?
ii) If it was later known that one whistle produces a frequency of 21000Hz,
what is the frequency of the other?
b) Two electronics students listening to an oscillator producing a note through a speaker
observed the note becoming more and more difficult to hear. The first student said that
the sound was going beyond the human audio frequency range. The second responded
that the sound was going beyond the threshold of hearing. Explain which student is
correct and why.
c) Explain the following terms
i. Transverse wave
ii. Standing wave
iii. Resonance
iv Echo location

Fall 2004
A wire of total length 3500 mm and mass 3.0 grams is clamped between supports 2400 mm apart
and is stretched to a tension of 50 Newtons.
a) If the wire is plucked, what will be the velocity of a wave
as it travels along the wire?
b) What will be the first three resonance frequencies
produced by this wire?
c) If, due to an increase in temperature, the tension decreased
by 3.5% what will be the corresponding increase in the frequency of the
fundamental?


Fall 2004
A person in a rock concert standing a certain distance from a stack of four identical speakers is feeling a
sound level intensity of 90 dB.
(a) What sound level intensity would this person experience if the sound technicians shut
down all but one speaker?
(b) With all speakers operating, how far should the person move so that the decibel level at
the new location is 75dB



Fall 2004
(a) An organ pipe can resonate at frequencies of 234Hz, 390Hz and 546Hz but not at any other
frequencies between 234Hz and 546Hz. Show whether this is this an open pipe or a
closed pipe and calculate the fundamental frequency.


(b) Two dog whistles, when blown individually produce no audible sound. However, when
blown together produces an audible note of 5000Hz. Explain why is it possible to hear a
note when blown together but not when blown individually.

If when one of the whistles is replaced with a third whistle labeled 20000Hz and blown together with the
first, a note of 7000Hz is heard, what are the frequencies of the

Fall 2006

Two amplifiers rated at 75 Watts and 300 Watts per channel respectively are connected to identical
speakers placed 120 meters apart as shown in Fig 4 below.
With an observer standing halfway between the speakers, calculate the decibel level the listener would
experience if:

a) Only the 300W speaker was operating? (The 75W speaker was off)
b) Only the 75W speaker was operating? (The 300W speaker was off)
c) With BOTH speakers on?
d) Calculate how far (and in which direction) should the observer move so that the decibel level
from each speaker would be the same.