A procedure for the ultrasonic evaluation of the interlayer interfacial stiffness of multilayered structures is proposed. As a theoretical background to this proposal, the elastic wave propagation in a multilayered structure, in which the layers are bonded with spring-type interfaces, is analyzed theoretically based on the transfer-matrix method. Using the notion of the Bloch phase which characterizes wave transmission in the corresponding infinite periodic structure, some explicit relations are derived for the reflection coefficient of the multilayered structure. Based on the features clarified theoretically, the interlayer interfacial stiffness of the multilayered structure can be evaluated from the locations of local minima and maxima of the amplitude reflection spectrum. By numerical analysis, the proposed procedure is shown to apply even when the viscous property of the layers is not known precisely, and when a transient waveform of a limited length is used. Using the proposed procedure, the stiffness of interlayer resin-rich regions in a carbon-epoxy cross-ply composite laminate is identified from the experimental reflection spectrum. The identified stiffness is shown to lie within the range as expected from the micrographic observation and a simple estimate for a thin resin layer. V

The transmission characteristics of ultrasonic waves at oblique incidence to composite laminates are analyzed theoretically by the stiffness matrix method. The analysis takes into account the presence of thin resin-rich regions between adjacent plies as spring-type interfaces with normal and shear stiffnesses. The amplitude transmission coefficient of longitudinal wave through a unidirectional laminate immersed in water is shown to be significantly influenced by the frequency, the interlayer interfacial stiffnesses, and the incident angle. Using Floquet's theorem, the dispersion relation of the infinitely extended laminate structure is calculated and compared to the transmission coefficient of laminates of finite thickness. This reveals that the ranges of frequency and interfacial stiffnesses where the Floquet waves lie in the band-gaps agree well with those where the transmission coefficient of the finite layered structure is relatively small, indicating that the band-gaps appear even in the laminate with a finite number of plies. The amplitude transmission coefficient for an 11-ply carbon-epoxy unidirectional composite laminate is experimentally obtained for various frequencies and incident angles. The low-transmission zones observed in the experimental results, which are due to the critical angle of the quasi-longitudinal wave and the Bragg reflection, are shown to be favorably compared with the theory.

The second-harmonic generation characteristics in the elastic wave propagation across an infinite layered structure consisting of identical linear elastic layers and nonlinear spring-type interlayer interfaces are analyzed theoretically. The interlayer interfaces are assumed to have identical linear interfacial stiffness but can have different quadratic nonlinearity parameters. Using a perturbation approach and the transfer-matrix method, an explicit analytical expression is derived for the second-harmonic amplitude when the layered structure is impinged by a monochromatic fundamental wave. The analysis shows that the second-harmonic generation behavior depends significantly on the fundamental frequency reflecting the band structure of the layered structure. Two special cases are discussed in order to demonstrate such dependence, i.e., the second-harmonic generation by a single nonlinear interface as well as by multiple consecutive nonlinear interfaces. In particular, when the second-harmonic generation occurs at multiple consecutive nonlinear interfaces, the cumulative growth of the second-harmonic amplitude with distance is only expected in certain frequency ranges where the fundamental as well as the double frequencies belong to the pass bands of the layered structure. Furthermore, a remarkable increase of the second-harmonic amplitude is found near the terminating edge of pass bands. Approximate expressions for the low-frequency range are also obtained, which show the cumulative growth of the second-harmonic amplitude with quadratic frequency dependence.

An ultrasonic evaluation procedure for the interlayer interfacial normal stiffness and the intralayer longitudinal wave velocity of multilayered plate-like structures is proposed. Based on the characteristics of the amplitude reflection spectrum of ultrasonic wave at normal incidence to a layered structure with spring-type interlayer interfaces, it is shown that the interfacial normal stiffness and the longitudinal wave velocity in the layers can be simultaneously evaluated from the frequencies of local maxima and minima of the spectrum provided that all interfaces and layers have the same properties. The effectiveness of the proposed procedure is investigated from the perspective of the sensitivity of local extremal frequencies of the reflection spectrum. The feasibility of the proposed procedure is also investigated when the stiffness of each interface is subjected to small random fluctuations about a certain average value. The proposed procedure is applied to a 16-layered cross-ply carbon-fiber-reinforced composite laminate. The normal stiffness of resin-rich interfaces and the longitudinal wave velocity of plies in the thickness direction evaluated from the experimental reflection spectrum are shown to be consistent with simple theoretical estimations.

The nonlinear wave propagation in a homogeneous and isotropic elastic plate is analyzed theoretically to investigate the non-collinear interaction of plate wave modes. In the presence of two primary plate waves (Rayleigh-Lamb or shear horizontal modes) propagating in arbitrary directions, an explicit expression for the modal amplitude of nonlinearly generated wave fields with the sum or difference frequency of the primary modes is derived by using the perturbation analysis. The modal amplitude is shown to grow in proportion with the propagation distance when the resonance condition is satisfied, i.e., when the wavevector of secondary wave coincides with the sum or difference of those of primary modes. Furthermore, the non-collinear interaction of two symmetric or two antisymmetric modes is shown to produce the secondary wave fields consisting only of the symmetric modes, while a pair of symmetric and antisymmetric primary modes is shown to produce only the antisymmetric modes. The influence of the intersection angle, the primary frequencies, and the mode combinations on the modal amplitude of secondary wave is examined for a low-frequency range where the lowest-order symmetric and antisymmetric Rayleigh-Lamb waves and the lowest-order symmetric shear horizontal wave are the only propagating modes.

The ultrasonic wave transmission through multidirectional composite laminates is studied theoretically by accounting for the effect of thin interlayer resin-rich regions based on the spring-type interface model. Using the stiffness-matrix method, the energy transmission spectrum of the longitudinal wave impinging obliquely on cross-ply and quasi-isotropic laminates immersed in water is calculated. The location and bandwidth of the frequency ranges where the transmissivity becomes vanishingly small are shown to be significantly influenced by the incident angle, the laminate lay-up, and the interlayer interfacial stiffnesses. By examining the energy flux density of partial waves inside the laminate, these frequency ranges are shown to be the bandgaps due to the constructive interference of scattered waves from the interlayer interfaces. The mode combination causing the interference is found to vary remarkably with the bandgap location. Furthermore, the interference in the finite laminate structure is shown to occur in almost the same manner as the Floquet wave does in the infinitely extended laminate structure. The energy transmission spectrum is experimentally measured for 16-ply carbon/epoxy cross-ply and quasi-isotropic composite laminates using the through-transmission technique. The transmission and bandgap characteristics observed in the experimental results are reasonably reproduced by the present theory incorporating the interlayer resin-rich regions.

The influence of porosity on the ultrasonic wave propagation in unidirectional carbon-fiber-reinforced composite laminates is investigated based on the two-dimensional finite element analysis and measurements. Random distributions of pores with different contents and size are considered in the analysis, together with the effects of viscoelastic plies and interlaminar resin-rich regions. The transient reflection waveforms are calculated from the frequency-domain finite-element solutions by the inverse Fourier transform. As the measures for porosity characterization, the ultrasonic wave velocity, attenuation coefficient, and interlaminar interface echo characteristics are examined for 24-ply unidirectional composite laminates. As a result, the wave velocity decreases with the porosity content in a manner insensitive to the pore size. On the other hand, the attenuation coefficient increases both with the porosity content and with the pore size. The time-frequency analysis of the reflection waveforms shows that the temporal decay rate of interlaminar interface echoes at the stop-band frequency is a good indicator of the porosity content. The measured porosity-content dependence of the wave velocity is better reproduced by the numerical simulations when the interlayer interfacial stiffnesses are adjusted according to the porosity content, indicating that not only the porosity features but also the interlaminar interfacial properties vary with curing conditions.

The acoustic second-harmonic generation behavior in a multilayered structure with nonlinear spring-type interlayer interfaces is analyzed theoretically to investigate the frequency dependence of second-harmonic amplitudes in the reflected and transmitted fields when the structure is subjected to the normal incidence of a monochromatic longitudinal wave. The multilayered structure consists of identical linear elastic layers and is embedded between two identical linear elastic semi-infinite media. The layers are bonded to each other by spring-type interfaces possessing identical linear stiffness but different quadratic nonlinear parameters. By combining a perturbation analysis with the transfer-matrix method, analytical expressions are derived for the second-harmonic amplitudes of the reflected and transmitted waves. The second-harmonic amplitudes due to a single nonlinear interface are shown to vary remarkably with the fundamental frequency, reflecting the pass and stop band characteristics of the Bloch wave in the corresponding infinitely extended layered structure. By calculating the spatial distribution of second-harmonic amplitude inside the multilayered structure, the influence of the position of the nonlinear interface as well as the number of layers on the frequency dependence of second-harmonic amplitudes of the reflected and transmitted waves is elucidated. When all interlayer interfaces possess the identical nonlinearity, the second-harmonic amplitudes on both sides of the structure are shown to increase monotonically with the number of layers in the frequency ranges where both fundamental and double frequencies are within the pass bands of Bloch wave. The influence of two non-dimensional parameters, i.e., the relative linear compliance of the interlayer interfaces and the acoustic impedance ratio between the layer and the surrounding semi-infinite medium, on the second-harmonic amplitudes is elucidated.