• Proceedings of the Korea Committee for Ocean Resources and Engineering Conference
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• 2002.05a
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• pp.173-178
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• 2002

Fourier transform has been one of the most common tools to study the frequency characteristics of signals. With the Fourier transform alone, it is difficult to tell whether signal's frequency contents evolve in time or not. Except for a few special cases, the frequency contents of most signals encountered in the real world change with time. Time-frequency methods are developed recently to overcome the drawbacks of Fourier transform, which can represent the information of signals in time and frequency at the same time. In this study, heat damage process of a carbon fiber reinforced plastic(CFRP) and glass fiber reinforced plastic(GFRP) under monotonic tensile loading was characterized by acoustic emission. Different kinds of specimens were used to determine the characteristics of Strength and AE signals. Time-frequency analysis methods were employed for the analysis of fracture mechanism in CFRP such as matrix cracking, debonding and fiber fracture.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.14 no.3
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• pp.307-325
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• 2014

A newly developed method based on energy is presented to study the damage pattern of FRP material. Basalt fiber reinforced polymer (BFRP) is employed to monitor the damage under fatigue loading. In this study, acoustic emission technique (AE) combined with scanning electronic microscope (SEM) technique is employed to monitor the damage evolution of the BFRP specimen in an approximate continuous scanning way. The AE signals are analyzed based on the wavelet transform, and the analyses are confirmed by SEM images. Several damage patterns of BFRP material, such as matrix cracking, delamination, fiber fracture and their combinations, are identified through the experiment. According to the results, the cumulative energy (obtained from wavelet coefficients) of various damage patterns are closely related to the damage evolution of the BFRP specimens during the entire fatigue tests. It has been found that the proposed technique can effectively distinguish different damage patterns of FRP materials and describe the fatigue damage evolution.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.77 no.5
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• pp.637-650
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• 2021

The paper presents an investigation of the widely varying mechanical performance and behaviour of steel and Glass Fibre Reinforced Polymer (GFRP) reinforced concrete beams using non-destructive techniques of Acoustic Emission (AE) and Digital Image Correlation (DIC) under four-point bending. Laboratory experiments are performed on both differently reinforced concrete beams with 0.33%, 0.52% and 1.11% of tension reinforcement against balanced section. The results show that the ultimate load-carrying capacity increases with an increase in tensile reinforcement in both cases. In addition to that, AE waveform parameters of amplitude and number of AE hits successfully correlates and picks up the divergent mechanism of cracking initiation and progression of failure in steel reinforced and GFRP reinforced concrete beams. AE activity is about 20-30% more in GFRP-RC beams as compared to steel-RC beams. It was primarily due to the lower modulus of elasticity of GFRP bars leading to much larger ductility and deflections as compared to steel-RC beams. Furthermore, AE XY event plots and longitudinal strain profiles using DIC gives an online and real-time visual display of progressive AE activity and strains respectively to efficaciously depict the crack evolution and their advancement in steel-RC and GFRP-RC beams which show a close matching with the micro-and macro-cracks visually observed in the actual beams at various stages of loading.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.29 no.4
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• pp.535-547
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• 2022

Failure patterns of rock specimens represent valuable information about the mechanical properties and crack evolution mechanism of rock. Several kinds of research have been conducted regarding the failure mechanism of brittle material, however; the influence of brittleness on the failure mechanism of rock specimens has not been precisely considered. In the present study, experimental and numerical examinations have been made to evaluate the physical and mechanical phenomena associated with rock failure mechanisms through the uniaxial compression test. In the experimental part, Unconfined Compressive Strength (UCS) tests equipped with Acoustic Emission (AE) have been conducted on rock samples with three different brittleness. Then, the numerical models have been calibrated based on experimental test results for further investigation and comparing the micro-cracking process in experimental and numerical models. It can be perceived that the failure mode of specimens with high brittleness is tensile axial splitting, based on the experimental evidence of rock specimens with different brittleness. Also, the crack growth mechanism of the rock specimens with various brittleness using discrete element modeling in the numerical part suggested that the specimens with more brittleness contain more tensile fracture during the loading sequences.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.20 no.4
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• pp.276-284
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• 2000

The acoustic emission (AE) behavior of reinforced concrete beams tested under flexural loading was investigated to characterize and identify the source of damage. This research was aimed at identifying the characteristic AE response associated with micro-crack development, localized crack propagation, corrosion, and debonding of the reinforcing steel. Concrete beams were prepared to isolate the damage mechanisms by using plain, notched-plain, reinforced, and corroded-reinforced specimens. The beams were tested using four-point cyclic step-loading. The AE response was analyzed to obtain key parameters such as the time history of AE events, the total number and rate of AE events, and the characteristic features of the waveform. Initial analysis of the AE signal has shown that a clear difference in the AE response is observed depending on the source of the damage. The Felicity ratio exhibited a correlation with the overall damage level, while the number of AE events during unloading can be an effective criterion to estimate the level of corrosion distress in reinforced concrete structures. Consequently, AE measurement characterization appears to provide a promising approach for estimating the level of deterioration in reinforced concrete structure.

• International Journal of Railway
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• v.1 no.4
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• pp.149-156
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• 2008

During maintenance or construction works in or at the tracks of railways, high risks for passengers and railway staff, especially for the workers on the construction site exist. The high risks result out of the movement of rail vehicles, like trains or construction vehicles, which must be faced by using any available technical and operational technologies for securing them against the environment. Therefore, it is necessary to evaluate the level of protection continuously and to identify new and innovative methods and technologies for the protection of the gang (construction worker, machines and material). Especially on construction sites at line sections with two or more parallel tracks but also with single tracks, there are still a lot of incidents and accidents mostly with seriously injured persons or fatalities. These were mainly gang members that breach the railway-loading gage. By using proper warning or protection systems, the avoidance of such accidents must be achieved. The latest developments. in gang protection systems concern on the one hand fixed barriers in the middle between the construction site and the operated track and on the other hand construction vehicles equipped with automatic warning systems. The disadvantage of such protection methods is that the gang can be warned against an approaching train but a monitoring of the gang members cannot be performed. Only one part of a potential dangerous situation will be detected. If the gang members will overhear the acoustic warning signal of the security staff and the workers will not leave the danger zone in the track, the driver of the approaching train had no chance to react to the dangerous situation. An accident is often inevitable. While the detection of acoustic warning signals by the gang members working on a construction site is very difficult, the acoustical planning of an automatic warning system has to be designed for an acoustic short range level of one meter besides the construction vehicle. The decision about the use of today's technical warning system (fixed systems, automatic warning systems, etc.) must be geared to the technical feasibility and the level of safety which is needed. Criteria for decision guidance to block a track should be developed by danger estimation and economical variables. To realize the actual jurisdiction and to minimize the hazards of railway operations by the use of construction vehicles near the tracks further developments are needed. This means, that the warning systems have to be enhanced to systems for protection, which monitor the realization of the warning signal as a precondition for giving a movement authority to a train. This method can protect against accidents caused by predictable wrongdoing. The actual state of the art technique of using a collective warning combined with additional security staff is no longer acceptable. Therefore, the Institute of Transportation System of the German Aerospace Center in Braunschweig (Germany) will develop a gang warning and protection system based upon imaging methods, with optical sensors such as video in visible and invisible ranges, radar, laser, and other. The advantage of such a system based on the possibility to monitor both the gang itself and the railway-loading gauge either of the parallel track or of the same track still in use. By monitoring both situations, the system will be able to generate a warning message for the approaching train, that there are obstacles in the track, so that the train can be stopped to prevent an accident. And also the gang workers will be warned, while they breach their area.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.421-433
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• 2018

Carbon fiber reinforced polymer (CFRP) cable has good mechanical properties and corrosion resistance. However, the anchorage of CFRP cable is a big issue due to the anisotropic property of CFRP material. In this article, a high-efficient bonding anchorage with novel configuration is developed for CFRP cables. The acoustic emission (AE) technique is employed to evaluate the performance of anchorage in the fatigue test and post-fatigue ultimate bearing capacity test. The obtained AE signals are analyzed by using a combination of unsupervised K-means clustering and supervised K-nearest neighbor classification (K-NN) for quantifying the performance of the anchorage and damage evolutions. An AE feature vector (including both frequency and energy characteristics of AE signal) for clustering analysis is proposed and the under-sampling approaches are employed to regress the influence of the imbalanced classes distribution in AE dataset for improving clustering quality. The results indicate that four classes exist in AE dataset, which correspond to the shear deformation of potting compound, matrix cracking, fiber-matrix debonding and fiber fracture in CFRP bars. The AE intensity released by the deformation of potting compound is very slight during the whole loading process and no obvious premature damage observed in CFRP bars aroused by anchorage effect at relative low stress level, indicating the anchorage configuration in this study is reliable.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.274-286
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• 2005

Fracture behaviors and acoustic emission (AE) characteristics of single-edge-notched monolithic aluminum plates and glass fiber/aluminum hybrid laminate plates have been investigated under tensile loads. AE signals from monolithic aluminum could be classified into two different types: signals with low frequency band and high frequency band. High frequency signals were detected in the post stage of loading beyond displacement of 0.45mm. For glass fiber/aluminum laminates, AE signals with high amplitude and long duration were additionally confirmed on FFT frequency analysis, which corresponded to macro-crack propagation and/or delamination between A1 and fiber layers. On the basis of the above AE analysis and fracture observation with optical microscopy and ultrasonic T scan, characteristic features of AE associated with fracture processes of single-edge-notched glass fiber/aluminum laminates were elucidated according to different fiber ply orientations.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.16-22
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• 1994

In contrast to the machineries using rolling element bearings, systems with journal bearings generally operate in large scale and under severe loading condition such as steam generator turbines and internal combustion engines. Failure of the bearings in these machineries can result in the system breakdown. To avoid the time consuming repair and considerable economic loss, the detection of incipient failure in journal bearings becomes very important. In this experimental approach, acoustic emission monitoring is applied to the detection of incipient failure caused by several types of abnormal operating condition most probable in the journal bearing systems. It has been known that the intervention of foreign materials, insufficient lubrication and misassembly etc. are principal factors to cause bearing failure and distress. The experiment was conducted under such designed conditions as hard particles in the lubrication layer, insufficient lubrication, and metallic contact in the simulated journal bearing system. The results showed that acoustic emission could be an effective tool to detect the incipient failure in journal bearings.

• Composites Research
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.46-53
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• 2001

In this research, damage behavior of singly oriented ply (SOP) fiber metal laminate (FML) subjected to concentrated load was studied. The static indentation tests were conducted to study fiber orientation effect on damage behavior of FML. During the static indentation tests, acoustic emission technique (AE) was adopted to study damage characteristics of FML. AE signals were obtained by using AE sensor with 150kHz resonance frequency and the signals were compared with indentation curves of FML. The damage process of SOP FML was divided by three parts, i.e., crack initiation, crack propagation, and penetration. The AE characteristics during crack initiation show that the micro crack is initiated at lower ply of the plate, then propagate along the thickness of the plate with creating tiber debonding. The crack grow along the fiber direction with occurring 60∼80dB AE signal. During the penetration, the fiber breakage was observed. As fiber orientation increases, talc fiber breakage occurs more frequently. The AE signal behaviors support these results. Cumulative AE counts could well predict crack initiation and crack propagation and AE amplitude were useful for the prediction of damage failure mode.