A Review of Bionic Structures in Control of Aerodynamic Noise of Centrifugal Fans

Abstract

Due to the complexity of the working conditions and the diversity of application scenarios, the normal operation of a fan, whether volute tongue, volute shell surface, or blade, often encounters some unavoidable problems, such as flow separation, wear, vibration, etc.; the aerodynamic noise caused by these problems has a significant impact on the normal operation of the fan. However, despite the use of aerodynamic acoustics to design low-noise fans or the use of sound absorption, sound insulation, and sound dissipation as the main traditional noise control techniques, they are in a state of technical bottleneck. Thus, the search for more efficient methods of noise reduction is looking toward the field of bionics. For this purpose, this paper first analyzes the mechanism of fan noise in the volute tongue and blades, and then, this paper reviews the noise control mechanism and improvement research using the bionic structures in the volute tongue structure, the contact surface of the volute shell, and the leading and trailing edges of the blade in the centrifugal fan. Finally, the current challenges and prospects of bionic structures for aerodynamic noise control of centrifugal fans are discussed.

Keywords

• bionic structure
• aerodynamic noise control
• centrifugal fan
• non-smooth surface