Polarized digital shearography for simultaneous dual shearing directions measurements

The selection of the direction of sensitivity for digital shearography is determined by its shearing direction. As a result, directionally shaped defects could be missed in non-destructive testing using a digital shearography system with only one shearing direction. This paper reports a polarized digital shearography system based on two Mach-Zehnder interferometers, which can create two orthogonal shearing directions and record shearograms in the two orthogonal directions simultaneously. The two shearograms are separated from each other by proper polarization design so that no cross interference occurs. The phase maps of the shearograms are generated by spatial phase shift methods through the introduction of different carrier frequencies in the two orthogonal shearograms and use of the Fourier transform method. This enabled simultaneous dual directional non-destructive testing during continuous loading. Theory derivation, spectrum analysis, and non-destructive testing application results are shown in detail.