Case Study: Michigan Engineering Services achieves validated, rapid control of automotive interior noise with Altair HyperMesh (EFEA)

Energy Finite Element Analysis by MES used to Control Interior Automotive Noise

Michigan Engineering Services (MES), a research and development company that develops engineering simulation software and services, needed to control airborne interior noise in vehicles—identifying the type, quantity and placement of acoustic, mass and damping treatments across frequencies up to 8–10 kHz. Conventional finite element analysis (FEA) is computationally expensive or infeasible at those frequencies, so MES worked with Altair and used Altair HyperMesh to seek a more practical high‑frequency modeling approach.

MES implemented Energy Finite Element Analysis (EFEA) using the same tooling and workflows in Altair HyperMesh; EFEA models energy flow with far fewer elements and uses element and joint libraries to represent power transfer. The Altair‑enabled EFEA matched test data for production vehicles multiple times, allowed rapid evaluation of alternative designs, and guided targeted treatments—panel contribution analysis showed the top three panels accounted for ~69.1% of total power at 1000 Hz (top ten panel shares: 29.9, 20.9, 18.3, 8.6, 4.6, 4.0, 3.7, 3.4, 2.8, 2.1), helping reduce cost and weight impacts.

Michigan Engineering Services