Hydraulic flow noise characterization of spool valves using experimental techniques

Abstract

This research was conducted to characterize and develop a deeper understanding of the hydraulic flow noise for a spool valve. Hydraulic noise was analyzed to study the interaction of the valve spool and the flow noise generation to isolate where in the spool articulation the most noise was generated. The goal was to correlate turbulent fluid flow in pressurized hydraulic circuits to different spool positions while isolating what factors were the main drivers of spool noise generation. The experiments were conducted on a valve controlled by a closed-circuit hydraulic system, using this system fluid-born noise could be isolated from other noisy mechanisms and a noise profile of each could be measured. It was found that internal spool geometry and flow channel open area played the largest role in valve noise generation for the valve. In the future, more valves could be tested to develop a robust profile library using the test methods developed.