An Electrical Capacitance Array for Imaging of Water Leakage inside Insulating Slabs with Porous Cells

Abstract

The paper proposes a capacitance-sensor-array-based imaging system to detect water leakage inside insulating slabs with porous cells, such as anechoic acoustic rubber tiles. The modeling is conducted by using the finite element method to obtain the electrical potential distribution and sensitivity map with the proposed capacitance sensor array. An experimental test setup, which is composed of an eight-electrode capacitance sensor array and a commercialized capacitance bridge instrument for measurement, is developed. Experiments regarding different leakage scenarios are carried out by using the test setup. Preliminary results standing for different water leakage cases, which are based on the experimental data obtained from the test setup, are presented and depicted as images reconstructed by using different algorithms including the linear back projection (LBP), the projected Landweber iteration, and the total variation regularization. These results demonstrate that the proposed capacitance sensor array is feasible and has a great potential for imaging of water leakage inside insulating slabs with porous cells. A cost-effective capacitance measurement circuit for practical applications is also proposed and simulated.

The Self-Calibration Method for the Vertex Distance of the Elliptical Paraboloid Array

“…Depending on the application requirements, sensor arrays can be designed with different geometries, including those that are linear [4], circular [5], planar [6], L-shaped [7], and so on. Rui et al [8] proposed a capacitance-sensor-array-based imaging system to detect water leakage inside insulating slabs with porous cells. Tan et al [9] developed a giant magneto resistance sensor array which included various types of small gaps, curling wires, wide fractures, and abrasion to detect defects in various types of wire rope.…”