Impact location estimation in anisotropic media

Abstract

Impact location estimation techniques are important components of Structural Health Monitoring systems. This paper considers impact location estimation in composite structures using acoustic emission signals arriving at a passive sensor array attached to the structure. Because composite structures are anisotropic, the wave propagation properties depend both on the direction of propagation and the location on the structures. As a result, this is a substantially more difficult problem than that of impact location estimation in isotropic media. The algorithm presented in this paper uses three sensor clusters and formulates the impact location estimation problem as one of minimizing a quadratic objective function. Unlike many published location estimation algorithms, the algorithm in this paper does not require the waveform velocity profile for the structure. Experimental results demonstrating the ability of the algorithm to accurately estimate the impact location using acoustic emission signals is included in the paper.