Ultrasonic Sensing and Actuation in Laminate Structures Using Bondline-Embedded d35 Piezoelectric Sensors

Abstract

Ultrasonic systems employing embedded piezoelectric transducers have seen increased interest in recent years. The ability to sense, actuate, and analyze the wave propagation modes in engineering structures has been fundamental to the advancement of ultrasonic structural health monitoring (SHM). This paper presents a study into the sensing and actuation properties of shear-mode (d35) piezoelectric transducers made of lead zirconate titanate (PZT) that are internally embedded in the bondline of laminate structures. The manuscript presents analytical analysis, finite element simulation, and experimental validation building from an individual piezoelectric element to a full laminate structure. The validated model was then used to perform a parametric study into the effects of d35 PZT transducer size on the strength of actuation and sensing output signal. The selectivity of d35 PZT sensors was also investigated by generating multiple wave modes in the laminate structure and inspecting the output signals. The d35 PZT sensors were found to selectively detect only certain modes of the wave propagation providing a fundamental hardware filter that could be employed to simplify signal analysis and processing. The results of this study indicate that d35 PZTs embedded in the bondline have multiple properties that can potentially be employed for ultrasonic SHM.

Damage Detection Using d15 Piezoelectric Sensors in a Laminate Beam Undergoing Three-Point Bending

“…At 30 kHz excitation frequency, the bondline-embedded d15 PZT actuators at the neutral axis of a symmetric structure were expected to generate antisymmetric (A0) waves which are coupled with transverse shear strain with negligible other modes [25]. This finding was supported with numerical and experimental results, and discussed in more detail in [25]. As can be observed from the received signals in Figure 6, there are two main wave packets.…”

“…It was shown in the literature that Pearson correlation coefficient is more sensitive to phase shifts in received signals while the normalized signal energy method was found to be more sensitive to amplitude of waveform signals. Therefore, the PCC and NSE methods were used to process waveform signals in the time domain as: Several experiments and extensive simulation of d15 PZT have been conducted in literature to study the characteristics of ultrasonic waves generated by d15 PZTs mounted on the surfaces of plates [21] and internally embedded within the bondline of laminate structures [25]. It should also be mentioned that at relatively low actuation frequency, the behavior of fundamental Lamb waves (S0 and A0 modes) propagating in a plate-like structure approach the behavior of flexural waves and axial waves, respectively [29].…”

Selective actuation and sensing of antisymmetric ultrasonic waves using shear-deforming piezoelectric transducers

“…A convergence study was performed on the FE model to ensure the accuracy of the solutions. Details of the analysis and modeling can be found in work by Altammar et al 30 Ten d 15 PZTs were tested experimentally by subjecting them to a frequency sweep using a KEYIGHT 33500B Series waveform generator and measuring the voltage response across the PZT in series with a 100 Ω resistor and measured with a Tektronix MDO3014 oscilloscope. The close match between analytical, FE, and experimental results shown in Table 2 indicates the validity of the FE model, and the discrepancies were attributed to inaccuracies in the material properties and geometry.…”

Experimental Study for Damage Identification of Storage Tanks by Adding Virtual Masses

“…Based on the basic idea of the VDM [18,22], the frequency response of the structure after adding the virtual mass m can be numerically constructed using a set of excitations and the corresponding acceleration responses. The added mass is called virtual, because the process is purely numerical and it involves no physical masses.…”

“…At present, the detection methods applicable to monitoring of tanks mainly include X-ray detection [11], acoustic emission [12,13,14], ultrasonic detection [15,16,17,18], magnetic flux leakage detection [19,20], eddy current [21], etc. The advantage of these nondestructive detection methods [22] is that they do not depend on the finite element model [23] of the structure; however, they cannot quantitatively evaluate the degree of damage.…”