Acoustics Research Centre

Boundary Element Method

(BEM)
Brief
Prof. Y. W. Lam
 Acoustics Research Centre

Basics
• BEM is a numerical technique to solve partial
differential equations (PDEs) of a variety of physical
problems with well defined boundary conditions.
• The PDE over a problem domain is transformed into a
surface integral equation over the surfaces that
enclosed the domain.
• The integral equation can be solved by discretising
the surfaces into small patches - boundary elements.
• Only surfaces need to be discretised - resulting in a lot
less elements than FEM.
• Particularly useful for acoustics - problem domain
often involves the entire 3D space in free field
 Acoustics Research Centre

Acoustic Problem
The (harmonic) acoustic problem is defined by the wave equation (with
or without sources)

and the boundary conditions

special cases:
 Acoustics Research Centre

Transform to Integral Equation

Since the problem is defined by the bc, we can re-formulate the problem on the
boundary itself - mathematically transformed into an integral equation
(no source exterior problem):
In full 3D
space
In half 3D
space

Inside
solid
Unknown 1: Unknown 2:
Dipole source Monopole source
distribution distribution

Huygens principle - wave propagation as originates from sources on

a wave front (in our case the boundary)
 Acoustics Research Centre

Interior Problem:
No source Interior problem:
In full 3D
space
In half 3D
space

Outside
Volumn
Unknown 1: Unknown 2:
Dipole source Monopole source
distribution distribution
 Acoustics Research Centre

Application of Boundary Conditions

The boundary condition relates surface pressure to surface velocity, reduces the
number of unknown fields from 2 to 1 on the surface:
 Acoustics Research Centre

Adding Sources:
Exterior Problem:

Interior Problem:
 Acoustics Research Centre

Numerical Solution
Boundary divided up into small boundary elements - small enough so that
approximations can be made to facilitate a solution.

Unknowns out of integral

Simplest approximation - surface

pressure and velocity constant over
each element, and
Shape function [N]=1 (zero order)
 Acoustics Research Centre

Linear Equations
A set of linear equations that can be solved numerically:

Coefficient matrices

Unknown variable Known variables

 Acoustics Research Centre

Characteristic Frequencies

• Non-unique solution (failure) when ~ interior region

resonates.
• Overcome by either:
– Combined with the equation for r in Vint in the case of exterior
problems (or r in Vext in the case of interior problems). An
over-determined matrix equation is formed and solved by a
least square method.
– A combination of the integral equation and its normal
derivative formulation, provided that the coefficient of the
combination satisfies certain requirements.
• Automatically taken care of by the computer program.
 Acoustics Research Centre

Thin Panel Approximation

When a panel is thin, the surface pressure and velocity on either side of
the panel is related and an analytical equation can be used to reduce the
modelling to just one side of the panel

Automatically done in DIFTHINI

 Acoustics Research Centre

DIFTHINI

• Purely for number crunching – calculation

• Console program – run in a Windows Command
Prompt Box
• Problem/model specified entirely by the Input Data
File
• Results in 2 Output Files
– .out – mainly for debugging
– .lst – main results in dB
 Acoustics Research Centre

Example Input File

/* Specification of Boundary Elements
/*
/* Example data input file for DIFTHINI.
Comment /*
/* Elements should be square Longest side <1/4 (1/6 if possible) wavelength
/*
/* These are comment lines lines /* Number of 4-noded Boundary Elements
6
/* /* Element Node1 Node2 Node3 Node4 0 (to indicate Rectangular elements)
/* Modelling a simple panel (0.3mx0.2m) with uniform surface velocity. 1 1 2 6 5 0
/* Symmetry modelled in the x and y directions. 2 2 3 7 6 0
/*
/*
Polar radiation pattern at 1kHz calculated in the x-z principle plane
from front to back at a distance of 1m.
3
4
3
5
4
6
8
10
7
9
0
0
Element
/*
/* Number of nodes used to form the BE model
5
6
6
7
7
8
11
12
10
11
0
0 definitions
12 /*
/* Node X Y Z /* Symmetry option (1 for none, 2 for x, 4 for x & y)

Node
1 .0000 .0000 .000 4
2 .0500 .0000 .000 /*
3 .1000 .0000 .000
coordinates
/* frequency
4 .1500 .0000 .000 10000.000000
5 .0000 .0500 .000 /*
6 .0500 .0500 .000 /* List of complex normal velocity values v on each boundary element.
7 .1000 .0500 .000 /* The velocity over each element is assumed to be constant.
8 .1500 .0500 .000 /* Element Real(v) Imaginary(v)
9
10
.0000
.0500
.1000
.1000
.000
.000 Calculation /*
Velocity

Points spec
11 .1000 .1000 .000 1 1 0
12
/*
.1500 .1000 .000 2 1 0
3 1 0
Surface
/* Specification of sound field calculation option
/* -1 to calculate SPL at points on spherical surfaces
4 1 0
5 1 0 velocity spec
/* (NB. a positive number indicates a list of specific points) 6 1 0
/* /*
-1 /* use -1 -1 -1 to indicate end of this list of velocity values
/* -1 -1 -1
/* Radius of spherical surface, Min Max and Interval of calculation /*
1. 1. 1.0 /* 0 to indicate no external monopole sources
/* 0
/* Angle (degree) from z-axis, Min Max and Interval of calculation /*
0 360 2 /* -1 to indicate end of section
/* -1
/* Angle (degree) from x-axis in xy plane, Min Max and Interval /*
0. 0. 1 /* -1 to indicate end of data
/* -1
Acoustics Research Centre

Model of Example Input

 Acoustics Research Centre

Output .OUT file

• The .OUT file contains detailed sound pressure

(surface and external) data, an image of the
interpreted input model data, and a diagnostic
message:
• INTEGRAL FAILED TO CONVERGE X TIMES
OUT OF Y
• Y is the total number of integration done by the
program. Needless to say the number of failures X
should be 0
 Acoustics Research Centre

Example Output .LST File

2 0 Echo of calculation
0.350000 0.350000 1.00000 Point spec
0.000000E+00 360.000 2.00000
0.000000E+00 0.000000E+00 1.00000
PRESSURE DB-P/PIN DB-PS/PIN
1000.00 Calculation Point Coord,
1 (r,θ,Φ) in this example
0.000000E+00 0.000000E+00
( 0.350 0.000 0.000 ) 73.39 -4.72 -6.52
( 0.350 2.000 0.000 ) 73.34 -4.75 -6.53
( 0.350 4.000 0.000 ) 73.22 -4.84 -6.54
( 0.350 6.000 0.000 ) 73.03 -4.99 -6.57
( 0.350 8.000 0.000 ) 72.79 -5.15 -6.60
( 0.350 10.000 0.000 ) 72.56 -5.29 -6.65
.
.
.
( 0.350 360.000 0.000 ) 73.39 -4.72 -6.52
-1 -1 -1
-1.00000
SPL IL