SURFACE-ADAPTIVE ULTRASOUND (SAUL) FOR PHASED-ARRAY INSPECTION OF COMPOSITE SPECIMENS WITH CURVED EDGES AND COMPLEX GEOMETRY

摘要

Results from laboratory experiments and a fully automated industrial implementation are presented to demonstrate the ability of Surface-Adaptive Ultrasound (SAUL) to mitigate the challenges of complex geometry, variability of parts, and misaligned probes, while decreasing inspection times and costs. Shape-corrected scans are presented for a variety of parts demonstrating SAUL's ability to adapt the incident wave to the geometry, even for tight radii measured with a linear probe. Results for a linear and a curved array demonstrate that SAUL can compensate for misaligned probes.