Abstract
The inspection of fasteners in aluminium joints in the aviation industry is a time consuming and costly but mandatory task. Until today, the manual procedure with the bare eye does not allow the temporal tracking of a damaging behavior or the objective comparison between different inspections. A digital inspection method addresses both aspects while resulting in a significant inspection time reduction. The purpose of this work is to develop a digital and automated inspection method based on In-plane Heatwave Thermography and the analysis of the disturbances due to thermal irregularities in the plate-like structure. For this, a comparison study with Ultrasound Lock-in Thermography and Scanning Laser Doppler Vibrometry as well as a benchmarking of all three methods on one serviceable aircraft fuselage panel is performed. The presented data confirm the feasibility to detect and to qualify countersunk rivets and screws in aluminium aircraft fuselage panels with the discussed methods. The results suggest a fully automated inspection procedure which combines the different approaches and a study with more samples to establish thresholds indicating intact and damaged fasteners.
Highlights
The development and application of non-destructive testing (NDT) ensure the safety and reliability in many fields such as civil engineering, transportation and the energy sector
The purpose of this work is to develop a digital and automated inspection method based on In-plane Heatwave Thermography and the analysis of the disturbances due to thermal irregularities in the plate-like structure
Active thermography based on a time-varying amount of heat flux at the specimen surface is not known as a successful method for defect rivet detection
Summary
The development and application of non-destructive testing (NDT) ensure the safety and reliability in many fields such as civil engineering, transportation and the energy sector. Modern materials and structural concepts come with new and tailored monitoring systems that are potentially embedded in the structure during the manufacturing process. Classic fatigue phenomena of “old-school” materials like concrete, steel and aluminium alloys undergo advanced monitoring and testing methods. Many of these are empowered by the developments of new sensors and the (on-line) data processing. This work is positioned within the latter field and applies new as well as common technologies to a fuselage panel of a commercial aircraft
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