An Acoustic Sensor Array Design Suitable for Acoustic Beamforming of Power Equipment

Defects or malfunctions in power equipment often emit abnormal sounds. Acoustic imaging technology based on acoustic beam formation can help operation and maintenance personnel detect the location of abnormal sounds and improve operation and maintenance efficiency. This paper designs an acoustic sensor array suitable for acoustic beam forming of power equipment. First, the frequency characteristics of the acoustic signals emitted when power equipment fails are summarized. Generally speaking, the frequency of the sound of power equipment failure has a wide bandwidth. Therefore, the acoustic sensor used for detection needs to have broadband adaptability. Then the tabu search algorithm was used to optimize three acoustic sensor arrays suitable for power equipment acoustic beam forming. The design took into account the cooperation between the array and the camera in practical applications and the impact of the MEMS acoustic sensor process on the array. Finally, the three designed arrays were compared with multi-arm spiral arrays and combined arrays, and an acoustic sensor array with the best overall performance was obtained.