Inverse Detection of Delaminations in Composite Laminates

1523_Frame_C11.
fm Page 391 Thursday, August 28, 2003 5:43 PM
11
Inverse Detection of Delaminations
in Composite Laminates
In this chapter, computational inverse techniques using elastic wave

responses of displacement for delamination detection in composite laminates
are introduced. Both horizontal and vertical cracks will be considered. The
genetic algorithm (GA) and neural network (NN) are employed as the
inverse operators and the strip element method (SEM) is used as the forward
solver to calculate the wave response. Examples of practical applications
have been presented to demonstrate the efficiency of computational inverse
techniques for delamination detection in composite laminates.
This chapter focuses on different computational inverse techniques for
delamination detection in composite laminates. No experiments are pro-
vided; however, stability of the inverse solution to the presence of the noise
simulated by Gaussian noise and white noise will be examined and discussed
in detail.
11.1 Introduction
Many new delamination detection techniques using elastic waves for com-
posite laminates have been proposed (Karim et al., 1989; Liu and Lam, 1994;
Doebling et al., 1996; Luo and Hanagud, 1997). One of them numerically
infers the location and size of delaminations from the elastic low-frequency
waves scattered by the delaminations. Kundu et al. (1987, 1988) investigated
the dynamic interaction between two interface delaminations and the tran-
sient behavior of an interfacial delamination in composite plates. Karim et al.
(1989, 1992a, b) studied the scattering of elastic waves due to delaminations
and flaws in plates using the combination of finite element method (FEM)
and guided wave expansions. Karunasena et al. (1991) investigated the scat-
tering of plane-strain waves due to delaminations using the combined FEM
and Lamb wave modal expansion method. Liu, S.W. et al. (1991) studied the
transient scattering of Rayleigh Lamb waves of a surface-breaking delamina-
© 2003 by CRC Press LLC

1523_Frame_C11.fm Page 392 Thursday, August 28, 2003 5:43 PM
tion using the FEM and boundary element method (BEM). The location and
size of delaminations have been investigated from elastic low-frequency
waves scattered by these delaminations or flaws (Liu and Lam, 1994; Liu et
al., 1995b, 1996). Their calculated results were also compared with measured
ones. Datta et al. (1992) and Liu and Datta (1993) later applied the method
to investigate the scattering of impact and ultrasonic waves due to delami-
nations in a composite plate. In order to improve computational efficiency,
Liu and his co-workers (Liu and Lam, 1994; Liu et al., 1995b, 1996; Lam et
al., 1997, Wang et al., 1998) used the SEM to investigate horizontal and vertical
cracks in composite laminates subjected to scanning or fixed source loads.
The numerical analyses were carried out in time and frequency domains, and
the calculated results were compared with the ones in nondelamination cases.
These works demonstrated that scattered elastic waves are significantly
related to the location and size of delaminations or flaws. However, they
could not provide a systematical procedure for the detection of delamina-
tions or flaws from the scattered waves, although some polynomial formulae
were proposed for estimating the larger delaminations in laminates approx-
imately (Liu and Lam, 1994; Lam et al., 1997). This is because analysis for
scattered waves with the given delamination configuration is still basically
a forward analysis, while the detection for the delaminations from the mea-
sured scattered waves needs to be formulated as an inverse problem. The
inversion for this kind of problem is mathematically nonlinear and analyti-
cally intractable; thus, computational methods are required.
Theoretical wave analysis studies have found sensitive correlation between
the scattered wave field and the delamination characteristics. This implies
that elastic wave techniques can be a very promising alternative means for
detecting and characterizing delaminations in laminates, if a proper inverse
procedure can be formulated. This fact has also been confirmed by experi-
ments for the case of beams (see Chapter 10).
Thus, considerable interest has grown in developing inverse procedures,
employing optimization methods that include genetic algorithms for delam-
ination detection. Wu et al. (2002) identified horizontal and vertical cracks
in laminates using the µGA. Xu and Liu (2002d) have detected the flaws in
composite laminate from the scattered elastic wave field using the modified
µGA combined with a gradient-based optimizer. In their treatment, the
detection problem is formulated as an optimization problem of minimizing
the difference between measured and calculated surface displacement
response derived from scattered elastic wave fields. Using lamb waves
whose wavelength is of the same order as that of the laminate thickness,
Xu and Liu (2002d) recently employed the IP-GA to detect the damage in
composite laminates.
With the development of artificial intelligent techniques, NNs have pro-
vided an effective tool for solving this kind of inverse problems. Wu et al.
(1992) adopted an NN model to portray the structural behavior before and
after damage in terms of the frequency response function, and then used
this trained model to detect the location and extent of damages by feeding

in measured dynamic response. Klenke and Paez (1994) used two probabi-
listic techniques to detect the damages in aerospace housing components,
one of which involved a probabilistic neural network model. Rhim and Lee
(1995) used the NN model to identify damages in a composite cantilevered
beam; the damage was modeled as delamination in the FEM model of beam.
Using an NN model, Masri et al. (1996) detected changes in the dynamic
characteristics of a structure-unknown system. Luo and Hanagud (1997)
used an NN model with the dynamic learning rate steepest descent method
to carry out the real-time flaw detection of composite materials, while Zhao
et al. (1998) used a counter-propagation NN model to identify the damages
in beams and frames. Liu, N. et al. (1999) used the NN model to detect the
impact damages in carbon fiber-reinforced polymer composite laminates. In
their study, the transient acoustic emission waveforms detected from the
surface of materials were used as the input of the NN model.
More applications of the NN model in the area of damage detection can
be found in Bishop (1994) and Doebling et al. (1996). Recently, an NN tech-
nique has been proposed for the detection of delaminations in anisotropic
laminates (Xu et al., 2001b). Computer-generated displacement responses on
the surface of plate, excited by a time-harmonic line load, are used as the
input of the NN. The delamination parameters that specify the location and
size of the delaminations in the anisotropic laminates are taken as the output
of the NN.
This chapter introduces several computational inverse techniques using
wave responses of the composite laminates to determine the location and
size of the delaminations. The materials presented here are largely from Liu
and his co-workers (Wu et al., 2002; Xu et al., 2001b, 2002; Xu and Liu, 2002d).
11.2 Statement of the Problem

Consider a composite laminate that consists of a number of anisotropic
layers. A horizontal or vertical crack is located inside this laminate. A time-
harmonic line load of excitation q0, which does not vary in the y direction
(see Figure 7.7), is applied on the upper surface of the laminate. This load
can be expressed as
q0 = q0 e − iωt (11.1)
where q0 and ω are the load amplitude and frequency, respectively. Without
further specification, the exciting load defined by Equation 11.1 has a unit
amplitude ( q0 = 1) and frequency ω = 3.14 c 44 / ρ / H (c44 and ρ are one of
the elastic constants and mass density of glass/epoxy, respectively). The
excited displacement response on the surface of this laminate consists of a

number of modes of lamb waves scattered from the delamination. The wave
response is used as the known information for the delamination detection.
Optimization methods including the µ GA, IP-GA, and NN can be
employed to inversely detect the geometry parameters of the delaminations.
In these procedures, the SEM (see Section 10.2.1) has been used as the
forward solver. For the detailed description of SEM implementation for wave
scattering in composite laminates with horizontal delaminations and/or
vertical cracks, readers are referred a monograph by Liu and Xi (2001). In
the following sections, horizontal delaminations and vertical cracks will be
considered.
11.3 Delamination Detection Using Uniform µ GA

In general, the calculated displacement filed from SEM with a set of assumed
delamination parameters for a laminate is different from those measured
from the laminates with the actual delamination. The inverse procedure can
then be formulated by an optimization procedure, which minimizes the sum
of squares of difference between calculated and measured response, defined
with L2 norm as given by Equation 2.123. To carry out the minimization of
the error function, the uniform µGA method is employed in such procedures.
Consider a laminate [C90/G45/G–45]s with horizontal and vertical cracks
that has been investigated using the µGA by Wu et al. (2002). Material
constants of carbon/epoxy and glass/epoxy are assumed to be known and
given in Table 7.2. In the numerical analysis using SEM, every layer in the
laminate is divided into four strip elements in the thickness direction. Total
number of strip elements is thus 24 along the thickness direction.
11.3.1 Horizontal Delamination

Figure 11.1 shows the composite laminate [C90/G45/G–45]s with a horizontal
delamination. The thickness of laminate in the z direction is denoted by H.
The length and the depth of laminate in x and y direction are considered to
be infinite. A horizontal delamination is located inside the laminate; its loca -
tion is defined by the distance ac (from x = 0 to the left tip of delamination),
the depth dc (from the upper surface of laminate to the center of delamination
in z direction) and its length is denoted by lc. The following dimensionless
parameters are used in the numerical analysis (Wu et al., 2002):
x a d l
x= , ac = c , dc = c , lc = c (11.2)
H H H H

q(ω)
ac lc dc C90 1st layer

z G+45
Delamination G-45
H G-45
x G+45
C90 6th layer
FIGURE 11.1
A six-layer composite laminate with a horizontal delamination. The laminate is subjected to
harmonic excitation of a line load on the surface.
FIGURE 11.2
Sudden change of displacement amplitudes above the delamination. A rough indication of the
starting and ending point of the delamination region can be observed by comparison with the
curve of laminate without delamination. (From Wu, Z.P. et al., Eng. Comput., 18, 116–123, 2002.
With permission.)
Consider now a delaminated laminate with a horizontal delamination of

ac = 5.0H, lc = 2.0H, and dc= 0.5H. The wave response on the surface of the
laminate is computed using SEM and plotted in Figure 11.2, which shows
that a noticeable change of the displacement amplitudes takes place over the
delamination range. Although the location and length of the delamination
cannot be exactly obtained by observing the amplitude change, it is sufficient
to determine the range of the response data to be used for constructing the
error function before the searching process started. The µGA uses a popu-
lation size of 5, tournament selection, no mutation, niching, elitism, and
uniform-crossover of pcross= 0.5.
Assume that the depth of the delamination is known, and the delamination
location and length are to be determined. Therefore, two delamination
parameters are to be identified. Two cases of searching range for the delam -
ination parameters are given as

• Case (a) — lc within [0.5H, 3.5H] and ac within [2.0H, 8.0H]

• Case (b) — lc within [1.0H, 3.0H] and ac within [3.0H, 7.0H]
Case (a) is a wider search compared to case (b).

The convergence process of the µGA search is given in Figure 11.3(a) and
Figure 11.3(b) for case (a) and case (b), respectively. The points to be noted are:
• In case (a), the true delamination length was found at the 51st gen-
eration of evolution while the delamination location was found at
the 261st generation, impliying that searching for the delamination
location is more difficult than searching for the delamination length.
fitness error
crack location
crack length
(a) searching reange: crack length: 0.5 to 3.5

and crack location: 2.0 to 8.0
fitness error
crack location
crack length
(b) searching reange: crack length: 1.0 to 3.0

and crack location: 3.0 to 7.0
FIGURE 11.3
Evolution of the searching process for detecting the delamination length and its location for
the laminate [C90/G+45/G–45] s using the genetic algorithm (true delamination length = 2.0
and true location = 5.0). (From Wu, Z.P. et al., Eng. Comput., 18, 116–123, 2002. With permission.)

TABLE 11.1
Identified Results Using µGA for Horizontal Delamination in the
Laminate [C90/G45/G–45]s Excited by a Vertical Harmonic Line
Load on the Surface
True Delamination Converged Delamination
Parameters Parameters Fitness
Length Location Length Location (%)
Case (a) 2.0H 5.0H 2.03H 5.02H 1.5
Case (b) 2.0H 5.0H 2.01H 4.98H 1.8
Note: H = thickness of the laminate.
Source: Wu, Z.P. et al., Eng. Comput., 18, 116–123, 2002. With permission.
TABLE 11.2
Efficiency of µGA Search for Horizontal Delamination in the
Laminate [C90/G45/G–45]s Excited by a Vertical Harmonic Line
Load on the Surface
Number of Generations at
Searching Range Convergence
Length Location Length Location
Case (a) [0.5H, 3.5H] [2.0H, 8.0H] 51 261
Case (b) [1.0H, 3.0H] [3.0H, 7.0H] 35 99
Note: H = thickness of the laminate.
Source: Wu, Z.P. et al., Eng. Comput., 18, 116–123, 2002. With permission.
In other words, the delamination location is less sensitive to the type

of error function used.
• In case (b), similar phenomena were observed. Because the search
spaces are narrowed for delamination location and delamination
length, the search process converged much faster for both parame-
ters as summarized in Table 11.1 and Table 11.2. Case (b) requires
35 and 99 generations for the delamination length and delamination
location, respectively.
• Comparing the results for case (a) and case (b), it can be found that
although the population sizes are the same, finer discretization in
the GA searching space can help to achieve a faster convergence.
In practical applications, it is always possible to fix a range of searching

space. However, the smallest possible search ranges should always be used
in order to reduce the computation cost, achieve faster convergence, and
increase the reliability of the solution.
11.3.2 Vertical Crack

Figure 11.4 illustrates schematically a composite laminate [C90/G45/G–45] s
with a vertical crack located inside the laminate. The location is defined by

q(ω) dc
ac C90 1st layer

z G+45
lc G-45
H Delamination G-45
x G+45
C90 6th layer
FIGURE 11.4
A six-layer composite laminate with a vertical crack. The laminate is subjected to harmonic
excitation of a line load on the surface. (From Xu, Y.G. et al., Appl. Artif. Intelligence, 15, 601–631,
2001. With permission.)
the distance ac (from the plane x = 0 to the left tip of delamination in x

direction) and the depth dc (from the upper surface of laminate to the center
of delamination in z direction). The length of delamination is denoted by lc.
Two cases of different vertical cracks are examined:
• Case a — ac = 4.0H, dc= 0.166H, and lc = 0.667H

• Case b — ac = 5.0H, dc= 0.125H, and lc = 0.75H
The searching ranges from the three delamination parameters ac, dc, and l c
are within [0,10H], [0, H], and [0, H], respectively, for both cases. Figure
11.5(a) and Figure 11.5(b) show the convergence processes of the fitness value
as well as the errors of three delamination parameters detected by the µGA,
respectively, for these two delamination cases. These figures show that, for
both cases, satisfactory results can be obtained at the 40th generation.
This study shows that nearly exact values of the delamination parameters
have been found with a small number of function evaluations. Results show
that the µGA is quite effective for the detection of delaminations in the
composite laminates.
11.4 Delamination Detection Using the IP-GA

Consider again the problem in Section 11.3.1, but here all three parameters
(ac, dc, lc) for the horizontal delamination are to be considered. The delami-
nations are assumed to be located at the junctions of two adjacent strip
elements and within the region from x = 0 to x = 10H to simulate possible
ideal delamination between layers. The measured displacement response is
sampled at 250 points evenly spaced on the surface of the laminate within
the region specified from x = 0 to x = 10H; therefore, this inverse problem is
heavily over-posed.
Two horizontal delamination cases are considered:
• Case I — ac = 4H, dc = 4/24H, lc = H

• Case II — ac = 5.4H, dc = 6/24H, lc = 1.5H

Error function and parameter error (%)

100
ac lc
60 dc Error
20
-20
-60
0 10 20 30 40
Number of generations
case (a)
100
ac lc
Fitness and parameter error (%)
60 dc Error
20
-20
-60
0 10 20 30 40
case (b)
FIGURE 11.5
Evolution of the searching process for detecting the vertical crack of the laminate [C90/G+45/
G–45]s using the µGA. (From Wu, Z.P. et al., Eng. Comput., 18, 116–123, 2002. With permission.)
The displacement responses on the surface of the laminate calculated using

the SEM code with the given delamination parameters are shown in Figure
11.6. They are used as the assumed noise-free measured unms (ns = 1, …, 250)
to inversely determine the delamination parameters by using the IP-GA.
The IP-GA uses a population size of 7, tournament selection, no mutation,
niching, elitism, uniform crossover of pcross = 0.5, one child, and α = 0.382, β
= 0.5. The searching range of three delamination parameters, ac, dc, and lc, is
within [0, 10H], [1H, 12H], and [0.2H, 5H]; their possibilities are set to 32768,
24 and 32768, respectively. This means the total number of possibilities is
about 2.58 × 1010 and the search space for the actual delamination parameters
is very large.

0.5
I
0.4
II
0.3
0.2
0.1
0.0
0 2 4 6 8
Horizontal location X/H
FIGURE 11.6
Displacement responses on the surface of the laminate [C90/G+45/G–45] s with a delamination
used as the input of the IP-GA. The laminate is excited by a vertical line load on the surface.
Case I: ac = 4H, dc = 4/24H, lc = H; Case II: ac = 5 .4H, dc = 6/24H, lc = 1.5H. (From Xu, Y.G. et
al., Appl. Artif. Intelligence, 15, 601–631, 2001. With permission.)
60
ac lc
40
dc Error
20
-20
-40
-60
0 5 10 15 20 25
FIGURE 11.7
Convergence process for the three parameters of the horizontal delamination in laminate [C90/
G45/G–45]s. The actual values of the delamination parameters are ac = 4H, dc = 4/24H, lc = H.
(From Xu, Y.G. et al., Appl. Artif. Intelligence, 15, 601–631, 2001. With permission.)
Figure 11.7 and Figure 11.8 show the convergence processes of error func-
tion value as well as the errors of three detected delamination parameters
for the best individual for these two simulated delamination cases, respec-
tively. From these two figures, it can be observed that:
• Satisfactory results are obtained for both cases at the 30th generation
with 210 times of function evaluations.
• The maximal error of detected delamination parameters is 0.17 and
2.36%, corresponding to the best error function value of 0.23 and
2.31, respectively, for these two delamination cases.

60
ac lc
40
dc Error
20
-20
-40
-60
0 5 10 15 20 25
FIGURE 11.8
Convergence process for the three parameters of the horizontal delamination in laminate [C90/
G45/G–45]s. The actual values of the delamination parameters are ac = 5.4H, dc = 6/24H, lc =
1.5H. (From Xu, Y.G. et al., Appl. Artif. Intelligence, 15, 601–631, 2001. With permission.)
• The same inverse analysis is conducted using the conventional µGA

with the same genetic operators. At the same generation, maximal
errors of detected parameters are found to be –15.75 and 18.34%,
respectively, for these two cases. The corresponding best error func-
tion values are 7.566 and 7.854, respectively. It can be found that
the present IP-GA is much more efficient for these cases of delam-
ination detection in composite laminates. With only 30 generations
of evolution process, the IP-GA has successfully discovered the
delamination parameters with the maximal error of 2.36% in the
simulated cases.
11.5 Delamination Detection Using the Improved IP-GA

The improved IP-GA (see Section 5.5) is also applied for the inverse analysis
of delamination detection. Consider the same laminate [C90/G45/G–45] s
with a horizontal delamination located at the junctions of two adjacent strip
elements, while the vertical cracks are located across several successive
strip elements.
Four cases with true delamination parameters are examined:
• Case I — horizontal delamination: ac = 6.0H, dc = 0.25H, lc = 1.0H;

• Case II — horizontal delamination: ac = 4.0H, dc = 0.333H, lc = 1.2H;
• Case III — vertical crack: ac = 4.0H, dc = 0.166H, lc = 0.667H;
• Case IV — vertical crack: ac = 5.0H, dc = 0.125H, lc = 0.75H.

0.4
Case I
Case II
0.3
Case III
Case IV
0.2
0.1
0.0
0 2 4 6 8
Horizontal location X/H
FIGURE 11.9
Simulated erroneous measurement of displacement responses on the surface of laminate [C90/
G45/G–45]s for four cases. They are generated by adding a white noise with 5% noise level to
the simulated displacement with actual values of the delaminations using SEM. (From Xu,Y.G.
et al., AIAA J., 40(9), 1860–1866, 2002. With permission.)
Surface displacement responses sampled at 250 points on the surface of

these laminates are simulated using the SEM. A white noise with 5% level
is added into the computer-generated displacement to simulate the noise-
contaminated measurement, as shown in Figure 11.9. The improved IP-GA
is used to detect these three delamination parameters using the measured
responses.
The search range of three delamination parameters, ac, dc, and lc, is then
set to be within [0, 10H], [0.042H, 0.5H], and [0.2H, 5H] for the horizontal
delamination case, and [0, 10H], [0, 0.5H], and [0.042H, 0.96H] for the vertical
crack case, respectively. The number of possibilities for three delamination
parameters is 32768, 12, and 32768 for the horizontal delamination case, and
32768, 32768, and 24 for the vertical crack case, respectively. The total pop-
ulation of possible individuals for the inverse searching spaces is approxi-
mately 1.29 × 1010 and 2.58 × 1010 for the horizontal and vertical crack cases,
respectively. As an example, Figure 11.10 presents a two-dimensional sketch
of the error function for the laminate [C90/G45/G–45]s with true delamina-
tion parameters of ac = 4H, dc = 4H, and lc = 2H. It is clearly seen that a huge
number of local optima are in this error function.
The improved IP-GA uses the following operation parameters: popula-
tion size of 5, uniform crossover at pcross = 0.5, mutation at pmutate = 0.02, and
α = 0.2 and β = 0.5. The first generation of five sets of delamination para m -
eters is randomly generated at first. Then the generations are gradually
evolved with the process of convergence of the improved IP-GA, until the

Error function
lc/H
ac/H
FIGURE 11.10
Search space for two delamination parameters for a horizontal delamination in laminate [C90/
G45/G–45]s excited by a line load on the surface. A huge number of local optima are in the
search space. (From Xu, Y.G. et al., AIAA J., 40(9), 1860–1866, 2002. With permission.)
minimal error function is sufficiently small. Figure 11.11 shows the conver -
gence processes of the minimal error function and the corresponding errors
of three delamination parameters for these four delamination cases. It can
be seen that
• The improved IP-GA converges to the satisfactory detection results

very fast.
• The maximal error of the detected delamination parameters with
respect to their true values is –4.1, –4.3, –0.36, and –0.35% at the 60th
generation in the evolution process for the four delamination cases,
respectively.
11.6 Delamination Detection Using the Combined

Optimization Method
The combination of a µ GA and a gradient-based optimization method can
often provide an ideal performance in efficiency and accuracy for the
optimization procedure needed for nonlinear optimization problems, as
shown in Section 5.8. Following a similar technique as that described in
Chapter 5, the modified µ GA (see Section 5.4.1) is employed at the first
step in the inverse procedure to determine the potential candidates, the
BCLSF based on the modified Levenberg–Marquardt method (see Chapter
4) and using the finite-difference method for evaluating the Jacobian, is

20
Error (%)
-20
ac lc
-40
dc Error
-60
-80
15 30 45 60
(a) Case I
20
-20
Error (%)
-40
ac lc
-60 dc Error
-80
15 30 45 60
(b) Case II
FIGURE 11.11
Convergence processes of the improved IP-GA for detection of four cases of delaminations or
cracks in the laminate [C90/G45/G–45]s. (From Xu, Y.G. et al., AIAA J., 40(9), 1860–1866, 2002.
With permission.)
then used in the second stage to find the global minimum of the objective
function of error.
11.6.1 Implementation of the Combined Technique

11.6.1.1 Formulations of Objective Functions
The objective error function for delamination detection problems is defined
by the difference between the measured displacement response on the sur-
face of a laminate and the calculated response from the corresponding com-
putational model with a trial set of delamination parameters, ac, dc, and lc.
The error functions can be defined using three norms as shown in Chapter

40
10
-20
ac lc
-50
dc Error
-80
15 30 45 60
(c) Case III
40
10
-20
ac lc
-50
dc Error
-80
15 30 45 60
(d) Case IV
FIGURE 11.11
Continued.
2, e.g., L1, L2, and L∞ norms. It is well known that L1 norm is the sum of the
absolute values of individual errors and is less sensitive to a few large errors
but more sensitive to the spatial distribution of data. L2 norm is the sum of
the square of individual errors and leads to a least-squares solution widely
applied in engineering. L∞ norm only considers the single worst error and
is most sensitive to the maximal outlier but least sensitive to the spatial
distribution of data.
To examine the effects of the forms of error functions, these three norms
are implemented and examined in this section. Consider the laminate
[C90/G45/G–45]s with a horizontal delamination of ac = 4H, dc = 4H/24,
and lc = 1.8H.
The modified µGA is applied to find the near-optimal solutions for each
of these three types of error functions. In using the µGA, the genetic operators
and parameters are selected as follows: population size of 5, random number
seed of –20,000, tournament selection, uniform crossover of pcross = 0.5, no

60
L1 norm
40
20
0
-20 ac dc
-40 lc fitness
-60
0 5 10 15 20 25 30
60
L2 norm
40
20
0
-20
-40
-60
0 5 10 15 20 25 30
60
∞ L norm
40
20
0
-20
-40
-60
0 5 10 15 20 25 30
Generation
FIGURE 11.12
Convergence processes of the modified µGA for detection of horizontal delamination in the
laminate [C90/G45/G–45] s using different error norms. (From Xu, Y.G. and Liu, G.R., Comput.
Methods Appl. Mech. Eng., 191, 3929–3946, 2002. With permission.)
mutation, elitism, and niching operation. Figure 11.12 shows the searching
processes of modified µGA for delamination parameters with respect to three
types of objective functions. It can be observed from this figure that
• L1 norm demonstrates the fastest convergence among the three

norms. The µGA found a near-optimal solution only at generation
8 where the error of three delamination parameters, ac, dc, and lc, is
0.925, 0, and –6.67%, respectively.
• L2 norm shows similar results with slightly lower convergence. The
µGA found a near-optimal solution at generation 12 where the
error of the three delamination parameters is –11.60, 0, and 6.5%,
respectively.

• L∞ norm demonstrates the worst result and therefore is not recom-

mended to use for this type of delamination detection problem.
11.6.1.2 Switch from µGA to BCLSF

In the combined optimization technique, the µGA provides an initial guess
for the BCLSF. The µGA search stops at the so-called switch point. In general,
the switch point selected at a later generation would increase the possibility
for the µGA to provide a better initial guess. However, this would increase
the computation cost of the searching process. For the present problem, a
single computation of the objective function takes approximately 80 seconds
of CPU time, and a generation computation takes about 7 minutes; thus,
avoiding unnecessary µGA runs is very important. However, if the switch
point is selected too early, the µGA will provide an initial guess with less
quality that may not be close enough to the vicinity of the global optimum,
causing the BCLSF to fail in converging to the global optimum. A proper
selection of the switch point from the µGA to BCLSF is important.
To investigate the effect of the switch point at different generations, the
same case stated earlier is investigated again, with the objective function
formulated using L1 norm. The problem is solved first using the µGA along
with the first 80 generation runs. In the combined algorithm, the switch
points are set at the 8th, 23rd, 29th, and 39th generations, respectively. Figure
11.13 shows the convergence process of the µGA searching during the first
80 generations. Table 11.3 shows the results of optimal computations using
the combined technique with different switch points. Figure 11.13 and Table
11.3 show that
• The µGA converges to the true solution of delamination parameters

more slowly compared to the combined optimization technique with
any switch point, using 582 minutes of computation time and
decreasing errors of the three delamination parameters to 0.902, 0,
and –2.278%, respectively. Even with the worst choice of switch
points, the combined technique takes only about half of this time
and gets a more accurate result.
• Most µGA runs at later generations do not improve the best fitness
value effectively. For example, running from generation 8 to 22,
generation 23 to 28, generation 29 to 38, and generation 39 to 80 does
not result in any improvement on the error function value, but takes
about 110, 40, 70, and 300 minutes, respectively. Moreover, the best
fitness value is only improved by 4.4% from generation 22 to 39 and
no improvement is made from generation 39 to 80. This demon-
strates that it is necessary to replace the later searching in the µGA
with a gradient-based algorithm such as BCLSF.
• A switch from the µGA to the BCLSF at a relatively earlier generation
performs better than that at a later generation in overall perfor-
mance.

60
ac dc
Parameter error (%) and fitness value

40
lc fitness
20
-20
-40
-60
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Generation
FIGURE 11.13
Convergence processes of the modified µGA for detection of horizontal delamination in the
laminate [C90/G45/G–45]s during the first 80 generations. (From Xu, Y.G. and Liu, G.R., Comput.
Methods Appl. Mech. Eng., 191, 3929–3946, 2002. With permission.)
TABLE 11.3
Results of Horizontal Delamination Identification Using
Different Optimization Schemes (µGA and Combined
Optimization Method with µGA and BCLSF) for Laminate
[C90/G45/G–45]s
Parameter Error (%) CPU Time (min)
Switch Point a ac dc lc µGA BCLSF Total
µGA (no switch) 0.91 0 –2.28 582 — 582
Generation 8 0.43 0.07 0.81 52 21 73
Generation 23 0.32 0.06 0.69 164 21 185
Generation 29 0.38 0.06 0.78 206 21 227
Generation 39 0.16 0.05 0.73 279 16 295
a Generation number at which µGA is switched to the gradient-
based optimization method. (The subroutine BCLSF in IMSL is
used in this study.)
Source: Xu, Y.G. and Liu, G.R., Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. Eng., 191,
3929–3946, 2002. With permission.
It is difficult to suggest an explicit criterion for selecting the switch point

suitable for all the cases, for it generally depends on the complexity of the
problem to be investigated. If a GA takes N generations to find the optimum
by itself, switching at about generation N/4 should be a safe and efficient
choice for most of the problems.

0.8
noise-free
0.7
noise (15%)
0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0.0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
X/H
FIGURE 11.14
Noisy displacement response on the surface of the laminate used for inverse detection of a
horizontal delamination in the laminate [C90/G+45/G–45]s. (From Xu, Y.G. and Liu, G.R.,
Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. Eng., 191, 3929–3946, 2002. With permission.)
11.6.1.3 Effect of Noise

Noise is inevitably involved in the measured data in practice. To investi-
gate the effect of noise, white noise is intentionally introduced in the
simulated measurements for the surface displacement responses. The noise
level is set as 5, 10, and 15%, respectively, in this investigation. Figure 11.14
shows the 15% noise-contaminated displacement responses. The L1 norm
and L2 norm are used to formulate the objective function. Figure 11.15
shows the evolution processes of the modified µ GA corresponding to
different noise amplitudes and error norms. Table 11.4 shows the corre-
sponding errors of delamination parameters detected at generation 20. It
can be seen that the modified µGA can bear relatively weak noise conta m -
inations (η = 5%) for cases of using L1 and L2 norms. The L2 norm seems
to show greater stability to tolerate higher-level noisy contamination. With
the increase in noise amplitude, the performance of the µGA becomes
worse. When η = 15%, the improved µGA fails to reach the near-optimum
solution for both cases.
11.6.1.4 Ill-Posedness Analysis

These examples show that GA search solutions are very stable. This is
because this inverse formulation is immune from the ill-posedness of the
problem, due to heavily over-posed formulation and employment of an SEM

100
90
80
70
Best fitness value 60

L1 norm (η = 5%) L2 (10%)
50
L2 (5%) L1 (15%)
40
L1 (10%) L2 (15%)
30
20
10
0
0 5 10 15 20
Generation
FIGURE 11.15
Convergence processes of the µGA with respect to different noise amplitudes and error norms
for inverse detection of a horizontal delamination in the laminate [C90/G+45/G–45] s. (From
Xu, Y.G. and Liu, G.R., Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. Eng., 191, 3929–3946, 2002. With permission.)
TABLE 11.4
Errors (%) of Delamination Parameters Detected Using
Simulated Measurement Data with Different Noise
Levels and Error Norms for Horizontal Delamination
in Laminate [C90/G45/G–45]s
L1 Norm L2 Norm
Noise ac dc lc ac dc lc
pe = 5% 1.72 0 –5.78 1.15 0 –4.37
pe = 10% 7.62 –25 –16.89 2.93 0 –6.71
pe = 15% –36.65 50 9.06 –34.18 –25 –8.78
Note: µGA, at generation 20.
Source: Xu, Y.G. and Liu, G.R., Comput. Methods Appl. Mech.
Eng., 191, 3929–3946, 2002. With permission.
that solves the wave equation analytically in the horizontal direction (see
Section 10.2.2). The projection regularization is also at work because discrete
sampling is used in the error function formulation. Note that at the presence
of noise, forcing the GA to converge to below the error range of the exper-
iments is meaningless. If the solution is not stable because of ill-posedness,
the discrepancy principle should be used to stop the search process once
the error gets close enough to the noise level (see Chapter 3).

0.8
noise-free
0.7
filtered (15%)
0.6
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0.0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
X/H
FIGURE 11.16
Filtered displacement response on the surface of the laminate. The simulated measurement data
are first added with 15% white noise. A filter based on the smoothing with moving average
method is applied to obtain the filtered curve. (From Xu, Y.G. and Liu, G.R., Comput. Methods
Appl. Mech. Eng., 191, 3929–3946, 2002. With permission.)
11.6.1.5 Regularization by Filtering

To suppress the effect of noise effectively, filter out the noise from the mea-
sured displacement responses before they are used in the objective function.
The filter could be selected in a number ways from the filter bank, as pro-
vided by Strang and Nguyen (1996). The smoothing with moving average
method introduced in Section 3.5 is employed here to treat the noise-con-
taminated inputs. Figure 11.16 shows one of the noisy displacement
responses after filtering. The filtered responses are used again for the inverse
analysis using the modified µGA; all demonstrate a satisfactory convergence
towards the global optimum. The maximum error of delamination parame-
ters detected at generation 30 is within ±8% for the cases studied. In addition,
the L1 norm is likely to work better than the L2 norm, as in the noise-free
case discussed previously. Figure 11.17 shows the evolution process of the
µGA for the objective error function formulated using the L1 norm with the
filtered displacement responses in Figure 11.16. The investigations show that
the µGA for the objective function formulated using the L1 norm is still valid
in a noisy environment provided that the noise filter is applied a priori.
11.6.2 Horizontal Delamination in [C90/G45/G–45]sLaminate

The composite laminate [C90/G45/G–45]s with a horizontal delamination is
considered. Three delamination cases are defined:

60
ac dc
40
Parameter error (%) and fitness value

lc error
20
-20
-40
-60
0 5 10 15 20 25 30
Generation
FIGURE 11.17
Convergence process of the modified µGA using the filtered response for the inverse detection
of a horizontal delamination in the laminate [C90/G+45/G–45] s. (From Xu, Y.G. and Liu, G.R.,
Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. Eng., 191, 3929–3946, 2002. With permission.)
• Case I — ac = 4.0H, dc = 4H/24, lc = 1.8H

• Case II — ac = 5.0H, dc = 6H/24, lc = 1.5H
• Case III — ac = 6.0H, dc = 4H/24, lc = 1.0H
These delamination parameters are to be inversely identified. Only the

surface displacement responses resulting from the elastic wave field scat-
tered by these delaminations are measured and used for carrying out the
delamination detection. The measured surface displacement responses are
simulated using the SEM code with the true delamination parameters.
For calculating the surface displacement response corresponding to the
given delamination parameters using SEM, each layer in this laminate is
divided into four strip elements along the thickness direction. The number
of total strip elements in the thickness direction is thus 24. The displacement
response is picked up at 250 sampling points on the surface of the laminate.
11.6.2.1 Noise-Free Cases

Figure 11.18 shows three noise-free responses of surface displacements cor-
responding to the three simulated flaw cases given earlier.
The L1 norm is used to formulate the objective function. The modified
µGA with the same operators and parameters specified in Section 11.6.1 is
used to provide an initial guess for the BCLSF. Search ranges of three
delamination parameters, ac , dc , and lc , are within [0.5, 9.5], [1/24, 12/

0.8
Case 1 (4-4/24-1.8)
0.7
Amplitude of displacement response

Case 2 (5-6/24-1.5)
0.6 Case 3 (6-4/24-1.0)
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0.0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
X/H
FIGURE 11.18
Displacement responses on surface of the laminate [C90/G+45/G–45]s with a horizontal delam-
ination (for three cases) used as the input for the combined optimization method. The laminate
is excited by a vertical line load on the surface. (From Xu, Y.G. and Liu, G.R., Comput. Methods
Appl. Mech. Eng., 191, 3929–3946, 2002. With permission.)
24], and [0.5, 5.0], respectively. The switch point is selected at generation
10, which means that the µGA only runs 10 generations and then the best
individual at that generation is chosen as the initial guess for the BCLSF.
Figure 11.19 shows the evolution processes of the improved µGA for the
first 10 generations for three simulated flaw cases. Table 11.5 shows the
results of optimal computations using the combined technique. Three initial
guesses generated from the µ GA as well as the total computation time of
three optimization processes are also shown in Table 11.5. It can be seen
that the combined optimization technique using the modified µGA and
BCLSF is quite effective for solving delamination detection problems using
noise-free inputs.
11.6.2.2 Noisy Cases

White noise with the level of 5, 10, and 15% is respectively added into the
three simulated surface displacement responses in order to test the stability
and robustness of the detection technique. Figure 11.20 shows the noise-
contaminated responses. A µGA with the same operators and parameters as
given earlier is used to provide the initial guess. The switch point from the
µGA to BCLSF is moved to generation 12 in order to take into account the
effect of noise. Table 11.6 shows the optimization results, which are satisfac-
tory for the 5% noise level case.

16
12
Best fitness value
Case 1 (4-4/24-1.8)
4 Case 2 (5-6/24-1.5)
Case 3 (6-4/24-1.0)
0
0 2 4 6 8 10
Generation
FIGURE 11.19
Convergence process of the modified µGA for three cases of horizontal delaminations in the
laminate [C90/G+45/G–45] s. (From Xu, Y.G. and Liu, G.R., Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. Eng.,
191, 3929–3946, 2002. With permission.)
TABLE 11.5
Identified Results Using Combined Optimization Method for Three Cases
of Horizontal Delaminations in Laminate [C90/G–45/G+45]s Using Noise-
Free Input Data of Displacement Response
Parameter Error (%) Initial Guess by µGA CPU Time (min)
Case ac dc lc ac/H dc/H lc/H µGA BCLSF Total
1 0.34 0.09 0.53 4.037 0.167 1.680 72 28 100
2 0.52 0.06 0.88 4.538 0.250 1.962 72 28 100
3 0.82 0.15 0.93 6.436 0.167 0.836 72 32 104
Source: Xu, Y.G. and Liu, G.R., Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. Eng., 191, 3929–3946,
2002. With permission.
11.6.2.3 Discussion
The preceding examples numerically validate the detection technique using
three idealized cases of horizontal delaminations in laminates. For more
complicated problems where composites are not simple laminates or more
than one flaw simultaneously presents in composites, the detection tech-
nique is still applicable in principle. The only difference is that the surface
displacement response derived from the scattered elastic wave field should
be calculated using the computation model particularly suitable to the
problem.

0.8
Case 1 ( pe = 10%)
0.7
Amplitude of displacement response

Case 2 ( pe = 5%)
0.6
Case 3 ( pe = 15%)
0.5
0.4
0.3
0.2
0.1
0.0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
X/H
FIGURE 11.20
Noise-contaminated displacement responses on the surface of laminate [C90/G+45/G–45]s for
three cases of horizontal delaminations. (From Xu, Y.G. and Liu, G.R., Comput. Methods Appl.
Mech. Eng., 191, 3929–3946, 2002. With permission.)
TABLE 11.6
Identified Results Using Combined Optimization Method for Three Cases
of Horizontal Delaminations in Laminate [C90/G–45/G+45]s Using 5%
Noise-Contaminated Input Data of Displacement Response
Parameter Error (%) Initial Guess by µGA CPU Time (min)
Case ac dc lc ac/H dc/H lc/H µGA BCLSF Total
1 5.92 0.59 3.19 4.037 0.167 1.680 72 32 104
2 4.13 0.79 5.92 4.538 0.250 1.971 72 32 104
3 5.34 1.92 7.73 6.605 0.167 0.754 72 38 110
Source: Xu, Y.G. and Liu, G.R., Comput. Methods Appl. Mech. Eng., 191, 3929–3946,
2002. With permission.
The detection technique assumes that the computational errors for the
surface displacement responses resulting from mode errors, i.e., inaccurate
laws of physics, discretization errors, etc., are negligible in comparison with
the variations of displacement responses due to the presence of delamina-
tions. The assumption is generally acceptable in engineering applications
due to advances in modeling accuracy using computational techniques.
The studies have also shown that delaminations having larger sizes or
closer to the surface of composite laminates are more easily detected. This
is because these flaws provide more significant changes in magnitude and
pattern of surface displacement responses compared with the response of
delamination-free case.

11.7 Delamination Detection Using the Progressive NN

The progressive NN model described in Chapter 6 is adopted for inverse
characterization of delaminations in composite laminates. The outputs of the
NN model are the locations and sizes of the delaminations. The inputs of
the NN model are the displacement responses on the surface of laminates,
which can be easily measured using conventional experimental techniques,
as seen in Chapter 10. The [C90/G45/G–45]s composite laminate with a
horizontal delamination was considered here.
11.7.1 Implementation
Before the NN model is created, an investigation on the effect of the location,
as well as the size of the delamination, on the displacement response is
conducted.
Figure 11.21 through Figure 11.23 give the displacement response ampli-
tudes in the vertical direction on the upper surface of laminate under dif-
ferent delamination situations. By comparing Figure 11.21 and Figure 11.22,
it can be observed that a “special region” exists, which results from waves
scattered by the delamination and reveals significant change in amplitude
and pattern of the response within this region. This special region shifts
horizontally in the same direction as the delamination moves. The effect of
the delamination location ac on the displacement response is thus obviously
exhibited. Comparing Figure 11.21 and Figure 11.23 shows that the maximal
amplitude of the response within the special region decreases with the
increase of the delamination depth dc.
The effect of the delamination size lc on the displacement response can be
observed from each of these three figures. With the decrease of lc, the ampli-
tudes of the oscillated displacement response within the special region obvi-
ously mitigate. When lc = 0, i.e., the nondelamination case, the special region
disappears. These observations demonstrate that the information on delam-
ination is indeed naturally encoded in the surface response of the laminate.
This provides the possibility of using the surface response as the input of
the NN model to detect the delaminations in the laminate.
In order to detect the possible shortest delamination in horizontal direction
and simultaneously avoid the overcomplexity of the NN architecture, the
response amplitudes at 34 selected sampling points on the surface of the
laminate within the region from x = 0 to x = 10 were used as the input of
the NN model. Consequently, the number of neurons in the NN input layer
is 34, and the minimal length, xmin , for the detectable delamination is there-
fore about 10H/(34 – 1) = 0.3H. The delamination parameters ac , dc , and
lc were used as the output of the NN model, so the number of neurons in
the output layer of the NN is three. Two hidden layers were employed. The

FIGURE 11.21
Amplitudes of the displacement responses on the surface of laminate [C90/G+45/G–45]s with
a horizontal delamination (ac = 4H, dc = H/6). (From Xu, Y.G. et al., Int. J. Solids Struct., 38,
5625–5645, 2001. With permission.)
noncrack
1c = 0.4H
1c = 0.8H
1c = 1.0H
FIGURE 11.22
Amplitudes of the displacement responses on the surface of laminate [C90/G+45/G–45] s with

noncrack
1c = 0.4H
1c = 0.8H
1c = 1.0H
FIGURE 11.23
Amplitudes of the displacement responses on the surface of laminate [C90/G+45/G–45] s with
numbers of neurons for the first and second hidden layers are initially
assigned to be 45 and 20, respectively.
To formulate the initial training samples, it was assumed that there were
six levels of discrete values for the three delamination parameters ac , dc ,
and lc (see Table 11.7). A total of 63 = 218 combinations would be needed
to cover all the delamination possibilities by applying the complete combi-
nation method for this case. However, based on the orthogonal array method
and employing the corresponding orthogonal array L16(63), only 3 × (6 – 1)
+ 1 = 16 combinations were required to cover the whole sample space. To
further reinforce the sample set, it was decided to add six samples that result
from varying each delamination parameter to its extreme value in turn while
keeping the other two delamination parameters at their reference values.
The SEM code was used to calculate the displacement response on the
surface of laminate for each of these 22 combinations so as to generate 22
initial samples. These samples were then normalized and used for training
of the initially designed NN model.
According to Section 6.4.1, the numbers 24 and 9 were obtained for first
and second hidden layers, respectively. For this optimized NN architecture,
the given convergence criterion was fulfilled after 7032 training iterations.
The convergence of the error norm of the NN within the first 5000 iterations
is shown in Figure 11.24.

TABLE 11.7
Discrete Values of Delamination Parameters
Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Level 5 Level 6
ac 0 1 3 5 6 8
dc 2/24 4/24 8/24 12/24 16/24 20/24
lc 0.3 0.6 0.9 1.2 1.5 1.8
Source: Xu, Y.G. et al., Int. J. Solids Struct., 38, 5625–5645, 2001. With
permission.
Initial training
2nd retraining
3rd retraining
Error
4th retraining
FIGURE 11.24
Convergence of the NN model in the progressive training process using SEM as the teacher.
(From Xu, Y.G. et al., Int. J. Solids Struct., 38, 5625–5645, 2001. With permission.)
11.7.2 Noise-Free Case

Four cases of horizontal delaminations in the [C90/G45/G–45]s laminate are
examined:
• Case I — ac = 4.5, dc = 4/24, lc = 0.5;

• Case II — ac = 7, dc = 4/24, lc = 1.0;
• Case III — ac = 4.5, dc = 8/24, lc = 0.5;
• Case IV — ac = 7, dc = 8/24, lc = 1.0.

FIGURE 11.25
Displacement response amplitude on the surface of laminate [C90/G+45/G–45] s for four cases
of horizontal delaminations used as the input of the NN model to inversely identify the
delamination parameters. (From Xu, Y.G. et al., Int. J. Solids Struct., 38, 5625–5645, 2001. With
permission.)
These cases have not been used in the training samples; therefore, they
can be used for examining the detecting capability of the trained NN model.
The displacement responses on the surface of laminate calculated using the
SEM code with these delaminations are used as the simulated measurement
responses, as shown in Figure 11.25. These simulated responses were used
as the inputs of the trained NN model to reconstruct the delamination
parameters.
The first reconstructions of delamination parameters were immediately
obtained by feeding the simulated responses into the trained NN model for
these four delamination cases. In order to examine the accuracy of the output
from the NN model, these reconstructed delamination parameters were then
put into the SEM model to calculate the surface displacement responses of
the laminate. Figure 11.26 shows that these computed responses using the
delamination parameters predicted by the initially trained NN are signifi-
cantly different from the simulated ones in terms of the distance norm as
defined by Equation 6.17 for the four cases. In fact, the maximal error at the
initial step for the reconstructed ac , dc , and lc was as high as –23.44, –22.34,
–24.94, and –22.98% for the four cases, respectively. Obviously, the recon-
structions were not acceptable, so the retraining procedure for the NN model
was required.

3.0
H case 1 E case 3
C
Difference of the displacement amplitude

2.5 C
C case 2 F case 4
H
E
2.0 H
E H
C
H
1.5 C
E
E
F
1.0 F
F
F
0.5
0.0
1 2 3 4
Number of iterations of training for the NN
FIGURE 11.26
Changes of the difference displacement amplitude between the actual displacement and the
computed displacement using delamination parameters predicted by the NN at different iter-
ations. (From Xu, Y.G. et al., Int. J. Solids Struct., 38, 5625–5645, 2001. With permission.)
Four new samples were consequently generated using these reconstructed

delamination parameters and the resulting displacement responses calcu-
lated using the SEM code. These new samples were then put into the original
sample set to replace four selected samples with largest distance norms. The
NN model was retrained with the adjusted sample set, and then used to
reconstruct the delamination parameters again. With the progress of this
retraining process, the displacement responses calculated using the SEM
code with the reconstructed delamination parameters became closer to the
true ones. As an example, Figure 11.27 shows the evolution process of cal-
culated displacement response amplitudes for case (2) using the delamina-
tion parameters predicted by the NN at different iterations. After three
episodes of retraining, the displacement responses calculated from the recon-
structed delamination parameters were very close to the actual ones for all
four cases. The maximum error of the reconstructed delamination parame-
ters with respect to their assumed values decreases to –5.03, –4.92, –6.84, and
–5.43%, respectively.
Figure 11.28 shows the convergence of these delamination parameters
during the progressive reconstruction process. The convergence of the error
norm for the NN model during these three retrainings is also shown in Figure
11.24. The numerically simulated results demonstrate that the progressively
trained NN model can correctly detect the locations ( ac and dc ) and the

1st reconstruction
2nd
3rd
4th
target
FIGURE 11.27
Progressive process of the calculated displacement response amplitudes. (From Xu, Y.G. et al.,
Int. J. Solids Struct., 38, 5625–5645, 2001. With permission.)
length ( lc ) of delamination hidden in the anisotropic laminate using noise-

free response data.
11.7.3 Noise-Contaminated Case

To further examine the applicability of the technique for the practical prob-
lems where the noise is inevitable in the measured data, the displacement
response data acquired from the SEM code were contaminated with exces-
sive Gaussian noise.
To compare the output from the NN model using these noisy data as input
with that of the noise-free cases, the location and length of delaminations
assumed in case (1) and case (4) examined previously were reconstructed
again. The Gaussian noises (see Equation 2.130) with levels of 5% (pe = 0.05)
and 10% (pe = 0.1) are used for these two cases, respectively. They were then
added into the simulated response data using SEM code with the actual
parameters. These simulated measurement data with noise are then put into
the trained NN model for reconstructing the delamination parameters.
Similar to the analysis process outlined in Section 11.7.2, the first iteration
of reconstructions from the NN model for case (1) and case (4) were not
satisfactory, so retraining of the NN model was then conducted. After four
episodes of successive retraining, the maximal error of delamination param-
eters reconstructed from the NN model for case (1) converged to –5.03 and

5 H
Å location H depth
H
P Å Å
-5 length P
P
H
Å
P
-15 H
Å
(1) ac = 4.5, dc = 4/24, lc = 0.5
P
-25
5 Å
Errors of crack parameters detected by NN (%)
Å H
-5 H P
H H P
Å
P
-15
(2) ac = 7.0, dc = 4/24, lc = 1.0
P
-25
5
-5 H
Å
H
Å P
H P
H Å
-15 P
Å (3) ac = 4.5, dc = 8/24, lc = 0.5
-25 P
5 Å
Å
H
-5 H P
Å P
H
H
-15 Å P
(4) ac = 7.0, dc = 8/24, lc = 1.0

P
-25
1 2 3 4
Number of iterations of training for the NN model
FIGURE 11.28
Errors of delamination parameters detected by the trained NN model at different iterations
using the noise-free input data of displacement response. (From Xu, Y.G. et al., Int. J. Solids
Struct., 38, 5625–5645, 2001. With permission.)
–6.14% from –27.61 and –28.42% for the response data with 5 and 10%
involved noise, respectively. For case (4), it converged to –6.36 and –6.81%
from –27.89 and –29.83% for the same two noise levels, respectively. The
training is therefore stopped because the errors have fallen into the range of
the measurement errors; any further improvement is practically meaningless.
These reconstructed results are shown in Figure 11.29. Based on the results,
it is found that the satisfactory reconstruction of the delamination parameters
is possible from the trained NN model even if the input contains certain
levels of noise. This example shows that the NN model is immune from the
ill-posedness of the problem because of use of SEM code (see Section 10.2.2)
and the discrete samplings providing the projection regularization. Because

10
(1) ac = 4.5, dc = 4/24, lc = 0.5 H
H
0 pe = 5% H Å
P
Å
P
-10 Å
H P
Å Å location H depth
-20 P
H
Å P length
P
-30
10
(2) ac = 4.5, dc = 4/24, lc = 0.5
Errors of crack parameters detected by NN (%)
0 pe = 10%
Å
H
P
H H
Å
P
Å
-10 H P
Å
P
-20
P
Å
H
-30
10
(3) ac = 7.0, dc = 8/24, lc = 1.0 H H
0 pe = 5%
H Å Å
P P
-10 P
Å
H
P
-20 Å
P
H
Å
-30
10
(4) ac = 7.0, dc = 8/24, lc = 1.0
0 pe = 10%
Å
H
P
Å
P
-10 Å H
P
H
P
Å
-20 H
P
Å
-30 H
1 2 3 4 5
Number of training the NN model
FIGURE 11.29
Errors of delamination parameters detected by the progressively trained NN model at different
iterations using the noise-contaminated input data of the displacement response. (From Xu,
Y.G. et al., Int. J. Solids Struct., 38, 5625–5645, 2001. With permission.)
34 sampling points are used in this study, the NN built can accommodate
higher levels of noise compared with the case discussed in Section 9.7.2.
11.7.4 Discussion
The accuracy of reconstructions from the trained NN model depends signif -
icantly on the sensitivity of the displacement response sampled on the lam-
inate surface to the variation of the location and length of delaminations.
The longer and shallower the delamination is, the more significant the dis-
tortion shown in the curve of the surface displacement response. Conse-

quently, better accuracy could be obtained in reconstructing the delamination

parameters. This is seen in case (2) and case (3); case (2) has the highest
accuracy and case (3) is the lowest among the four delamination cases.
From the numerical examinations, it is seen that the accuracy of output
from the NN model improves with increase of the retraining process. The
required accuracy can be reached by increasing the times of retraining if the
noise-free training and input data are used, although this requires more
computational effort. Judgment should be exercised for a particular delam-
ination detection in the practical applications. When noisy input data are
used, however, too extensive iterations of retraining are meaningless (see
Section 9.7.2.3).
11.8 Remarks
• Remark 11.1 — the delamination in laminates can be characterized

based on measured displacement on the surface of the laminate. The
advantage of this technique is the feasibility for the application in
real engineering applications. All that is necessary is to apply a time-
harmonic load on the surface of laminate and simultaneously mea-
sure the surface displacement response. The delaminations hidden
in the laminate can be successfully detected using inverse techniques
presented in this chapter.
• Remark 11.2 — the delamination detection problem in laminate is
formulated as an optimization problem minimizing the difference
between the measured and calculated surface displacement
response. The scattered wave fields in the frequency domain for the
laminates with horizontal or vertical cracks can be effectively com-
puted using the SEM code. Characteristic parameters of delamina-
tions can be inversely detected by incorporating genetic algorithms
with the forward solver of the SEM code. Uniform µGAs and IP-
GAs, as well as the combination of the modified µGA and gradient-
based optimization method, can be used.
• Remark 11.3 — the delamination detection problem in laminate is
also solved as an identification problem using the progressive NN.
The excited displacement response on the surface of laminate is used
as the input of the NN model. The delamination parameters are used
as the output of the NN model. The results indicate that the pro-
gressive NN is effective for inversely identifying the delamination
parameters in laminated laminates.
• Remark 11.4 — apart from the SEM code, some powerful software
packages such as LS_DYNA, NASTRAN, and ANSYS, etc. have been
developed. They are commercially available and can be used to

calculate elastic wave fields for complex composite structures. These

advanced computer software packages provide forward solvers for
the detection technique to be applied to complex structures.

Inverse Detection of Delaminations in Composite Laminates

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1523_Frame_C11.

fm Page 391 Thursday, August 28, 2003 5:43 PM

In this chapter, computational inverse techniques using elastic wave

© 2003 by CRC Press LLC

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11.2 Statement of the Problem

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11.3 Delamination Detection Using Uniform µ GA

11.3.1 Horizontal Delamination

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ac lc dc C90 1st layer

Consider now a delaminated laminate with a horizontal delamination of

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• Case (a) — lc within [0.5H, 3.5H] and ac within [2.0H, 8.0H]

Case (a) is a wider search compared to case (b).

(a) searching reange: crack length: 0.5 to 3.5

(b) searching reange: crack length: 1.0 to 3.0

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In other words, the delamination location is less sensitive to the type

In practical applications, it is always possible to fix a range of searching

11.3.2 Vertical Crack

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ac C90 1st layer

the distance ac (from the plane x = 0 to the left tip of delamination in x

• Case a — ac = 4.0H, dc= 0.166H, and lc = 0.667H

11.4 Delamination Detection Using the IP-GA

• Case I — ac = 4H, dc = 4/24H, lc = H

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Error function and parameter error (%)

The displacement responses on the surface of the laminate calculated using

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• The same inverse analysis is conducted using the conventional µGA

11.5 Delamination Detection Using the Improved IP-GA

• Case I — horizontal delamination: ac = 6.0H, dc = 0.25H, lc = 1.0H;

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Surface displacement responses sampled at 250 points on the surface of

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• The improved IP-GA converges to the satisfactory detection results

11.6 Delamination Detection Using the Combined

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11.6.1 Implementation of the Combined Technique

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(c) Case III

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• L1 norm demonstrates the fastest convergence among the three

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• L∞ norm demonstrates the worst result and therefore is not recom-

11.6.1.2 Switch from µGA to BCLSF

• The µGA converges to the true solution of delamination parameters

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Parameter error (%) and fitness value

It is difficult to suggest an explicit criterion for selecting the switch point

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11.6.1.3 Effect of Noise

11.6.1.4 Ill-Posedness Analysis

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Best fitness value 60

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11.6.1.5 Regularization by Filtering

11.6.2 Horizontal Delamination in [C90/G45/G–45]sLaminate

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Parameter error (%) and fitness value