PVDF Piezoelectric Sensor Research Articles

The Research of Oil Pipeline Leak Detection and Location Based on PVDF Piezoelectric Sensors

This paper mainly deals with the problem of oil pipeline leak and difficult to detect its location, combining the trait of our country’s oil pipeline, researching the leak detection and location based on the PVDF piezoelectric sensors. This paper firstly describes the domestic status of pipeline leak detection, and then gives a brief introduction for the PVDF piezoelectric film, finally discusses the pipeline leak detection and location system based on PVDF piezoelectric sensors. Experiments show that the use of PVDF piezoelectric sensors on pipeline leak detection, the leak can be correctly identified, and improving the detection sensitivity and leak resolution, effectively reducing the false alarm rate.

A new method for measuring ice adhesion strength at an ice–substrate interface

AbstractThis research focuses on the development of a direct technique for measuring atmospheric ice adhesion strength using embedded piezoelectric film sensors at the ice‐substrate interface. The substrate is a small aluminium beam on which PVDF piezoelectric sensors are bonded. The composite beam formed by aluminium and an ice layer is submitted to sinusoidal stress at the interface by a shaker on which one end of the beam is clamped. The piezoelectric charge coefficient is used to predict the electric charge density induced on the piezoelectric film, which enables us to develop a macroscopic and direct measurement technique for determining mechanical stresses at the atmospheric‐ice‐substrate interface. The preliminary results obtained show that adhesive failure was obtained for each test for a frequency close to the natural resonance frequency of the aluminium beam. Within the limitations of the experimental conditions, it was possible using this approach to obtain ice adhesion strengths in accordance with those obtained in the literature. This demonstrates the feasibility of this simple ice adhesion testing method. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Health Monitoring and Diagnosis for Flexible Structures with PVDF Piezoelectric Film Sensor Array

How to access the health situation of civil infrastructures is a brand-new challenge that scientists and civil engineers faced up to. Therefore, the method of health monitoring and diagnosis for flexible structures is a very active area of both academic and industrial research and development. For the large flexible structures, the mini cracks, which are the premise to induce the large cracks and damages in the structures, exert a little influence on the resonant frequencies of the structures. So the health monitoring method based on the changes of the resonant frequencies need that the cracks are so large that it can influence the resonant frequencies. However the mini cracks would change the vibration amplitude determined through monitoring the strain near the cracks, which can be used as the information sources realizing the health monitoring and diagnosis. It is a pity that the random external disturbances would influence the vibration amplitude, which can influence the effectiveness of the method that based on the vibration amplitude, so the key problem using the health monitoring and diagnosis method based on the vibration amplitude is how to avoid the influence of the random external disturbance. In this paper, a health monitoring and diagnosis method for flexible structures, which based on the relative outputs between sensors among PVDF piezoelectric film sensor array, is put forward. A Functional Link Neural Network (FLNN) is used as the damage modes classification unit. The experimental results show that the health monitoring method proposed in this paper is effective for diagnosing the damage and its severity, although the damage modes are not too complicated. Because the FLNN realizes the classification through enhancing the input patterns, the architecture of the neural network used in this paper is simple, the learning algorithm is easy, and the learning speed is fast. During the training and validation of the FLNN, its input patterns are formed by the relative outputs between the PVDF piezoelectric film sensors, which are affixed on the surface of flexible structures and formed into the sensor array. So the external exciting amplitude is not needed to be fixed or to be confined to a fixed variation range for the health diagnosis, which is validated by the experiment on the flexible beams and guarantees the method proposed in this paper to be suitable for a general usage.

Nondestructive evaluation of model adhesive joints by PVDF piezoelectric film sensors

Metallized poly(vinylidene fluoride) (PVDF) films can be etched into nondestructive evaluation (NDE) sensor devices. Since these sensors are relatively inexpensive, thin and lightweight, they can be attached permanently to adhesively bonded joints, laminated composites, and other structures to measure structural integrity. The present study has addressed techniques to design, attach, and utilize such sensors for adhesive joint and laminated composite applications. PVDF sensors have been successfully used as NDE transducers in pulse-echo, through-transmission, and acousto-ultrasonic techniques to monitor curing, and to detect porosity and crack propagation in different model joint geometries. Feasibility of several applications has been demonstrated, although several problems remain. The potential of using these techniques for practical bonded structures is also suggested.