(A) noise monitoring system for localization and classification of inter-floor noise in apartment house

Abstract

Due to the high population density, Korea has a very high rate of apartment house compared to other countries. In such environment, many people are unavoidably suffering from inter-floor noise, and disputes caused by inter-floor noise has become serious social problems. This paper proposes a noise monitoring system for precise data recording of inter-floor noise occurrence in apartment house. The proposed system measures the sound pressure level of noise, and estimates the direction of noise source along with the type of noise. An embedded sensor board with attached microphones is used in this system. The measurement of the noise level is implemented by digital signal processing techniques. Noise source localization is performed using estimated TDOA (Time difference of arrival) from microphone array. Noise type classification is done through the nearest neighbor classifier by extracting meaningful features from the noise signal. Recorded data from the proposed system is expected to be used as an important reference data for any case of disputes due to inter-floor noise.