Recent Advances in Piezoelectric Wafer Active Sensors for Structural Health Monitoring Applications

Area of Science:

• Materials Science
• Mechanical Engineering
• Structural Health Monitoring

Background:

• Piezoelectric Wafer Active Sensors (PWAS) are crucial for structural health monitoring (SHM).
• Understanding PWAS performance in extreme conditions is vital for reliable SHM applications.
• Assessing damage detection capabilities of PWAS in diverse structural materials is an ongoing research area.

Purpose of the Study:

• To present recent advancements in PWAS technology from the Laboratory for Active Materials and Smart Structures (LAMSS).
• To evaluate the durability of PWAS materials under high temperature and nuclear radiation.
• To demonstrate the effectiveness of PWAS in detecting various types of structural damage and their novel application as acoustic emission sensors.

Main Methods:

• Material characterization of PWAS after exposure to high temperature and nuclear radiation.
• Wavefield analysis for detecting crack and corrosion damage in aluminum plates.
• Damage imaging methods for identifying delamination in composite plates.
• Acoustic emission (AE) signal analysis using PWAS for in situ fatigue crack monitoring.

Main Results:

• PWAS materials exhibited no significant microstructural changes post-exposure to harsh environments, indicating suitability for extreme conditions.
• PWAS successfully detected simulated crack and corrosion damage in aluminum and delamination in composite structures.
• PWAS demonstrated efficacy as acoustic emission sensors, accurately locating fatigue crack growth through signal arrival times and amplitude decay analysis.

Conclusions:

• PWAS are robust and reliable for SHM in harsh environments.
• PWAS offer versatile damage detection capabilities in both metallic and composite structures.
• The novel application of PWAS as AE sensors provides a promising method for real-time fatigue crack monitoring.