This paper examines the use of active lock-in thermography and optical microscopy coupled with digital image processing as a production-time quality control tool for porcelain tile manufacturing. We demonstrate that it is possible to associate physical properties such as density, porosity and water absorption capacity with internal defects such as thermal delamination in ceramics. Defective and intact samples were subjected to active lock-in thermography and digital microscopy analysis on a workbench developed to simulate the conditions found in production lines. The images were collected and processed using morphological operators, image enhancement and thresholding to detect the presence of defects. These methods were compared with methods that analyze the physical properties of the materials to demonstrate that it is possible to detect the presence of defects.
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