• Journal of the Korean Society of Radiology
• /
• v.6 no.5
• /
• pp.351-356
• /
• 2012

Ultrasonic cavitation is a physical phenomenon that generates and collapses microbubbles in media (mainly fluids) under conditions of strong ultrasonic irradiation. In this study, changes in the ultrasonic acoustic characteristics of bubble clouds in relation to ultrasonic irradiation were observed by the quantitative evaluation of cavitation yields. Concave-type single ultrasonic transducers with center frequencies of 500 kHz and 1.1 MHz were used to produce cavitation, and 2.25 MHz interference ultrasonic waves that would traverse any bubble clouds generated were used to analyze the cavitation. The parameters used for the evaluation of cavitation yields (changes in the center frequency, attenuation characteristics, and the propagation time of penetrating waves) were analyzed in relation to the cavitation-generating conditions (irradiation intensity, excitation signal, and center frequency). On the basis of these results, correlations between the changes in the center frequency and irradiation intensity were identified. Although the correlation coefficient was low, notable changes were observed in the center frequency under certain irradiation conditions. Attenuation trends in the interference ultrasonic waves showed high correlations with all the irradiation conditions, and it was noted that these trends were not affected by the forms of cavitation generated. No differences in the propagation time were observed among different irradiation conditions. These findings suggest that bubble yields can be quantitatively evaluated effectively by evaluating the diverse irradiation conditions and that such a quantitative evaluation could be used to study the basic cavitation phenomenon occurring in high-intensity ultrasonic wave treatment.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
• /
• v.22 no.1
• /
• pp.1-8
• /
• 2002

The high frequency ultrasonic transducers using polyvinyliden fluoride(PVDF) and polyvinylidene fluoride trifluorethyylene(P(VDF-TrFE)) were developed. The characteristics of fabricated high frequency ultrasonic transducer such as beam diameter, high frequency ultrasonic detection field and amplitude of the first pulse echo signal from the test target in the water were analyzed. The high frequency ultrasonic detection field was affected by the length of coaxial cable between high frequency transducer and ultrasonic pulser/receiver. As the size of the test target increased, the high frequency detection field decreased and the amplitude of a reflection signal increased. The peak amplitude of the first pulse echo signal of P(VDF-TrFE) transducer was higher than that of PVDF transducer. The high frequency ultrasonic detection field of PVDF transducer was wider than that of P(VDF-TrFE) transducer. With C-scan testing, the developed high frequency ultrasonic transducer could detect the 30 to $100{\mu}m$ of hydrogen induced crack of steel specimen by C-scan testing.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
• /
• v.40 no.5
• /
• pp.408-416
• /
• 2021

In the ultrasonic dispersion, in order to avoid direct contact of the radiation surface of ultrasonic transducers with a liquid sample, the liquid sample is separated by a glass container and it receives ultrasonic energy through an acoustic medium. The transmission efficiency of the ultrasonic energy in the multi-layered ultrasonic system is an important factor. In this study, we suggested a method that can improve the ultrasonic energy transfer efficiency by using a propylene glycol solution as a liquid matching layer in the multi-layered acoustic system. In this method, a propylene glycol solution was filled between the Langevin-type ultrasonic transducer and the luminol solution and the sonoluminescence phenomena in the luminol solution, which is caused by nonlinear effect of high power ultrasound radiated from the transducer, was examined by using a Photo Multiplier Tube (PMT). The transmission efficiency depending on the concentration of propylene glycol solution was observed, and we can see that as the concentration of the propylene glycol solution increased, the matching effect increased while the acoustic attenuation increased. It was confirmed that there is an optimal concentration compromised these two conflicting conditions, and the optimum concentration of the propylene glycol solution was determined experimentally.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
• /
• v.29 no.2
• /
• pp.130-136
• /
• 2009

Turbine, which is one of major components in nuclear power plants, requires reliable nondestructive inspections. But, accessibility of transducers is limited and interpretation of acquired signals is not easy at all due to the complication. So, in this study, we have fabricated mock-up specimens of real size and shape. we applied pulse-echo method and time-of-flight diffraction(TOFD) method for precise inspection of turbine key and wheel bore. And phased array ultrasonic testing method was adopted for wheel dovetail of turbines by using mock-up. Furthermore, an automatic scanner system was developed for in-service inspection of the developed methods.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
• /
• v.35 no.2
• /
• pp.120-127
• /
• 2015

In this paper, a linear-array transducer capable of overcoming the faults of a single element and phased array transducers with convex shape for non-destructive ultrasonic testing was designed and fabricated. A 5.5 MHz linear-array transducer was designed using the PiezoCAD program based on the KLM analysis and the PZFlex program based on the FEM analysis. A 2-2 composite structure was employed to achieve broad-band characteristics. A 128 element linear-array transducer was fabricated and its performance was compared with the simulation results. The center frequency of the fabricated transducer was 5.5 MHz and the -6 dB frequency bandwidth was 70 %. Thus, we expect that the designed transducer can provide an effective inner image of the test material during non-destructive ultrasonic testing.

• Smart Structures and Systems
• /
• v.26 no.2
• /
• pp.227-239
• /
• 2020

Despite proven effectiveness and accuracy in laboratories, the existing damage assessment based on guided ultrasonic waves (GUWs) or acoustic emission (AE) confronts challenges when extended to real-world structural health monitoring (SHM) for railway tracks. Central to the concerns are the extremely complex signal appearance due to highly dispersive and multimodal wave features, restriction on transducer installations, and severe contaminations of ambient noise. It remains a critical yet unsolved problem along with recent attempts to implement SHM in bourgeoning high-speed railway (HSR). By leveraging authors' continued endeavours, an SHM framework, based on actively generated diffuse ultrasonic waves (DUWs) and a benchmark-free condition contrast algorithm, has been developed and deployed via an all-in-one SHM system. Miniaturized lead zirconate titanate (PZT) wafers are utilized to generate and acquire DUWs in long-range railway tracks. Fatigue cracks in the tracks show unique contact behaviours under different conditions of external loads and further disturb DUW propagation. By contrast DUW propagation traits, fatigue cracks in railway tracks can be characterised quantitatively and the holistic health status of the tracks can be evaluated in a real-time manner. Compared with GUW- or AE-based methods, the DUW-driven inspection philosophy exhibits immunity to ambient noise and measurement uncertainty, less dependence on baseline signals, use of significantly reduced number of transducers, and high robustness in atrocious engineering conditions. Conformance tests are performed on HSR tracks, in which the evolution of fatigue damage is monitored continuously and quantitatively, demonstrating effectiveness, adaptability, reliability and robustness of DUW-driven SHM towards HSR applications.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
• /
• v.10 no.6
• /
• pp.286-294
• /
• 2001

In this study, 3-D underwater object recognition using the self-made 3-3 type composite ultrasonic transducer and modified SOFM(Self Organizing Feature Map) neural network are investigated. Properties of the self-made 3-3 type composite specimens are satisfied considerably with requirements as an underwater ultrasonic transducer's materials. 3-D underwater all object's recognition rates obtained from both the training data and testing data in different objects, such as a rectangular block, regular triangular block, square block and cylinderical block, were 100% and 94.0%, respectively. All object's recognition rates are obtained by utilizing the self-made 3-3 type composite transducer and SOFM neural network. From the object recognition rates, it could be seen that an ultrasonic transducer fabricated with the self-made 3-3 type composite resonator will be able to have application for the underwater object recognition.

• Smart Structures and Systems
• /
• v.22 no.4
• /
• pp.481-493
• /
• 2018

Ultrasonic guided waves have attracted increasing attention for non-destructive testing (NDT) and structural health monitoring (SHM) of bridge cables. They offer advantages like single measurement, wide coverage of acoustical field, and long-range propagation capability. To design defect detection systems, it is essential to understand how guided waves propagate in cables and how to select the optimal excitation frequency and mode. However, certain cable characteristics such as multiple wires, anchorage, and polyethylene (PE) sheath increase the complexity in analyzing the guided wave propagation. In this study, guided wave modes for multi-wire bridge cables are identified by using a semi-analytical finite element (SAFE) technique to obtain relevant dispersion curves. Numerical results indicated that the number of guided wave modes increases, the length of the flat region with a low frequency of L(0,1) mode becomes shorter, and the cutoff frequency for high order longitudinal wave modes becomes lower, as the number of steel wires in a cable increases. These findings were used in design of transducers for defect detection and selection of the optimal wave mode and frequency for subsequent experiments. A magnetostrictive transducer system was used to excite and detect the guided waves. The applicability of the proposed approach for detecting and locating wire breakages was demonstrated for a cable with 37 wires. The present ultrasonic guided wave method has been found to be very responsive to the number of brokenwires and is thus capable of detecting defects with varying sizes.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
• /
• v.20 no.2
• /
• pp.124-130
• /
• 2011

In this study, in order to evaluate the yield of bubble by ultrasonic cavitation in HIFU sonication, the bubble image analysis was performed. The changing phenomenon of cavitation effect according to the sonication condition was discussed by analyzing the bubble image. Especially the appearance of bubble cloud, the size of micro-bubble, and the yield of bubble were considered. The 500 KHz and 1.1 MHz concave type ultrasonic transducers were used for HIFU sonication. Computer controlled digital camera was used to obtain the bubble image, and the binary image processing(binarization coefficient : 0.15) was performed to analyze them. In results of 500 KHz and 1.1 MHz transducer, the area of bubble cloud was increased in proportion to the rise in sonication intensity($R^2$ : 0.7031 and 0.811). The mean size of single microbubble was measured as 98.18 um in 500 KHz sonication, and 63.38 um in 1.1 MHz sonication. In addition, the amount of produced bubble was increased in proportion to sonication intensity. Through the result of this study and further study for variable image processing method, the quantitative evaluation of ultrasonic cavitation effects in HIFU operation could be possible with the linearity associated with the sonication conditions.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• v.20 no.3
• /
• pp.170-178
• /
• 1988

An automated ultrasonic flaw detection system was developed for thin-walled and short tubes such as Zircaloy-4 tubes used for cladding heavy-water reactor fuel. The system was based on the two channels immersion pulse-echo technique using 14 MHz shear wave and the specially developed helical scanning technique, in which the tube to be tested is only rotated and the small water tank with spherical focus ultrasonic transducers is translated along the tube length. The optimum angle of incidence of ultrasonic beam was 26 degrees, at which the inside and outside surface defects with the same size and direction could be detected with the same sensitivity. The maximum permissible defects in the Zircaloy-4 tubes, i.e., the longitudinal and circumferential v notches with the length of 0.76mm and 0.38mm, respectively and the depth of 0.04 mm on the inside and outside surface, could be easily detected by the system with the inspection speed of about 1 m/min and the very excellent reproducibility. The ratio of signal to noise was greater than 20 dB for the longitudinal defects and 12 dB for the circumferential defects.