Speed-of-Sound Measurements in Liquids Using Time-of-Flight Sensors

摘要

Speed of sound as a fundamental property of all material phases is an important measurement category. It is continuously measured in industrial processes, e.g. for material and product quality control. Speed of sound is also strongly related to other physical and thermodynamic material characteristics and thus fundamental for science and engineering. As modelling is limited and cannot meet the needs in all fields of application, the demand for high accuracy measurements remains high. Speed of sound in liquids is comparatively easy to measure with adequate precision using a variety of measurement techniques. We cater to high accuracy speed-of-sound measurements in water as a reference for similar liquids of interest. For the investigations we used commercially available sensors working with the time-of-flight technique. These sensors are originally designed for in-situ determination of sound speed in oceanic environments and are therefore constructed for robustness with respect to in-situ measurement conditions (low-corrosive materials, pressure-resistant and thermally stable composition).