Structural health monitoring of materials by high critical temperature SQUID

Abstract

Nowadays, tailoring the material properties is essential for advanced product design in engineering systems. The need to provide key information about micro- and macro-structural behaviour of materials, without destructively sectioning the sample, has spurred the development of nondestructive evaluation methodologies. These techniques are required during material production, quality testing of components during manufacturing, and in-service inspection of structural integrity. To ensure the highest possible operational safety along with an economic efficiency, it is necessary to carry out inspections with a high sensitivity and a proven reliability. Due to its unparalleled magnetic field sensitivity over a wide frequency range and large dynamic range, SQUID-based nondestructive evaluation has unique advantages for materials and structures characterization. We will present an overview of eddy-current nondestructive analysis utilizing high T c SQUIDs with an emphasis on examples relevant to the aeronautical industry. These include the detection of deep-lying defects in multi-layer structures of Al–Ti alloys and damage of extremely lightweight graphite/epoxy composites. Both of these can be successfully treated by this approach where conventional electromagnetic probes often fail. In addition some results based on the volume integral formulation, successfully developed to simulate the response of the system to different type of flaws in Al-alloy planar structures and to solve the inverse electromagnetic problem, will be shown.