Ultrasonic guided waves have generated growing interest over the past decade as the range of applications for which guided waves are proving useful is rapidly growing.
The nature of guided waves, which can propagate long distances, yields tremendous potential for time and cost savings during the inspection of a wide variety of structures from railway tracks to pipelines to aircraft skins. Guided waves can achieve much greater inspection ranges than conventional ultrasonic testing methods because they utilise the structure itself as a waveguide by exploiting resonances between the boundaries of the structure (e.g. the surfaces of a plate or the OD and ID of a pipe). Therefore, while conventional “bulk” wave UT systems can generally only inspect an area very close to or directly beneath the transducer, guided wave systems can detect flaws many feet away from the transducer, and in some cases several hundred feet away. Due to the unique properties of guided waves, they are also capable of detecting small defects at very low frequencies compared to traditional UT, this capability increases penetration power.
Current uses:
- Crack Detection
- Corrosion Detection