Abstract
The equivalent source method(ESM) is used for the calculation of the internal pressure field for an enclosure which can have arbitrary boundary conditions and nay include internal objects which scatter the sound field. The advantage of using ESM is that it requires relatively low computing cost and is easy to model the internal diffracting objects. Typical ESM modeling uses two groups of equivalent source positions. One group includes the first order images of the source inside the enclosure. The Positions of the other group are usually on a spherical surface some distance outside the enclosure. The normal velocity on the surfaces of the enclosure walls is evaluated at a larger number of positions than there are equivalent sources. The sum of the squared difference between this velocity and the expected is minimized by adjusting the strength of the equivalent sources. This study is on the optimal far field sources positions when using the equivalent source method. In general, the far field sources are evenly distributed on a surface of a virtual sphere which is centered at the enclosure with a sufficiently large radius. In this study. optimal far field source locations are searched using simulated annealing method for various radii of spheres where far field sources are located. Simulation results showed that optimally located sources with adequate distance away from the enclosure center gave better result than sources with even distribution even with a smaller number of far field sources.
