Identification of Sound Power Source for Noise Reduction of the Table Saw

摘要

There are approximately 860,000 carpenters employed in the United States. Of these workers, over 50%rnhave significant hearing loss by the time they retire. One of the most commonly used carpentry tools isrnthe table saw. As in many cases of portable power tools used by these carpenters, noise levelrnconsiderations during the design phase seem to be given low priority. In this senior capstone designrnproject, we conducted sound power level and vibrations spectrum measurements in an effort to identifyrnthe major contributors to the overall noise level. Barriers and constrained layer damping controls werernapplied in a successive manner to examine their noise reduction capability and identify major noisernsources. These efforts resulted in an overall reduction of 6 dB in sound power level. Further, it is shownrnthat the electric motor is the most significant noise source.