Friday, May 30, 2014

Facts About Industrial Noise Control In Florida

By Nora Jennings


Industrial noise in an aspect that is almost inevitable when heavy machinery is being used. It however may become a serious issue because of the potential for permanent damage to hearing of employees when they are exposed to high noise levels. Therefore, it is important for industries to have reduction strategies. These should be implemented on a constant basis. There are many strategies for industrial noise control in Florida.

Damping is one of the used methods. It is made use of in chutes, panels, hoppers, conveyors and machine guards among others. There are two techniques used with this method. The first is unconstrained layer damping that involves use of bitumastic material. This material is stuck to the surface in question. The other technique entails construction of a laminate. Constrained layer damping is more effective and rugged.

Constrained layer damping either involves re-manufacture of steel guards or buying self adhesive steel sheets. The latter is able to be stuck on to existing components to cover about 80 percent of the flat surface area. This gives 5-25 dB noise reduction. The limitation of this is that there is reduction of efficiency for thicker sheets. Implementation in sheets above 3mm thickness becomes difficult.

The use of fan installations is also effective. Maximum efficiency of fans coincides precisely with minimum noise. As a result, any fan installation features that tend to minimize efficiency of the fan will definitely increase sonic pollution. The most experienced examples are dampers and bends close to the fan. For fan efficiency to be at a maximum, there should at least be 2-3 duct diameters between features that may disturb flow.

When ductwork is used, there will be 10-20 dB reduction in noises that are transmitted in the air. Rather than making use of silencers, one can line the last bend in the ductwork through the use of acoustic absorbents. The absorbents may either be fiberglass or foam. Alternatively, there can be construction of simple right-angled bends constructed from absorbents and which can fit on the openings. Any duct vibrations are handled through the use of dampers.

There is the application of fan speed reduction in centrifugal flow fans and axial fans. Noise from fans is roughly proportional to the 5th power of fan speed. Therefore, small drops in speed of fans will massively reduce noises. This can be achieved by changing size of pulleys or control systems. Dampers may also be reset.

The use of electric motors can be employed in such a way that noises are greatly controlled in the industry. The majority of companies have many electric motors used on a large range of devices. Most people are however not aware of the availability of general duty motors that are up to 10 dB or more quieter than the available typical units. It is best to feed motors into the system gradually such that all replacements are quiet.

In case employees have to work in places with high levels of sonic pollution, then they would have to sue earplugs and various other protective gears. It protects them from developing complications. It is also advisable that they go for medical examinations of the ears regularly.




About the Author:



No comments:

Post a Comment