New Approaches to Flaw Classification and Sizing for Quantitative Ultrasonic Testing

정량적 초음파 시험을 위한 결함분류와 크기산정의 새로운 기법

In modern high performance engineering applications, the structural integrity of materials and structures are quite often evaluated using fracture mechanics. This evaluation in turn requires information on the flaw geometry (location, type, shape, size, and orientation). The ultrasonic nondestructive evaluation (NDE) method is one technique that is commonly used to provide such information. Flaw classification (determination of the flaw type ) and flaw sizing (prediction of the flaw shape, orientation and sizing parameters) are very important issues for quantitative ultrasonic NDE. In this paper new approaches to both classification and sizing of flaws are described together with extensive review of previous works on both topics. In the area of flaw classification, a methodology is developed which can solve classification problems using probabilistic neural networks, and in the area of flaw sizing, a time-of-flight equivalent (TOFE) sizing method is presented. The techniques proposed here are in a form that can be used directly in many practical applications to quantitative estimates of the flaw's significance.