Anechoic Wind Tunnel, University of Southampton

The Anechoic Wind Tunnel at the University of Southampton is an open jet wind tunnel. The test section size is one meter by 0.75 meters and is capable of a maximum speed of approximately 80 meters a second, approximately 290 kilometres an hour. This corresponds very roughly to the approach speed of an aircraft on approach to landing. A heat exchanger within the circuit is used to control temperature. A series of honeycomb screens are used to straighten up the flow resulting in a turbulence of 0.15 percent of the free stream velocity. The tunnel itself has very good free stream turbulence levels which is important for the quality of the measurements. A phased microphone array allows visualization at the acoustic sources providing a very powerful diagnostic tool. The facility is unique in terms of university facilities within the UK both in terms of its the maximum speed attainable and also the size of the test section.