Design and construction of a reverberation chamber for high-intensity acoustic testing.

A high-intensity acoustic test facility was constructed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) to support the Mariner Mars 1971 project. For ease of construction, the reverberation chamber itself is rectangular, which resulted in very little sacrifice in acoustic performance. Levels as high as 156 dB can be achieved with the chamber empty and test levels of 150 dB have been used with a Mariner Mars spacecraft model (full size) in the chamber. Levels as high as this must be generated using electropneumatic transducers, which modulate gaseous nitrogen to this facility.