Experimental Investigation for Monitoring Corrosion Using Plastic Optical Fiber Sensors

Abstract

The timely and cost-effective identification of the onset of corrosion and its progress would be critical for effectively maintaining structural integrity. Consequently, a series of fundamental experiments were conducted to capture the corrosion process on a steel plate using a new type of plastic optical fiber (POF) sensor. Electrolytic corrosion experiments were performed on a 5 mm thick steel plate immersed in an aqueous solution. The POF sensor installed on the upper side of the plate and directed downward detected the upward progression of the corrosion zone that formed on the underside of the plate. The results showed that the POF sensors could detect the onset of the upward-progressing corrosion front as it passed the 1 and 2 mm marks related to the thickness of the corroded zone. The POF sensors were designed to optically identify corrosion; therefore, the data obtained by these sensors could be processed using a newly developed graphic application software for smartphones and also identified by the naked eye. This method offered an easy and cost-effective solution for verifying the corrosion state of structural components.

Corrosion Monitoring by Plastic Optic Fiber Sensor Using Bi-Directional Light Transmission

“…Sensors 2024, 24, x FOR PEER REVIEW 2 of 23 sensors can be processed using graphical application software on a mobile phone; and (4) optical data or the corrosion condition can be visually confirmed if necessary. The initial experiment employing POF sensors to detect expanding corrosion zones in steel plates was conducted successfully [21], validating the factors listed above. However, the proposed method required two or more POF cables for corrosion detection: one for transmitting light to a monitoring point and another for retrieving reflected light to capture the corrosion phenomenon.…”