Preparation of polyvinyl acetate composite as a new backing material for the manufacture of ultrasonic transducers

Abstract

Polyvinyl acetate (PVAc) composites were loaded with varying amounts of nano-metal alloy (Ag–Sn–Cu–Pt) and stearic acid. They are used as backing materials for ultrasonic transducers to prevent back-echoes from reverberating into the piezoelectric element and to reduce noisy echoes. The novelty of this work is the usage of these newly prepared PVAc/alloy composites as backing material in ultrasonic transducers with a polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) active element. The X-ray diffraction (XRD) technique was used to examine the structure of the composites. The ultrasonic technique investigated the ultrasonic attenuation coefficient, the acoustic impedance, the mechanical properties, and other parameters. The transducers with the new backing composites gained high sensitivity, broadband, short ringing, and so on. These characteristics were improved by increasing the nano-metal alloy content in the backing composites. The study also proved the efficiency of the PVAc/alloy composite as new backing material in ultrasonic transducers.Graphical abstractSketch of fabricated ultrasonic transducers with backing materials from PVAc/alloy composites (B1, B2, B3, B4, B5, and B6) and their important features (BW is transducers’ band width and S is transducers’ sensitivity).