Structural damage detection using ultrasonic wave modulation with low-profile piezoceramic transducers

Abstract

The paper presents the application of the nonlinear acoustic technique for fatigue crack detection. The method uses frequency modulation of the high-frequency ultrasonic wave by the low-frequency modal excitation. Low-profile, surface-bonded piezoceramic transducers are used for acousto-vibration actuation and sensing. The paper investigates the application of the broad-band low-frequency modal excitation. The study demonstrates that small fatigue cracks can be detected in an aluminum plate by the increase of amplitude level of modulation sidebands in the ultrasonic spectra. However, the sidebands can be also observed when the crack is not present in the plate due intrinsic nonlinear effects. Further studies are recommended to investigate these findings.

Plastic Pipe Defect Detection Using Nonlinear Acoustic Modulation

“…This method has been used by researchers for damage detection such as Van Den Abeele et al (2000aAbeele et al ( ) (2000b have introduced nonlinear elastic wave spectroscopy (NEWS) technique which is to excite a test specimen with two frequency waves simultaneously and measure the harmonics and sidebands of the detected frequency to detect damage. Later on, Parsons (2006) and Staszewski and Simondi et al (2009) have used more advanced equipment for the damage detection which is the low-profile piezoceramic actuator and a piezoelectric transducer to generate both the low frequency vibration and high frequency ultrasonic waves simultaneously to the specimen. Therefore, the method by using piezo-electric generator or actuator to generate signals and using the DAQ software to interpret the data received will be used in this study.…”