Ferguson, Frederick | Search NASA

NASA NTRS2001

Active Wave Propagation and Sensing in Plates

Health monitoring of aerospace structures can be done using an active interrogation approach with diagnostic Lamb waves. Piezoelectric patches are often used to generate the waves, and it is helpful to understand how these waves propagate through a structure. To give a basic understanding of the actual physical process of wave propagation, a model is developed to simulate asymmetric wave propagation in a panel and to produce a movie of the wave motion. The waves can be generated using piezoceramic patches of any size or shape. The propagation, reflection, and interference of the waves are represented in the model. Measuring the wave propagation is the second important aspect of damage detection. Continuous sensors are useful for measuring waves because of the distributed nature of the sensor and the wave. Two sensor designs are modeled, and their effectiveness in measuring acoustic waves is studied. The simulation model developed is useful to understand wave propagation and to optimize the type of sensors that might be used for health monitoring of plate-like structures.

Ghoshal, Anindya↗

NASA NTRS2000

Structural Modeling Using "Scanning and Mapping" Technique

Supported by NASA Glenn Center, we are in the process developing a structural damage diagnostic and monitoring system for rocket engines, which consists of five modules: Structural Modeling, Measurement Data Pre-Processor, Structural System Identification, Damage Detection Criterion, and Computer Visualization. The function of the system is to detect damage as it is incurred by the engine structures. The scientific principle to identify damage is to utilize the changes in the vibrational properties between the pre-damaged and post-damaged structures. The vibrational properties of the pre-damaged structure can be obtained based on an analytic computer model of the structure. Thus, as the first stage of the whole research plan, we currently focus on the first module - Structural Modeling. Three computer software packages are selected, and will be integrated for this purpose. They are PhotoModeler-Pro, AutoCAD-R14, and MSC/NASTRAN. AutoCAD is the most popular PC-CAD system currently available in the market. For our purpose, it plays like an interface to generate structural models of any particular engine parts or assembly, which is then passed to MSC/NASTRAN for extracting structural dynamic properties. Although AutoCAD is a powerful structural modeling tool, the complexity of engine components requires a further improvement in structural modeling techniques. We are working on a so-called "scanning and mapping" technique, which is a relatively new technique. The basic idea is to producing a full and accurate 3D structural model by tracing on multiple overlapping photographs taken from different angles. There is no need to input point positions, angles, distances or axes. Photographs can be taken by any types of cameras with different lenses. With the integration of such a modeling technique, the capability of structural modeling will be enhanced. The prototypes of any complex structural components will be produced by PhotoModeler first based on existing similar components, then passed to AutoCAD for modification and correction of any discrepancies seen in the Photomodeler version of the 3Dmodel. These three software packages are fully compatible. The DXF file can be used to transfer drawings among those packages. To begin this entire process, we are using a small replica of an actual engine blade as a test object. This paper introduces the accomplishment of our recent work.

Amos, Courtney L.↗