Advanced techniques in ultrasonic nondestructive evaluation

超声无损评估先进技术

• 批准号: RGPIN-2019-04096
• 负责人: Sinclair, Anthony
• 金额: $ 2.33万
• 依托单位: University of Toronto
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2022
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2022-01-01 至 2023-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=759696
• 关键词: Advanced; techniques; ultrasonic; nondestructive; evaluation

Critical engineering components must be carefully inspected to minimize the danger of a catastrophic failure. This is particularly important in fields where a failure could lead to major financial loss, environmental damage, or personal injuries, e.g., industries such as aviation, nuclear power generation, oil & gas pipelines, petrochemical processing. Potentially dangerous flaws may not be visible at the surface of a component so techniques such as x-ray or ultrasonic wave inspection can be used to probe for flaws that are beneath the component's surface. This research program is focused on the development of new types of ultrasonic sensors, and mathematical algorithms to process the ultrasonic echo signals that yield flaw images. The final objective is then to obtain a much sharper, clearer "map" of the size, shape, and type of flaw(s) in an engineering component such that an accurate assessment can be made of its potential for causing a component failure. The sensor development component of this work is targeted at producing ultrasonic transducers that can operate for extended periods in harsh environments, in particular high temperature or elevated gamma radiation fields. One major application of such sensors would be for their permanent installation on any components in a petrochemical or electrical power generation plant that might be prone to corrosion or crack initiation. The probes could continually monitor the integrity of these key plant components at temperatures up to 700 C while the plant is in operation, and periodically send the information back to a centralized computer system for analysis and storage. Plant safety would be enhanced, and unexpected plant failures would be reduced. The improved probe hardware is to be complemented by development of advanced signal processing algorithms that can "sharpen" a blurry image of a flaw, or separate two blurry echoes originating from a pair of closely-spaced sub-surface flaws. There is a wealth of potential applications for such signal enhancement strategies, e.g., geophysics, telecommunications, astronomy, obstetrics, neurology, and micro-robotics. Some of the proposed techniques combine information contained in multiple types of signals with knowledge about the expected general form of a flaw echo, in a "data fusion" scheme. Combining all the key factors enables a more accurate estimate of a few key flaw parameters, such as flaw size or shape. The direct beneficiaries of this work will be Canadian industry, which will be able to reduce the number of unexpected failures during plant operations. This will help protect the environment, reduce injuries, and keep production costs low.

必须仔细检查关键工程部件，以尽量减少灾难性故障的危险。这对于故障可能导致重大财务损失、环境破坏或人身伤害的领域尤其重要，例如航空、核能发电、石油和天然气管道、石化加工等行业。潜在危险的缺陷在部件表面可能不可见，因此可以使用 X 射线或超声波检查等技术来探测部件表面下方的缺陷。该研究计划的重点是开发新型超声波传感器和数学算法来处理产生缺陷图像的超声波回波信号。最终目标是获得工程部件中缺陷的尺寸、形状和类型的更清晰、更清晰的“图”，以便能够准确评估其导致部件故障的可能性。这项工作的传感器开发部分旨在生产能够在恶劣环境（特别是高温或高伽马辐射场）下长时间运行的超声波换能器。此类传感器的主要应用之一是永久安装在石化或发电厂中可能容易腐蚀或产生裂纹的任何组件上。当工厂运行时，探测器可以在高达 700°C 的温度下持续监测这些关键工厂组件的完整性，并定期将信息发送回中央计算机系统进行分析和存储。工厂的安全性将得到提高，意外的工厂故障将会减少。 改进的探头硬件将通过开发先进的信号处理算法来补充，这些算法可以“锐化”缺陷的模糊图像，或分离源自一对紧密间隔的地下缺陷的两个模糊回波。这种信号增强策略有很多潜在的应用，例如地球物理学、电信、天文学、产科、神经病学和微型机器人。所提出的一些技术在“数据融合”方案中将多种类型的信号中包含的信息与关于缺陷回波的预期一般形式的知识结合起来。结合所有关键因素可以更准确地估计一些关键缺陷参数，例如缺陷尺寸或形状。这项工作的直接受益者将是加拿大工业界，它将能够减少工厂运营期间意外故障的数量。这将有助于保护环境、减少伤害并降低生产成本。