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A Report On Structural Health Monitoring (SHM)

Balaji Sivasubramanian

This report on Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) briefly discusses the general methods and principles on the topic. It is more of a review on the previous works and a general theory on the basics of SHM principle and technology. A small ideation on the future of SHM has also been given along with discussions on Damage Prognosis. I. INTRODUCTION

tructural health monitoring has become a frequently used word in recent times. With technology moving forward on newer inventions, it has become mandatory to keep ourselves informed not only on the condition and state of the structure and components but also by and large detect defects and anomalies in them as and when they occur and give a prognosis on them. This can only be done by the use of sensors and actuators embedded either on, within or between structures. SHM has been a great boon to civil, mechanical and aerospace industry because of its ability to detect faults and provide a prognosis that allows the reduction of unscheduled maintenance and also cuts costs from by detecting problems early and in-situ conditions. It helps in determining unforeseen damages and also increases the safety factor of the structure. II. SHM PRINCIPLE AND TECHNOLOGY Structural Health monitoring is the method of getting information on the condition of structures and detecting the existence, location, depth, size,

severity and intensity of defects, cracks, loads, compression, bending, torsion, impacts, stability, corrosion and other stress and strains on a particular structure. These might occur because of structural faults or usage errors. Structural health monitoring is a simple process of detecting the above mentioned flaws as a change in either the geometrical, material and other boundary conditions and properties of the system. SHM methods rely on generating signals using transducers, guiding them through the structure and retrieving the data through sensors to detect anomalies. Sensors and transducers used in structural health monitoring are placed either on the surface of the structure and are known as surface sensors or they are fixed inside the structure. Then they are called as embedded sensors and if they are placed between two structures they are called as Integral sensors. These transducers convert (mostly) electrical signals into guided waves or other fields that pass through the structure. These guided waves or fields are picked up by the sensors that transmit it to signal processors that study the obtained data to detect the location, size and the severity of the damage or load. First a probing wave is sent through the structure. It interacts with the structure and any flaws with it. These are later picked up by the reflected signals and are analyzed. The analyzed signals are diagnosed for peak vales and other graphical representation of high stress or damage and are reported as different parameters according to the

type, location and size of the damage or load. The damage is evaluated and a prognosis of future progress is done to evaluate the time to either conduct maintenance or to replace the component or the entire structure itself. A few types of Structural Health monitoring methods are given below. Acoustic emission method When ever there is a crack or damage or any event where stress or strain energy is released, these travel as elastic waves in ultrasonic frequencies through the material. This method works on the principle that when a localized stress is released from a material an elastic wave is generated that can be captured to obtain information from it. This is fed into the signal processors and the location and intensity of the damage can be evaluated from it. Acousto Ultrasonic This method differs from acoustic emission in principle that the ultrasonic waves are produced externally and passed through the material. These waves that are harmless to the structure are modified by any change in the structure or by loads. These waves are captured and analyzed for any anomalies. Eddy current testing foil

the regions are placed micrometers apart, we can evaluate the anomaly very efficiently. Optical Fibers Optical fibers are distributed over a large area and a light of known wavelength is passed through them. Using Raman and Brillouins scattering effects, the little portion of light that has been scattered along the length of the fiber is collected back to obtain data on the localized properties in reference to their strain and temperature and can be further decoded to get complete detail on the damage. These along with other composite sensors and actuators make use of a variety of signal transmission and processing themes to allow for more accurate perception of damage and faults in any structure. We have sensors working based on change in the electromechanical impedance of the system and measuring the damage based on that. These methods give a very wide guidance on the technologies used in structural health monitoring. But there are unconventional and hypothetically more accurate methods being developed with neural network and fuzzy logic integrated systems to provide intelligent assistance as will be discussed in later part of the report. III. ADVANTAGE OF SHM

Here an eddy current field is generated and the growth of cracks or corrosion is detected through the change in the eddy field due to these faults or damages. Comparative Vacuum Monitoring In comparative Vacuum Monitoring, the sensors are made of alternating regions at vacuum and atmospheric pressure. A differential pressure flow meter is used to monitor the pressure difference between these regions. Any fault or crack on the surface would lead to a leak in the pressure difference between the regions at atmospheric pressure and regions at vacuum. Using this data we can find the location and severity of the fault. Since

Structural health monitoring makes sure that damages are detected in their initial phase. It makes sure that in-situ (while in running condition or on flight) damages are evaluated accurately for proactive action to be taken. It gives constant data on the condition of the structure so that maintenance and components can be done based on the information and then be scheduled instead of unnecessary inspections from time to time. It prevents sudden structural failure since any building up stress or large amounts of

loading that exceeds the structural capabilities are reported immediately. Helps avoid accidents that might occur through improper loading or usage errors. IV. FUTURE SCOPE AND CONCLUSION A lot of research has been going on in SHM on different levels from optimal placement of sensors to the level of designing new signal processing methods to integrate wavelet transforms and Short time and Fast Fourier transforms to evaluate the signals obtained from these methodologies. A lot of smart materials for the purpose of design and development in the transducers used in structural health monitoring and also in the development of the sensors and signal processors have come a long way through intense research. More developments on the structural health monitoring are on way by the use of technologies to provide intelligent monitoring. For example, the use of neural networks and fuzzy logic to create intelligent unsupervised learning modes for these detection systems will help in quick recovery during accidents and other minor impact loads that might prove to be structurally devastating if not dealt with properly. Hypersonic re-entry vehicles also require structural health monitoring as they face huge temperature changes and loads. These conventional methods may not be really effective in providing quick on time effective reports on the structural condition and hence would require more effective methodologies to asses and take control of the damage that might occur during those conditions. Apart from all these, damage prognosis has been a hot topic in flight / machine safety. By calculating inherent errors in a material and by finding out the faults of a structure we can predict its life time and the loads it can take at a given part of its lifetime by constant monitoring. This helps cut down costs by resolving smaller problems initially in the earlier stages itself. Surface Structural health monitoring becomes constricted once the atmospheric conditions become too extreme. For really harsh conditions like on the

ISS (International Space Station) where EVA (Extra vehicular activity) is required for a lot of repairs, SHM would help a great deal. An integrated data on the component states and the conditions along with continuous intelligent reports to obtain a further complete prognosis on the structure would make the entire job a lot easier to help solve problems especially on newer vehicles and surfaces that have just been introduced into the missions. Thus this paper deals with Structural Health monitoring and different aspects of it as needed to get a foothold into the field.