Engineering topics

Volker, Arno

Publications and source records attributed to Volker, Arno.

3 records

DOE OSTI2015

Field trials results of guided wave tomography

Corrosion is one of the industries major issues regarding the integrity of assets. Guided wave travel time tomography is a method capable of providing an absolute wall thickness map. This method is currently making the transition from the laboratory to the field. For this purpose a dedicated data acquisition system and special purpose EMAT sensor rings have been developed. The system can be deployed for permanent monitoring and inspections. Field trials have been conducted on various pipes with different diameters, containing either liquid or gas. The main focus has been on pipe supports. The results demonstrate the successful operation of the technology in the field. Expected corrosion damage was clearly visible on the produced results enabling asset owner to make calculated decisions on the pipelines safety, maintenance and operations.

42 ENGINEERING↗

DOE OSTI2015

1D profiling using highly dispersive guided waves

Corrosion is one of the industries major issues regarding the integrity of assets. Currently inspections are conducted at regular intervals to ensure a sufficient integrity level of these assets. Cost reduction while maintaining a high level of reliability and safety of installations is a major challenge. There are many situations where the actual defect location is not accessible, e.g., a pipe support or a partially buried pipe. Guided wave tomography has been developed to reconstruct the wall thickness. In case of bottom of the line corrosion, i.e., a single corrosion pit, a simpler approach may be followed. Data is collected in a pit-catch configuration at the 12 o'clock position using highly dispersive guided waves. The phase spectrum is used to invert for a wall thickness profile in the circumferential direction, assuming a Gaussian defect profile. An EMAT sensor design has been made to measure at the 12 o'clock position of a pipe. The concept is evaluated on measured data, showing good sizing capabilities on a variety simple defect profiles.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

DOE OSTI2015

Crack depth profiling using guided wave angle dependent reflectivity

Tomographic corrosion monitoring techniques have been developed, using two rings of sensors around the circumference of a pipe. This technique is capable of providing a detailed wall thickness map, however this might not be the only type of structural damage. Therefore this concept is expanded to detect and size cracks and small corrosion defects like root corrosion. The expanded concept uses two arrays of guided-wave transducers, collecting both reflection and transmission data. The data is processed such that the angle-dependent reflectivity is obtained without using a baseline signal of a defect-free situation. The angle-dependent reflectivity is the input of an inversion scheme that calculates a crack depth profile. From this profile, the depth and length of the crack can be determined. Preliminary experiments show encouraging results. The depth sizing accuracy is in the order of 0.5 mm.

42 ENGINEERING↗