An assessment of transducer mass loading effects on the parameters of an experimental statistical energy analysis (SEA) model

The effects of transducer mass and moments of inertia on frequency response functions (FRFs) were assessed. The relationships between the affected and unaffected values were determined through direct substructuring and then analysed with a finite element model. Subsequently, the effects of transducer mass loading on a structure were investigated with a special focus on the errors introduced in an experimental statistical energy analysis model built from the FRFs. Comparison with the experimental data validated the theoretical results. The data were acquired with different instrumentation sets, each of which was capable of highlighting a specific error. The results showed that the model's internal and coupling loss factors were never affected by the measurement errors, whereas the other parameters could be affected by the type of measuring instrumentation selected.