Article,
The effect of a suppressor to environmental noisenext term – A case study
Applied Acoustics, (2011)
Abstract
The purpose of the study is to describe the effect of a suppressor
to environmental noise with a typical Finnish rifle shooting range
that has a shooting shelter and some noise berms. The noise measurements
were carried out at Kyronpelto shooting range situated near Mikkeli
in Finland. The range is equipped with wooden shooting shelter, the
shooting distance is 150 m, and it has berms on sides and at the
impact end. The terrain is relatively flat in the area. The best
noise area reduction caused by a suppressor could be seen at angles
of 315–45° from the shooting direction. The projectile noise dominates
at angles 45–70°, and the effect of the suppressor is very small.
To the side and back the shooting shelter has already gained significant
noise attenuation, and therefore the suppressor cannot reduce the
noise area much more. When there was a relatively tight shooting
shelter to the side and back, the suppressor did not reduce the environmental
noise area significantly any more. It can be calculated that the
noise area of 65 dB (LAImax) is reduced from 95 ha to 50 ha (0.95
km2–0.50 km2) with the help of a suppressor. However, most of the
area is situated to the shooting sector and it has to be unoccupied
for safety reasons.
