• Proceedings of the Korea Concrete Institute Conference
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• 1991.04a
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• pp.105-110
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• 1991

The conventional high-frequency testing method is difficult to detect flaw in concrete because the high frequency stress wave is strongly attenuated due to the large grain size and heterogeneous structure. For restoration of this problem, we develop the stu요 of flaw detection in large concrete block containing various artificial flaws by low frequency spectrum anlysis of impact-echo waveforms. This impact-echo testing method is possible to determine the flaw size, shape and location in large concrete block even if required some attention in case of containing reinforcing steel bar.

• Proceedings of the Korea Concrete Institute Conference
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• 1995.10a
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• pp.164-168
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• 1995

As nation's infrastructure is getting old, nondestructive evaluation of existing structures and construction quality control are getting important. In this paper non-destructive evaluations of concrete members using impact echo and SASW methods are introduced. Both techniques are based on the stress wave propagations. Experimental tests were performed using beam type concrete member where voids and cracks are included. Within reasonable accuracy, void locations were detected using impact echo method and the dynamic modulus of concrete were measured using SASW method. Both NDT methods showed a feasibility for the implementation into quality evaluaton of concrete members in practice

• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2003.03a
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• pp.309-314
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• 2003

Impact Echo method has been successful in detecting a variety of defects in concrete structure. This study has the objectives to show important aspects of applying the Discrete Wavelet Transform(DWT) to signal processing of Modified Impact Echo(ModIE) Measurement systems and to the understanding of the seismic wave propagation. The data of ModIE were processed by DWT and compared with the results of conventional ModIE Analysis. Although it is inconsistent in the evaluated thickness of concrete lining, the DWT provides the features of separation, synthesis and de-noising in the original signal. The application of technique by wavelet was explained numerically with ABAQUS and performed experimentally with a real scale model in this work. Further works on the possible ways for creating new mother wavelet are specially needed for the enhancement of seismic signal analysis.

• Computers and Concrete
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.257-262
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• 2017

This study aims to develop a signal processing scheme to accurately predict the thickness of concrete slab using air-coupled impact-echo. Air-coupled impact-echo has been applied to concrete non-destructive tests (NDT); however, it is often difficult to obtain thickness mode frequency due to noise components. Furthermore, apparent velocity in concrete is a usually unknown parameter in the field and the thickness of the concrete slab often cannot be accurately measured. This study proposes a signal processing scheme using guided wave analysis, wherein dispersion curves are drawn in both frequency-wave number (f-k) and phase velocity-frequency ($V_{cp}-f$) domains. The theoretical and experimental results demonstrate that thickness mode frequency and apparent velocity in concrete are clearly obtained from the f-k and $V_{cp}-f$ domains, respectively. The proposed method has great potential with regard to the application of air-coupled impact-echo in the field.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.36 no.1
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• pp.1-8
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• 2024

We propose a new method for detecting voids behind tunnel concrete linings using the impact-echo method that is based on continuous wavelet transform (CWT) and a convolutional neural network (CNN). We first collect experimental data using the impact-echo method and then convert them into time-frequency images via CWT. We provide a CNN model trained using the converted images and experimentally confirm that our proposed model is robust. Moreover, it exhibits outstanding performance in detecting backfill voids and their status.

• Journal of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute of Korea
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• v.28 no.6
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• pp.659-666
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• 2015

In this paper, various influence factors on the impact-echo test which is an effective method in characterizing defects such as such as the delamination in the concrete structures were studied. The side to thickness ratio(a/h), the relative position of impacting and sensing points over the delamination that have great effects on the flexural and impact-echo(thickness) modes were investigated and examined by the parametric finite element analysis. As a result, the flexural modes dominate in the case of a/h > 2 and the thickness mode was more evident when a/h < 2. With regard to the relative position of impact source and sensing point to the defect, the flexural modes dominate even when either the loading or sensing point was over the delamination defect. However, the thickness mode prevails when both the impacting and sensing points are over the solid region beyond the delamination area.

• Architectural research
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.179-184
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• 2016

The structure must be periodically checked and measures must be taken to prevent deterioration in building construction. From this point of view, a nondestructive test is essential to estimate whether the construction of buildings is proper, and whether the dimension of depositing concrete is consistent and without damage. This study estimated the thickness of the concrete component of construction framework using the ultrasonic velocity method and the impact echo method, in order to investigate reliability of the estimation of the thickness of normal strength concrete and high strength concrete, leading to the following conclusions. In the estimation of the thickness of the concrete structures, specimens of normal strength of 24MPa and specimens of high strength of 40MPa demonstrated an average error rate of 5.1% and 2.2%, respectively. The impact-echo method, one of the non-destructive tests, is verified as an efficient diagnostic technique. With this information, we will determine specific standards for the maintenance of structures, and the re-creation of lost building blueprints.

• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2005.03a
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• pp.33-40
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• 2005

Impact-echo test, a kind of simple and economical method to evaluate the integrity of drilled piles has some limitations to use because the stress wave can be generated only on the head of a pile and the wave propagation in the pile with surrounding soils are very complicated. Numerical analyses and model tests in the laboratory have shown that both the ratio of length to diameter of a pile and the stiffness ratio of pile to soil have influence on the resolution of testing results. Full scale testing piles which have artificial defects were used to verify the capability of impact-echo technique as a tool for the pile integrity evaluation. Behaviour of the reflected signal of stress wave was investigated according to the type of defects. Elastic modulus of the pile was calculated using the wave velocity in the pile and the unconfined strength of concrete specimen. Influences of the stiffness difference between the pile and the ground on the characteristics of a wave signal were also examined.

• Tunnel and Underground Space
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• v.14 no.1
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• pp.35-42
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• 2004

Impact-echo is a method for non-destructive testing of concrete structure. This method is based on the use of impact-generated stress wave which is propagated and reflected from internal flaws within concrete structure and external surface. In this study, we performed non-destructive testing using impact-echo methods for safety diagnosis of civil engineering and building structures. There are testing cases for the three models having one-dimensional form ; The first case is the measurement of thickness change of the model, the second is the detection of cavity in the model, and the third is the predictions of the lining thickness and the position of the cavity under tunnel lining condition.

• Journal of the Korea institute for structural maintenance and inspection
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.199-207
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• 2008

As infrastructures are being deteriorated, nondestructive evaluation of existing structures and construction quality control are increasingly demanded. The importance of predicting compressive strength of concrete structure is also gradually increasing in construction industry. The estimation of concrete compressive strength is a critical factor of the construction management and quality control. This study has been conducted using Schmidt hammer test and Impact echo method, which are nondestructive test methods for the comparison of the concrete compressive strength. It is focusing to examine the relationship between compressive strength of concrete and rebound number by Schmidt hammer test result by Impact echo method. It was found that concrete compressive strength and rebound number have a close correlation.