This Article Full Text (PDF) All Versions of this Article: 1045389X08101634v1 20/9/1079    most recent References Alert me when this article is cited Alert me if a correction is posted Services Email this article to a friend Similar articles in this journal Alert me to new issues of the journal Add to Saved Citations Download to citation manager Request Permissions Request Reprints Add to My Marked Citations Citing Articles Citing Articles via Scopus Google Scholar Articles by Salamone, S. Articles by Coccia, S. Social Bookmarking                         What's this?

Guided-wave Health Monitoring of Aircraft Composite Panels under Changing Temperature

NDE & Structural Health Monitoring Laboratory, Department of Structural Engineering, University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, M.C. 0085, La Jolla, California 92093-0085, USA

Ivan Bartoli

NDE & Structural Health Monitoring Laboratory, Department of Structural Engineering, University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, M.C. 0085, La Jolla, California 92093-0085, USA

Francesco Lanza Di Scalea

NDE & Structural Health Monitoring Laboratory, Department of Structural Engineering, University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, M.C. 0085, La Jolla, California 92093-0085, USA, flanza{at}ucsd.edu

Stefano Coccia

NDE & Structural Health Monitoring Laboratory, Department of Structural Engineering, University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, M.C. 0085, La Jolla, California 92093-0085, USA

This study deals with the health monitoring of fiber-reinforced composite panels using ultrasonic guided waves and flexible piezocomposite transducer patches in a changing temperature environment corresponding to normal aircraft operations (—40°C to +60°C). The wave propagation problem is first studied analytically by a model that accounts for temperature effects on the transducer piezo-mechanical properties, the transducer-panel interaction, and the panel wave dispersion properties. Experiments are also conducted on a Carbon-fiber Reinforced Plastic (CFRP) [0/±45/0]_S laminate subjected to the —40°C to +60°C temperature excursion. Both model and experiment indicate substantial changes in the detected guided wave amplitude solely due to the temperature excursion. The second part of the study presents an application to bond defect detection in a simulated CFRP skin-to-spar joint of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle wings. It is shown that a statistical outlier analysis based on multiple guided-wave amplitude features and on a baseline partition is effective in detecting bond defects (poorly cured adhesive and two sizes of disbonds) despite the —40°C to +60°C temperature change. The results encourage the development of a continuous health monitoring system for composite aircraft wings during their normal operations.

Key Words: ultrasonic guided waves • structural health monitoring • macro-fiber composite transducers • temperature effects • outlier analysis.

This version was published on June 1, 2009

Journal of Intelligent Material Systems and Structures, Vol. 20, No. 9, 1079-1090 (2009)
DOI: 10.1177/1045389X08101634


CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter    What's this?