Ultrasonics Baseline Free Impact Location Sahithi Chatradi

Motivation Impacts can cause significant and hard to detect disbonding damage, potentially leading to catastrophic failure if left undetected.

Background TDOA systems compare the time of arrival of a signal at multiple sensors having known locations to evaluate the location of a source. Requires baseline knowledge of the wave propagation velocity

Algorithm Based on TDOA Technique Matlab Script based on Algorithm.

Simulation Given signal speed, times of arrival were calculated at the sensor locations. The algorithm was tested with multiple sensor geometries and impact velocities

Fig. 5 – Typical experimental setup Performed on 6061-T651 aluminum plates measuring 0.30 x 0.30 m with thicknesses of 0.0010 m, and 0.0064 m. Avoiding having 3 collinear sensors Sensors- Lead Zirconate Titanate (PZT) piezoceramic

Future Work The well-established properties of strain waves distorting and attenuating as they propagate are a potential source of errors Identifying alternative signal markers or compensating for this distortion and attenuation could improve the accuracy of the system in real application.

Questions?