sonX

sonX is a sophisticated sound propagation model developed at Empa.

Primary features are:

  • Ground effect calculation based on an analytical solution for spherical waves, which was extended for finite segment length and variable ground properties
  • Ray tracing algorithm to take meteorological effects into account. Additional to changes on shielding effects also levels in acoustical shadow zones are predicted
  • Reflection models for rigid surfaces that differentiate between coherent reflections (mirror-reflections) and scattering. The solution for the coherent part is based on the Kirchhoff-Helmholtz-Integral, the model for diffuse reflections follows the principal of exchange
  • Models for diffuse reflections on forest edges and cliffs
sonX was developed with the framework of sonRAIL, but is constantly extended and improved. Apart from an application for railway noise within sonRAIL, derived versions for shooting noise (sonARMS) and aircraft noise (sonAIR) have been released so far. An application for road traffic noise is planned within the project sonROAD+.
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Resulting sound rays for different weather conditions

Further Documents

Dokumentation des sonX-Ausbreitungsmodells, Stand 2022 (PDF, Deutsch)

sonX-Validierung, Stand 2013 (PDF, Deutsch)