Ultrasonic Nondestructive Testing for Early Airframe Damage Detection
Open Access
- Author:
- Lin, Morton F
- Area of Honors:
- Aerospace Engineering
- Degree:
- Bachelor of Science
- Document Type:
- Thesis
- Thesis Supervisors:
- Stephen Clarke Conlon, Thesis Supervisor
Dr. Mark David Maughmer, Thesis Honors Advisor
Dr. George A Lesieutre, Faculty Reader - Keywords:
- Structural Health Monitoring Macro Fiber Composite
- Abstract:
- An important method being developed to accurately track the actual life consumption of an individual aircraft's structural components is through Structural Health Monitoring (SHM). SHM provides a repeatable process as a guide to ensure the structural integrity of an aircraft in service, significantly mitigating risk and lowering operational costs throughout the life cycle of the aircraft. A critical need for active embedded SHM systems are the sensors and actuators attached to the airframe. Macro-Fiber Composite (MFC) transducers, developed by the NASA Langley Research Center, were utilized in this study to explore SHM techniques and implementation procedures for active structural damage detection. Such imbedded SHM systems will provide enabling technologies to reduce aircraft maintenance costs, improve aircraft availability, and maintain current safety and reliability standards. This study details the many advantages of the MFC transducer over traditional piezoelectric transducers, which include greater performance, flexibility, and durability. A pitch-catch setup was utilized to detect, localize, and characterize damage, using damage detection metrics and methodology developed throughout this thesis. MFC actuators and sensors were then embedded in a complex aerospace structure to transition these SHM techniques and procedures.