Title: CAE Support to Vehicle Audio Installation Issues
text: Audio CAE is an emerging area of interest for vehicle OEMs. Questions regarding early stages of the vehicle design, like choosing the possible positions for speakers, deciding the installation details that can influence the visual design, and integration of the low frequency speakers with the body & closures structure, are of interest. Therefore, at VCC, the development of the CAE methodology for audio applications has been undertaken. The key to all CAE applications is the loudspeaker model made available in the vibro-acoustic software used within the company. Such a model has been developed, implemented and verified in different frequency ranges and different applications. The applications can be divided into the low frequency ones (concerning the installation of woofers and subwoofers), and the middle/high frequency ones (concerning the installation of midrange and tweeter speakers). In the case of the woofer, it is the interaction with the body vibration that is of interest. Hence, the loudspeaker has to be used in a full vibro-acoustic Trimmed Body model. For the higher frequencies (midrange & tweeter) the body can be treated as locally reacting, if not rigid. The examples of the verification of the speaker model versus test data for a woofer mounted in a car door will be shown, together with applications to woofer installation issues. Regarding high frequencies, examples will be shown of the comparison of different grille variants and the evaluation of the position of the speaker on the sound quality at the listeners’ positions. Future developments will be discussed.