Sound Absorption Property of Polyurethane Foam with Polyethylene Fiber

Abstract

Flexible polyurethane (PU) foams with varying polyethylene fiber contents were synthesized to improve their acoustic performances. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of different polyethylene fiber contents of the PU foams on the resultant sound absorption, which was characterized by the impedance tube technique to obtain the incident sound absorption coefficient. Other parameters related to acoustic absorption performance of polyurethane foams were also measured such as microstructure, porosity and airflow resistivity. In this paper, these parameters were analyzed and compared with those of pure polyurethane foam. The results showed that the acoustic absorption properties of the PU foams were improved especially in the low frequency region by adding polyethylene fiber. When 0.2 g polyethylene fiber was added into the PU foam composite, the sound absorption coefficient is best especially around 125 – 315 Hz. The maximum enhancement in the acoustic properties of the PU foams was obtained by adding 0.1 g polyethylene fiber.

Keywords

• sound absorption
• porous materials
• polymeric composites
• open-cell foams
• microstructure