Experimental assessment of an RFID-based crack sensor for steel structures

Abstract

The use of welded steel cover plates had been a common design practice to increase beam section capacity in regions of high moment for decades. Many steel girder bridges with cover plates are still in service. Steel girder bridges are subject to cyclic loading, which can initiate crack formation at the toe of the weld and reduce beam capacity. Thus, timely detection of fatigue cracks is of utmost importance in steel girder bridge monitoring. To date, crack monitoring methods using in-house radio frequency identification (RFID)-based sensors have been developed to complement visual inspection and provide quantitative information of damage level. Offering similar properties at a reduced cost, commercial ultra-high frequency (UHF) passive RFID tags have been identified as a more financially viable option for pervasive crack monitoring using a dense array of sensors. This paper presents a study on damage sensitivity of low-cost commercial UHF RFID tags for crack detection and monitoring on metallic structures. Using backscatter power as a parameter for damage identification, a crack sensing system has been developed for single and multiple tag configurations for increased sensing pervasiveness. The effect on backscatter power of the existence and stage of crack propagation has been successfully characterized. For further automation of crack detection, a damage index based on the variation of backscatter power has also been established. The tested commercial RFID-based crack sensor contributes to the usage of this technology on steel girder bridges.

RFID-Based Crack Detection of Ultra High-Performance Concrete Retrofitted Beams

“…In a previous test the read distance of 35 inches (88.9 cm) was used. This was only for one test to confirm preliminary read-distance tests from the previous publication [14]. The previous publication also confirmed the accuracy and usability of this setup.…”

“…The collected RSSI measurements were then averaged to create the mean RSSI. This system’s applicability was also tested as it was not tested in previous research [14]. With acceptable performance that could overcome the difficulty in maintaining constant read distances, this system could be implemented in the field.…”

“…A cheaper method would be RFID-based tag crack sensors. Previous research of crack sensors by Kalansuriya [13] and Martinez-Castro [14], while successful on both concrete and metallic materials, respectively, lacks the validation of testing with UHPC. This system used passive RFID technology but with key modifications, such as the removal of the substrate material and the use of a volume-based index rather than just crack width and length like many other inspection procedures.…”

Long-Range Displacement Meters Based on Chipped Circular Patch Antenna

“…In recent years, there have been many passive wireless sensor-based radio frequency identification (RFID) tags used for structural health monitoring [8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17]. Bhattacharyya et al [18] designed an RFID displacement sensor that relates the RFID tag performance to the displacement.…”

A low cost electromagnetic sensor for detecting holes in metallic sheet

“…The "Soyuz" has hole on its body with only two millimeters wide, but this hole causes oxygen to leak into space and thus pressure were dropping inside and threatening the life of astronouts. Therefore a manual inspection using human eye for metal sheet is a must to prevent this disaster from happen again [4]. But another problem arises when we are using human eye to inspect hole in metal sheet.…”