Ultrasonic Nondestructive Method Research Articles

Evaluation of ultrasonic non-destructive inspection methods for structural integrity assessment of freight train axles

Evaluation of ultrasonic non-destructive inspection methods for structural integrity assessment of freight train axles

Non-destructive ultrasonic testing for identifying concealed weapons and analyzing internal chemical substances

The management of unknown weapons obtained from warfare, military operations, and terrorist situations requires a series of nondestructive testing processes. This management process, which is aimed at collecting information on the nature of the weapons, encompasses identification, processing, transportation, and storage of the obtained weapons. A lack of identification marks in acquired ammunition may indicate the potential presence of a chemical weapon. Therefore, nondestructive evaluation methods have been employed to identify unknown weapons. However, these methods rely on neutron- and radiation-based analyses, which require radiation-handling experts and specific protective facilities. Consequently, their application in this field is challenging. Herein, a nondestructive ultrasonic testing method, which can identify substances inside unknown weapons and optimize the verifiability of the state of the ammunition, was employed as an alternative method to overcome these limitations. The experimental system enabled quantitative and qualitative analyses of the internal chemicals by analyzing the time difference in acquiring the signals, particularly when the results indicate that the internal substance is a liquid. The results of this study can serve as a basis for advancing the application of ultrasonic testing as a viable and efficient approach for managing unknown weapons.

Pulse echo method for characterizing the ultrasonic properties of argan oil compared to vegetable oils with similar fatty acid profiles

Abstract This study investigates the use of a non-destructive ultrasonic pulse-echo method to characterize argan oil and other vegetable oils with similar fatty acid profiles. Ultrasonic parameters such as velocity, acoustic attenuation and reflection coefficient were measured across different temperatures. These parameters were used to create predictive models of ultrasonic velocity using partial least squares regression. Results demonstrated significant correlations between ultrasonic properties, oil temperature and fatty acid content. Specifically, ultrasonic velocity was found to be directly proportional to the content of saturated fatty acids and inversely proportional to the content of monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fatty acids. The reflection coefficient was also found to correlate with the fatty acid composition and temperature of the oils. Additionally, both ultrasonic velocity and acoustic attenuation decreased as the temperature increased from 25 °C to 50 °C. At 25 °C, the acoustic attenuation for argan oil was 22.37 Np/m, decreasing to 11.37 Np/m at 50 °C. These correlations allowed for the differentiation between food-grade argan oil, argan oil from seeds regurgitated by goats, sesame oil and peanut oil. The developed predictive models exhibited high coefficients of determination, with a value of 97.03 for argan oil, indicating strong agreement between measured and predicted ultrasonic velocities. This research highlights the potential of ultrasonic techniques for oil characterization and quality control.

Ultrasonic Non-Destructive Detection Method for Residual Stress in Rotary Forging Aluminum Alloy Plates.

Aluminum alloy plates are widely used to manufacture large-scale integral structure parts in the field of aerospace. During the forming and processing of aluminum alloy plates, different degrees of residual stress are inevitably produced. Fast and accurate detection of residual stress is very essential to ensuring the quality of these plates. In this work, the longitudinal critically refracted (LCR) wave detection method based on a one-transmitter and double-receiver (OTDR) transducer and the finite element simulation were employed to obtain the residual stress. Aluminum alloy plates with different deformation amounts were fabricated by rotary forging to obtain different residual stress states. Results reveal that the plate formed by rotary forging is in a stress state of central tension and edge compression. As the deformation increases from 20% to 60%, the peak residual tensile stress increases from 156 MPa to 262 MPa, and there is no significant difference in the peak compressive stress. When the deformation reaches 60%, the difference in the residual stresses at different depths is less than 13%, which indicates that the plastic deformation zone basically penetrates the entire longitudinal cross-section of the plate. The maximum deviation between measurement and FE is 61 MPa, which means the experimental data are in good agreement with the FE results.

Ultrasonic non-destructive inspection method for glass fibre reinforcement polymer (GFRP) hull plates considering design and construction characteristics

The design and construction characteristics, including glass fibre weight fraction ( Gc), number of single-ply layers, fabric combination, and fabrication quality, of glass fibre reinforcement polymer (GFRP) hull plates affect ultrasound propagation characteristics, such as ultrasonic velocity and attenuation, thereby influencing the accuracy of ultrasonic non-destructive test results. Therefore, this study is to propose a method to decrease the ultrasonic test errors of GFRP hull plate by using statistical method. The GFRP specimens with Gc of approximately 30–50 wt%, thicknesses of approximately 5–20 mm, and different fabric combinations were prepared using the hand lay-up method, considering the general design–construction characteristics. Further, an ultrasonic velocity decision method for ultrasonic inspection was proposed considering the GFRP hull design-construction characteristics, such as Gc and number of single-ply layers of hull plate by multiple linear regression method. The results show that the proposed method can reduce the thickness measurement error from approximately 20%–30% to 1%–2%, compared to an existing ultrasonic inspection method, only considering the Gc effect on ultrasonic velocity, which indicates that the proposed test method is suitable for practical applications.

Corrosion of API 5L X60 Pipeline Steel in Soil and Surface Defects Detection by Ultrasonic Analysis

The corrosion steels phenomenon is one of the main problems in the oil industry, such as in buried transmission pipelines used for high gas pressure for long distances. Steels are protected from the external soil corrosion through a bituminous coating, whose action is coupled with a cathodic protection system, which aims to maintain steel in its protection field and thus to avoid any corrosion risk. However, steels in service may experience external surface defects like corrosion pitting and cracking due to electrochemical or mechanical interactions of bare steel with an aggressive soil solution after steel protection failure. These are concerning phenomena and are the major threats of the pipeline transmission system’s reliability and ecological safety. Corrosion mechanisms are varied and can be evaluated by different methods, such as electrochemical measurements, which are influenced by various factors like temperature, pH, soil characteristics, resistivity, water content, and as well mechanical stresses. Corrosion results from simulated artificial soil solutions showed that steel is sensitive to corrosion by soil. Surface defects detection was carried out using an ultrasonic non-destructive method such as C-Scan Emission testing and the time of flight diffraction technique (TOFD) ultrasonic non-contact testing method. After propagation of the ultrasonic waves, the diffracted ultrasonic reflected wave occurring at the edges of the defects appears due to the presence of a corrosion defect by generating defect echoes. The C-Scan ultrasonic image shows surface reflection, including corrosion defects on interfaces with varying acoustic impedances. The cross-transverse speed ultrasonic propagation through the plate including defect is modified, revealing more surface defects, and cross-transverse speed is shown to increase ultrasonic detection presents some advantages, such as precision and speed of detection without alteration to the structure. This method can be used in the industrial context as an intelligent industrial robotics technique.

Determining rock crack stress thresholds using ultrasonic through-transmission measurements

The crack initiation stress threshold is widely used in excavation industries as rock spalling strength when designing deep underground structures to avoid unwanted brittle failures. While various strain-based methods have been developed for the estimation of this critical design parameter, such methods are destructive and often requires subjective interpretations of the stress–strain curves, particularly in rocks with pre-existing microcracks or high porosity. This study explore the applicability of non-destructive ultrasonic through-transmission methods for determining rock damage levels by assessing the changes in transmitted signal characteristics during loading. The change in velocity, amplitude, dominant frequency, and root-mean-square voltage are investigated with four different rock types including marble, sandstone, granite, and basalt under various stress levels. Results suggest the rate of signal variations can be reliably used to estimate crack closure and crack initiation stress levels across the tested rocks before failure. Comparison of the results between the conventional techniques and the new proposed methods based on ultrasonic monitoring are further discussed.

An ultrasonic study of the effect of uniaxial green compaction pressure on the elastic anisotropy of porous copper fabricated using the pore-former route

Porous copper is potentially very attractive for various functional applications such as filters and heat exchanger materials. Within the scope of this study, porous copper samples with dual pore morphologies were fabricated following the space holder technique using a 1:2 mixture ratio of K2CO3 to NaCl as pore formers. The initial compaction pressure required for green body fabrication was systematically varied between 120 and 180 MPa, and the influence of this pressure over porosity, pore morphology, volume shrinkage, and longitudinal elastic constants was systematically studied. Three longitudinal elastic constants of the porous Cu samples were determined following the non-destructive ultrasonic phase spectroscopy method through the measurement of the phase shift vs. frequency spectra along the three orthogonal directions in each sample. When the applied pressure is increased from 120 to 160 MPa and the Cu:PF mixture ratios are 70:30 and 60:40, respectively, the elastic constant values in the green compaction direction (C11) decrease from 34.2 GPa to 7.5 GPa and 23.7 GPa–17.9 GPa. However, for Cu:PF mixture ratios of 70:30 and 60:40, under 180 MPa green compaction pressure C11 increases to 30.9 GPa and 21.2 GPa, respectively. As the applied green compaction pressure increased from 120 to 160 MPa, the samples' average elastic anisotropy ratio initially increased from 0.29 to 0.59 and then decreased to 0.55 at 180 MPa pressure. While the initial increase in anisotropy is due to increased pore flattening with increasing green compaction pressure, the decrease in anisotropy ratio in the samples fabricated under 180 MPa green compaction pressure is due to enhanced sample densification. Contour maps for different properties have been proposed to identify the optimum combination of initial powder composition and green compaction pressure for the intended end application.

Durability of Concrete with Superabsorbent Polymer (SAP) Assessed Using Depth of Carbonation and NDT Ultrasonic Methods.

The paper concerns destructive and non-destructive (NDT) evaluation of the effect of the addition of superabsorbent polymer (SAP) used as a carrier of mixing water and a means of internal curing on the durability of concrete. The research concerns testing of five concretes-an ordinary reference concrete and four concretes differing in the content of mixing water introduced into the concrete mix in the form of pre-saturated SAP particles (25%, two variants of 50% and 75% of the total mixing water in the form of SAP hydrogel). The research consisted of 4 stages of tests. The subsequent stages involved the analysis of the effect of using SAP as a carrier of mixing water on the particular characteristics of concrete mix and hardened concrete, i.e., consistency and density of concrete mix (1st stage), carbonation tested using two indicators-phenolphthalein and thymol phenolphthalein (2nd stage), and finally: the homogeneity of the concretes' structure by means of ultrasonic method (determination of ultrasonic pulse velocity) 28 days after production (3rd stage) and 3 years after production (4th stage). The ultrasonic pulse (or wave) velocity was then correlated with the content of water applied in the form of SAP hydrogel. The statistical analysis of results showed that the method of introducing the mixing water into the concrete mix in the form of pre-absorbed superabsorbent polymer, although it changed the concrete mix consistency, did not significantly affect the concrete ability to resist carbonation. Meanwhile, after 3 years, the densification of the microstructure of concrete with SAP has been observed.

Study of the Kinetics of Adhesive Bond Formation Using the Ultrasonic Method

Adhesive bonding is widely used in modern industry. It has many advantages—the main one being the reduction in production costs. It also has certain limitations. One of the limitations of adhesive bonds is the relatively long bonding time of the joints. The main objective of this research was to determine the possibility of studying the kinetics of adhesive bond formation using a non-destructive ultrasonic method. A research experiment was planned and carried out. Adhesive specimens were prepared, and their quality changes over time were evaluated. In addition, the change in ultrasonic measures during the testing of these bonds was evaluated, as well as the hardness of the adhesive. In this study, the choice of test apparatus was made, in particular ultrasonic probes for the adhesive used and the materials to be bonded. The choice of adhesive was also made, for one in which bonding phenomena occur uniformly throughout the volume. This work examined the changes in the mechanical strength and hardness with time. The tests showed that the greatest changes in mechanical strength occur within the first 24 h after the bond was made. With the mechanical strength reaching 12.6 Mpa after 216 h, the strength in the first 24 h was 10.36 (for bonded steel sheets). For bonded steel discs, the maximum tensile strength was 26.99 Mpa (after 216 h), with a hardness of 22.93 Mpa during the first 24 h. Also, significant changes were observed in the adhesive hardness during the first 24 h. The hardness of the adhesive after 216 h was 70.4 Shore’a on the D scale, while after 24 h it was 69.4 Shore’a on the D scale. Changes in the ultrasonic parameters of the adhesive bond quality were found to occur along with changes in the bond quality.

A study on the effect of plasticity on the measurement of residual stresses using ultrasound technique

Residual stresses can have detrimental effect on the life cycle of engineering components and can affect the accuracy of the fatigue life prediction models. Accurate measurement of these stresses are therefore crucial. . However, destructive and semi-destructive methods of measuring residual stresses often cause damage to the components. In contrast, the non-destructive ultrasonic method allows for intact measurement of residual stresses even, in situation where portability is not feasible. Various waves can be utilized in the ultrasonic method for measuring residual stresses. In this study, longitudinal critically refracted (LCR) waves were employed due to their higher sensitivity, larger scanning area, and lower sensitivity to texture effect, making them preferable over other waves. The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of plasticity on the measurement of residual stresses using the ultrasonic method. To achieve this, two stainless steel disks were subjected to quenching at temperatures of 300 °C and 700 °C to induce different levels of residual stresses and plasticity. The material properties of the disks were determined through standard tensile tests to facilitate numerical simulations. Tensile test specimens were extracted from the initial sheet to measure the yield stress and modulus of elasticity. The coefficient of acoustoelasticity, was determined by subjecting the tensile test specimens to different stress levels and recording the wave flight time. The coefficient of acoustoelasticity for stainless steel 316Lwas obtained using the slope of and (E(t-t0))/t0,. Residual stresses were experimentally measured using both the ultrasonic method and the center-hole drilling method, and the results were compared with those obtained from numerical analyses. The findings from center-hole drilling method, ultrasonic method, and numerical simulation were then compared and discussed. Different levels of plasticity were considered, and the accuracy of measuring residual stresses was analyzed and evaluated.

Ultrasonic guided waves for monitoring incipient corrosion in reinforced concrete with top-bar defect

Top-bar defects in reinforced concrete are voids that are observed below the reinforcing bars that are at an elevation of more than 300 mm. The authors have demonstrated a new ultrasonic guided wave technique to non-destructively detect top-bar defect (Wang, Mukherjee et al., 2021). It has been reported that bars with top-bar defect corrode is faster than other bars. The corrosion also manifests in a different manner in these bars. This paper proposes a guided ultrasonic wave-based non-destructive method for monitoring corrosion in reinforced concrete with top-bar defect. Concrete wall samples with bars of various extents of top-bar defect were subjected to accelerated corrosion. Simultaneously, the bars have been monitored with guided ultrasonics. The investigation revealed that top-bar defect has a significant influence on the corrosion process. The destructive tests performed at the end of corrosion exposure revealed that the top-bar specimens had a significant loss of strength than the bars with a good bond. The proposed non-destructive has been calibrated to assess the residual capacities of corroded bars in presence of top-bar defect.

Study on ultrasonic nondestructive evaluation method for grain size of magnesium alloy components with complex profile

In order to solve the problems of difficult measurement, inaccurate results and serious interference of diffusion and attenuation in the nondestructive evaluation of grain size of magnesium alloy components with complex profile, the sound field models of plane, cylindrical and conical parts based on the multiple Gaussian sound beam method are studied, and the attenuation mechanism of ultrasonic propagation in the medium of complex components and the diffusion and attenuation components in curved test blocks are analyzed, An evaluation method of ultrasonic attenuation of grain size based on diffusion loss correction is proposed to eliminate the influence of complex components on the total amount of ultrasonic attenuation. The results show that the ultrasonic nondestructive evaluation method of grain size based on sound velocity diffusion correction can effectively reduce the system error and improve the accuracy of grain size evaluation of magnesium alloy components with complex profile.

Modeling ultrasonic wave fields scattered by flaws using a quasi-Monte Carlo method: Theoretical method and experimental verification

The modeling and visualization of wave fields scattered by flaws can be helpful in terms of guiding the testing and evaluation of flaws using an ultrasonic nondestructive method. In this work, the ultrasonic scattering of wave fields from flaws with different shapes is modeled using a quasi-Monte Carlo (QMC) method and measured through experiments for verification. The incident wave fields generated by a transducer can be modeled using the Rayleigh integral expression and calculated using the QMC method. When the size of the flaw is much larger than the wavelength, the incident wave over the lit portion of flaw can be treated as the source for the scattering of wave fields, and these wave fields can also be modeled using the proposed QMC method. In this paper, water is treated as the material and an embedded solid component is considered as the flaw. Numerical examples and results are presented for flaws with different shapes and sizes, and the properties of these scattering wave fields are analyzed and discussed. Experiments are performed to measure the scattering wave fields using a needle transducer, and it is shown that the results agree with the simulations, thus verifying the proposed modeling method. The work presented here can assist in understanding the wave-flaw interaction and can help in optimizing ultrasonic nondestructive testing.

Ultrasonic nondestructive evaluation of the bonding strength of polyurethane coatings based on feedforward comb filtering effect

Because of the ability to protect and decorate materials, polyurethane coatings (PU) are being applied more and more extensively in the transportation, furniture, automotive, and electronic industries. However, it is difficult to effectively evaluate the bonding quality of coatings by conventional destructive methods for high-volume products in industrial applications. In this work, an ultrasonic nondestructive method based on the feedforward comb filtering effect was proposed to assess the bonding strength of the PU coatings. The coating and substrate interface can be modeled as a distributed spring system. The phase of the reflected ultrasonic wave is highly related to the interfacial stiffness. The superimposed signals can be well analyzed based on the comb filtering effect, and an index called the ratio of notch frequencies to interval frequencies (NIR) was constructed to represent the phase difference. Finite element simulations were conducted to show the index’s construction method and variation with different interfacial stiffnesses. Immersed ultrasonic testing experiments with a transducer of 39.43 MHz were then conducted on PU coatings on two kinds of substrates made of aluminum and magnesium alloys. Each specimen was scanned as a grid to mimic the procedure of the well-known cross-cut test. The notch frequencies of the scanned received signals were applied to obtain the NIR index. To avoid the interference of the thickness of coatings, the decimal part of NIR was further proposed to link with the bonding strength obtained by the cross-cut test. This index changes accordingly with aluminum- and magnesium-based coatings’ bonding strength. The results prove that the proposed ultrasonic method based on the feedforward comb filter effect is high potential to assess the bonding strength of coatings nondestructively.

Influence of Structural Parameters - the Shape of Graphite and Matrix on Change of Ultrasonic Wave Propagation Rate and Value of Attenuation in Graphitic Cast Irons

Abstract Despite the tendency of the current industry, especially the automotive industry, it is to use modern, light and super-strong materials based on Al or HSLA steels, the application of classic materials such as cast iron still makes sense, especially concerning price and excellent castability. The article presents one of the possible ways of using the ultrasonic non-destructive method in quality control and simplification of the identification of the type of cast iron concerning the change of parameters of ultrasound propagation in materials. The main criteria for assessing the quality and determining the type of graphite cast iron were considered to be the rate of propagation of ultrasound - cL and the value of attenuation - α, which vary depending on the shape of the graphite and matrix. Graphitic cast irons with different graphite shapes (lamellar, vermicular, and globular shapes) and a matrix with different ferrite/perlite ratios were used as experimental material. Along with the ultrasonic tests, a metallographic analysis was also performed to quantify the microstructure of cast irons.

Evaluation of Concrete by Non-destructive Ultrasonic Pulse Velocity Method

Concrete is a material whose properties depend on its initial formulation, its conditions of use, and its change over time depending on its environment and the different types of degradation that it is likely to undergo. Knowledge and monitoring of its various mechanical properties are therefore essential for the maintenance of civil engineering works. All of the concrete assessment methods, whether destructive or non-destructive, can then provide a valuable diagnosis to the operators of the structure. Depending on their precision, they can be used to easily detect an alteration in the characteristics of the materials, locate a damaged area, the extent of the damage, or even precisely quantify the evolution of this damage over time and predict future changes. This paper presents the Ultrasonic Pulse Velocity technique (UPV) which is used by many companies to assess the compressive strength of concrete in situ and which allows measuring the speed and attenuation of elastic waves. The influence of the reinforcements on the ultrasonic pulse velocity has been studied and this is in the case of reinforcement perpendicular and parallel to the direction of propagation. The influence of several factors affecting the UPV, whether related to the properties of concrete or otherwise, was mentioned. Indeed, the porosity, the water/Cement ratio, the micro-cracks, the state of saturation and the temperature of concrete are parameters which strongly influence the values of UPV.

Investigation of the Relationship Between Egg Shell Strength and Thickness Using Non-Destructive Ultrasound Method

This research investigates the main specifications of eggshell which are the thickness of the shell and its strength. For this purpose, random sampling was implemented on 180 fresh and healthy eggs of Bovance breed produced at Ghazvin province agricultural jihad organization’s training center. To measure the shell thickness, four methods, dial gauge, ultrasound waves, micro-meter and photometer, were applied. Due to its precision, the indicator hour destructive measurement method was selected as the control method. By analyzing and comparing data collected through 4 methods in the research, a significant difference between measurement methods was revealed. Moreover, comparing the measurement methods with the control method (dial gauge), the lowest measurement error was that of the ultrasound wave measurement method with 7.1% and the highest was that of the photometer method with 15.7%. Furthermore, regression equations are determined for the referred measurement methods with the shell strength. It was observed that the ultrasound method compared to other methods proposed in this study is more accurate for measuring the thickness of the eggshell non-destructively. Therefore, the non-destructive ultrasonic measurement method can be a suitable alternative to these methods due to the proximity of the measured values to non-destructive, direct, and accurate destructive methods. Since the ultrasound method is a fast and relatively inexpensive method, this method can be used in the quality grading process of eggs.

Influence of the glue joint on the speed of propagation of sound waves in wood

Influence of the glue joint on the speed of propagation of sound waves in wood. The aim of this study is to demonstrate differences in the propagation of sound waves in wood depending on the type of glue used to form the joint. Samples of tree species considered as resonant wood, i.e. Norway spruce (Picea abies) and sycamore (Acer pseudoplatanus), and for comparison, wood of European beech (Fagus sylvatica) were used. The fractured samples were glued together using glutinous fish glue, polyurethane glue (Titebond Liquid Glue) and cyanoacrylate glue (BONDOLOC B415). All types of glue are used in instrument repair, of which glutinous glue is regarded to be the correct one used in gluing technique. The test was carried out using a non-destructive ultrasonic method. It has been shown that the highest decreases in speed of propagation of sound waves are in wood glued with glutinous glue and the lowest in wood glued with cyanoacrylate glue.

Ultrasonic nonlinear evaluation of tensile plastic damage in Nickel based single crystal superalloy

The tensile interruption tests of Nickel-based single crystal (NBSX) superalloys at room temperature were carried out to artificially introduce controllable levels of plastic damage, and linear and nonlinear ultrasonic nondestructive methods were used to evaluate it. The results indicate that ultrasonic nonlinear parameter β shows hypersensitivity to early tensile plastic damage compared with traditional linear parameters. Transmission electron microscope (TEM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD) measurements of dislocation string length and dislocation density were conducted to calculate the theoretical predicted values of β by ultrasonic nonlinearity dislocation monopole model, and they are in well agreement with experimental results. In addition, the actuation of slip systems and evolution of dislocation configuration were observed under optical microscope (OM) and TEM. From the perspective of element distribution and energy, it is revealed that the plastic deformation mechanism of the NBSX superalloys at room temperature is anti-phase boundary (APB) dislocation pairs shear γ′ phase. The measurement results of macro mechanical properties manifested that accumulative tensile plastic deformation lead to increase of strength and decrease of plasticity.