Journal of Civil Structural Health Monitoring (2018) 8:809–822

https://doi.org/10.1007/s13349-018-0307-2 (0123456789().,-volV)(0123456789().,-volV)

ORIGINAL PAPER

An impedance-based structural health monitoring approach

for looseness identification in bolted joint structure
S. K. Samantaray1,2 • S. K. Mittal2 • P. Mahapatra2 • S. Kumar2

Received: 26 August 2017 / Accepted: 19 September 2018 / Published online: 26 September 2018
Ó Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2018

Abstract
The task of structural safety has been always vital throughout the life span of a structure. The situation deteriorates, when it
is subject to repeated loading as seen in cases of railway joints. Generally, the bolted joints are frequently used connections
for mainteinance of structural integrity. The most common type of fault observed in bolted joints is looseness of the nuts
and bolts which leads to a damaging change by contact pressure that may cause an untoward incident. To avoid such
incidents, it is required to monitor the bolted joints very meticulously and regularly. This study presents an investigational
work for the looseness assessment of bolted butt joint structure using glued piezoelectric transducer and the implemen-
tation of an analytical approach based on the electro-mechanical impedance (EMI) method. For the purpose of investi-
gation, the experiments are being conducted in pristine condition of the structure, wherein the plate bars and girder beam
are bolted with four similar bolts without being pressed adequately and no part of the joint is glued. The test measurement
of undamaged state and loosed state has been conducted using impedance-based monitoring approach. To study the
effectiveness of the proposed method, an experimental investigation is conducted using the impedance chip AD5933 on a
bolted joint structure. The results provide cogent indication about the use of piezoelectric lead zirconate titanate sensor
based on EMI method for monitoring the status of the bolted joint structures.

Keywords Electro-mechanical impedance (EMI) technique  Piezoelectric–ceramic patch  Structural health monitoring
(SHM)  Prototype structure  Impedance chip  Experimental testing

1 Introduction unique characteristic for using it as a sensor or actuator, the

importance of SHM has increased many folds. SHM sys-
Structural health monitoring (SHM) is a method which is tem offers precise information about the structures to help
used by various researchers for inspection of structural engineers and managers to assess the state-of-condition of
health as well as monitoring of various engineering struc- their structures and if required, target-specific regions to
tures. Due to the advancement of smart materials having inspect.
The use of SHM for detecting damages in concrete and
some mechanical structures is recent and promising. There
& S. Kumar
virdi205@csio.res.in are various techniques adopted to create an efficient SHM
system but the most favourable one with special attention
S. K. Samantaray
swagat.samantaray@gmail.com given is the technique of electro-mechanical impedance
(EMI). In this technique, the piezoelectric transducers such
S. K. Mittal
skmskm1@rediffmail.com as lead zirconate titanate (PZT) ceramic are surface bonded
or embedded into the structure to be monitored. It is used
P. Mahapatra
prasant22@gmail.com as sensor–actuator device which can sense the physical
condition of the structure. The salient features such as light
1
Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research, New Delhi, weight, small size, low cost, active sensing capability,
India long-term stability and easy to apply make PZT the most
2
CSIR-Central Scientific Instruments Organisation, favourable sensing as well as actuating device for SHM
Chandigarh 160030, India

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application. The electric impedance of the PZT is directly
related to the mechanical impedance of the monitored
structure. The admittance which is the inverse of the
electrical impedance is a function of the stiffness, mass and
damping of the monitoring structure and it is also the
function of structural geometry, transducer bonding and the
ambient temperature.
In the EMI method, any occurrence of damage in the
structure affects the mechanical impedance and thus the
signatures (impedance or admittance) obtained by the PZT
patch can be directly measured using an electrical impe-
dance analyser or LCR meter. The analyser imposes an
alternate excited voltage signal to the bonded PZT patches
over the selected frequency range. The SHM application is
either global or local. In global SHM applications, the
damage detection is carried out along with the assessment
of characteristics measured for the entire structure. In local
SHM applications, the high-frequency excitations of the
bonded PZT are utilized for the measurement of property
and sensitivity of certain selected regions of the structure
intended for inspection.
The essentiality of impedance-based SHM technology is
the development of a suitable system for continuous
monitoring, inspection, and damage detection of structure
with minimum labour involvement. Liang et al. [1] was the
first to introduce the basic concept of the EMI and pro-
posed the piezoelectric impedance technology for SHM.
After that, the application of EMI technique was employed
in SHM system of truss structure, RC beam, steel bridge
joints, pipe joints, concrete structure, bolted joint structure
in aerospace and wind turbine. Bolt-loosening is one of the
common structural failures that occurs in aerospace, wind
turbine, civil structures, and railway joints [2–5]. The root
cause of looseness in such structure is the presence of
irregular stress on different directions, dynamic loading
condition; so it is important to carry out the research work
to detect the bolt-loosening to avoid any catastrophic
failure.
The EMI-based monitoring system is very simple and
popular because in this technique a piezoelectric transducer
is attached with the structure to be monitored. As a result, it
creates an interaction between electrical impedance of
transducer and the mechanical impedance of host structure.
The damage in terms of cracks and looseness can be
evaluated by measuring the impedance signature in
appropriate frequency range [6]. To detect bolt looseness, a
pragmatic approach of EMI technique was used by
Rutherford et al. [7], Ritdumrongkul and Fujino [8], and
Gyuhae and co-workers [9, 10]. Later, Park et al. [11]
applied impedance-based statistical pattern and Lim et al.
[12] used an impedance-based data normalization tech-
nique for the detection of bolt-loosening in a lab-scale
frame structure and a composite aircraft wing structure,
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Journal of Civil Structural Health Monitoring (2018) 8:809–822
respectively. However, the electrical impedance measure-
ment is usually made up with expensive, bulky, heavy and
high-power instruments such as impedance analysers (e.g.,
HP4194A and HP4192A). These factors would certainly
limit the use of large-scale EMI techniques such as in
industrial and field applications. To overcome the afore-
mentioned problems, several researchers have concentrated
on lowering the required cost for conducting the EMI
technique by a simple and low-cost circuit based on
operational amplifier and spectrum analyser [13, 14]. Xu
and Giurgiutiu [15] proposed a technique by an impedance
analyzer that uses only one simple resistor to connect the
transducer. The excitation signal is provided by a function
generator which is controlled via a general-purpose inter-
face bus (GPIB). The excitation and response signals are
both sampled synchronously using a DAQ device con-
trolled by LabVIEW software. Therefore, these systems
still require commercial instruments [16]. Kim et al. [17]
proposed an SHM system based on DSP in which a digital
rectangular pulse train of various frequencies generated by
pulse width modulation (PWM) was used to excite the
structure. A low-cost crack detection system based on
energy diffusion method using piezo electric sensor has
been reported for highway and airport pavement slabs and
its monitoring [18].
The torque levels’ prediction to identify the location of
loosened bolts in composite thermal protection panel was
developed by Yang et al. [19]. The ultrasonic energy
received through the interface of a bolted joint, and the
status of bolt connection and bolt-loosening are monitored
using the response signal energy method and the time
reversal method as proposed by Wang et al. [20, 21]. Some
review article mentions monitoring technology for bolted
structure using piezoelectric impedance method and give a
comparison among other techniques. It was found that the
piezoelectric impedance method is suitable for real-time
monitoring with high sensitivity to local structural damage
[22]. PZT-induced Lamb wave-based methods are often
used for bolt-loosening detection from jointed structure
[23, 24].
Nguyen et al. [25] proposed an SHM method for bolt
connections using multi-channel wireless impedance sen-
sor nodes based on Imote-2 platform. For the measurement
of impedance, the sensor node was integrated with an
AD5933 impedance chip. Another experiment has been
reported to detect loosening of bolts in bolt-jointed alu-
minium structure using AD5933 and microfiber composite
(MFC) patch [26]. An energy-based wave method, using
time reversal technique, was proposed to monitor the axial
load of bolted joint connections between two steel plates
[27]. Na and Lee [28] proposed EMI technique to improve
the damage detection performance on composite plates at
lower frequency with large surface area. The variations in
Journal of Civil Structural Health Monitoring (2018) 8:809–822
the impedance signatures were measured using the
AD5933 evaluation board. Taylor et al. [29] presented a
development associated to AD5933 and wireless impe-
dance sensor node for use in high-frequency EMI-based
SHM for real-life bridge monitoring. Recently, Zhang et al.
[30] used EMI method to identify the loose position of
different bolts in structure. Some of the researchers have
studied the looseness in steel grid structure using piezo-
electric transducer [31].
A comparative study of steady-state and transient-state
techniques in impedance-based SHM applications has been
conducted and found that steady-state technique is more
precise and sensitive [32]. Also, another comparative study
was done among the different vibration-based damage
detection methods and found that time series analysis
proves to be more successful in damage identification than
the rest of the methods [33]. Gulizz et al. [34, 35] proposed
a SHM paradigm based on the simultaneous use of ultra-
sounds and EMI to monitor waveguides and later they
extend the work to monitor the curing process of an
adhesive-bonded joint with the aim to provide the electro-
mechanical response of PZT. Some investigators utilize the
EMI techniques to monitor the changes in stiffness,
damping, and mass of the structure by monitoring bolt
preload using a smart washer; however, they used bulky
impedance analyzer and a personal computer for the data
acquisition which may be difficult to install at a site other
than laboratory and to conduct real-time monitoring
[36, 37].
Neves et al. [38] present a model-free damage detection
approach based on machine learning techniques. The
method was applied to data on structural condition of fic-
titious railway bridge gathered in a numerical approach
using a three-dimensional FEA.
Mostly, the structures are assembled with bolt joints in
civil, mechanical, and railway systems due to its easy
installation [39–41]. However, problems such as fatigue
and self-loosening are encountered when this system is
applied with external forces and loading conditions. The
connecting bolt is usually made with irreversible threads
and the risk of self-loosening can occur only under the
influence of an external load (torque or force) that can
overcome the friction load or when there is a significant
reduction of the friction due to relative sliding of the
contacting surfaces.
The main objective of the present study was to develop a
bolt looseness-monitoring system based on the EMI tech-
nique that can be applied under controlled environment
conditions. To achieve this, two pieces of girder beams
(620 mm each) and two pieces of splice plates (610 mm)
are fabricated and fastened by four similar M12 bolts. Then
a PZT is bonded to the structure and connected to the
impedance measurement system to induce the change of
811
structural condition. It was assumed that the loosening of a
bolt-joint changes the intensity and distribution of contact
pressure, stiffness, and structural damping. The impedance
signatures during tight and loose conditions of bolts are
measured by AD5933 evaluation board and then the large
amount of data are transferred to a computer for further
analysis.
2 Theoretical background and methodology
2.1 Electro-mechanical impedance-based SHM
techniques
The electro-mechanical impedance-based SHM techniques
use PZT patches which acts as an actuator–sensor. It uti-
lizes the electro-mechanical coupling property of PZT with
direct and converse effect. In this, an electric charge will be
generated when they are subjected to a stress or strain (the
direct PZT effect); and produce a stress or strain when an
electric field is applied to them in their direction of
polarization (the converse PZT effect). Due to this special
property, PZT materials can be utilized both as sensors and
actuators. The relation between the electrical and
mechanical behaviour of PZT can be described mathe-
matically by the liner Eqs. (1, 2):
Di ¼ eTij Ej þ dim Tm ð1Þ
Sk ¼ djk Ej þ sEkm Tm ð2Þ
where, Di is the electrical displacement, Sk is the strain
vector, Ej is the applied electric field, Tm the stress, eTij the
complex electric permittivity constant, dim the electrical
displacement per unit stress at constant electric field, djk the
strain per unit field at constant stress, and sEkm the elastic
compliance at constant electric field. The superscripts ‘T’
and ‘E’ indicate that the quantity has been measured at
constant stress and constant electric field, respectively. In
dim and djk , the first subscript denotes the direction of the
electric field and second, the direction of the associated
mechanical strain. The one-dimensional analytical model
proposed by Liang et al. [1] is presented in Fig. 1. It has
been shown that the electrical admittance (inverse of the
electrical impedance), Y(x), of the PZT patch is directly
correlated with the mechanical impedance of the host
structures Zs(x), and that of a PZT patch, Za(x), for the
frequency range of interest in most applications. Where, x
is the selected excited frequency of PZT
I0
Y ðxÞ ¼ ¼ GðxÞ þ jBðxÞ
Vi  
T Zs ðxÞ 2 ^E
¼ jxa e33  d Y ð3Þ
Zs ðxÞ þ Za ðxÞ 3x xx
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Fig. 1 1D model used to derive
the electro-mechanical
admittance of a PZT bonded to
a structure
As, the mechanical impedance of the host structure is
directly related to the electrical impedance of the bonded
PZT patch, any changes occuring in the structure can be
detected by measuring the electrical impedance of the PZT
patch. As per the Eq. (3), there is a relation between the
electrical impedance of PZT patch Za(x) and mechanical
impedance of the monitored structure Zs(x). Where, Vi is
the input voltage to the PZT patch and I0 is the output
current from the PZT. The parameter ‘a’ is the geometry
constant of the PZT, eT33 is the complex dielectric constant
at zero stress, d3x is the piezoelectric coupling constant in
E presents a SHM method for bolted connections using multi-
the arbitrary x-direction at zero stress and Yxx is the com-
plex Young’s modulus of the PZT with zero electric field.
2.2 Selection of frequency range
Mostly, the EMI technique uses frequencies between 30
and 400 kHz for excitation because in this range, there is
enough sensitivity for detection of minor changes in
structural property [10]. In the present study, the frequency
range was selected on the basis of hit and trial at different
frequency sweep to get the desired frequency range. A
frequency range higher than 200 kHz is found to be
favourable in localizing the sensing and the frequencies
lower than 80 kHz and covers a larger sensing area. So, the
frequency selection is crucial for local-looseness damage
detection and it should cover a large sensing area. So, the
frequency range of 50–80 kHz has been selected.
3 Experimental setup and data processing
A miniature AD5933 impedance measurement system was
used to conduct the experiments, where the AD5933
evaluation board is connected to PC/laptop through the
USB connector and the PZT material via two wires to
VOUT and VIN pins of evaluation board (Fig. 2). As
compared to the bulky impedance analyser, it is very
compact and small with frequency range of 100 kHz at a
single sweep.
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Journal of Civil Structural Health Monitoring (2018) 8:809–822
Coupled Electrometrical Admiance
K
PZT M
C
The PZT excites the object at a selected frequency range
and any change in the structural property is identified by
observing the variations in the impedance signature. The
AD5933 is a high-precision impedance converter system
which has on-board frequency generator with a 12-bit, 1
MSPS ADC [42]. Damage-monitoring of different struc-
tures along with its proof of concept has been demonstrated
by several researchers [43, 44].
The frequency generator allows an external complex
impedance to be excited with a known frequency. A mul-
tiple PZT interfaces with bolted connection. This study also
channel wireless impedance sensor nodes and multiple
PZT interfaces [45]. The PZT patches used for the study
was SP-5H plate (Sparkler Ceramics Pvt. Ltd). It is a
modified lead zirconate titanate ceramic with high per-
mittivity, high coupling factor and high charge constant
having dimension of 15 mm 9 15 mm 9 0.4 mm with
lead wire soldered. A laboratory scale experiment is per-
formed to demonstrate and validate the EMI technique for
looseness monitoring in a host structure. The test specimen
structure is fabricated using two girder beams, I-sections (I-
Section-1 and I-Section-2) and two splice plates (Plate-1
and Plate-2) which is attached to the beams with four
similar nuts and bolts. One PZT patch is used for moni-
toring of the structure which is bonded at a distance of
35 mm from the first nut and bolt on Plate-I using epoxy
resin (Finehard 998 and Epofine 138) as shown in Fig. 3a–
d. The chosen sensor location is random because only one
sensor is used to monitor the structure. If there are more
than one sensors, then the position of sensor needs to be
found out by the maximum stressed location. The martial
property of used PZT is listed in Table 1. All the tests were
carried out with a fixed temperature of 25 °C as the PZT
material is known to be sensitive to temperature changes
which can affect the signature of the structure.
A schematic representation of the test setup is given in
Fig. 4. The I-Section-1 (620 mm) and I-Section-2
(620 mm) was separated by a gap of 10 mm and both were
assembled using two plates (610 mm) each, plate 1 at front
side and the other plate was in reverse side as used in
Journal of Civil Structural Health Monitoring (2018) 8:809–822
Fig. 2 Impedance measurement system with AD5933 evaluation board and software user interface
railway fishplate joint. Both plates were completely
attached by four similar nut and bolts which were kept at
distance of 35, 200, 370, and 540 mm from the attached
PZT. The first nut and bolt was nearer to PZT and fourth
one was far from the PZT.
3.1 AD5933 impedance analysis
To properly measure the electrical impedance, the AD5933
must be calibrated using calibration resistor. The ability of
the AD5933 to be incorporated into a damage-sensing
platform developed previously by the authors was also
investigated [46]. The calibration was done by different
highly stable resistors such as 200 KX, 220 KX, 220 X,
and 665 X and impedance signature was obtained at dif-
ferent frequency ranges. The choice of the correct cali-
bration resistor determines the overall accuracy of the
system. In this case, AD5933 was calibrated using a 665 X
resistor after a conduction of number of preliminary tests.
To get repeatability in the signature and quick response
from impedance evolution software, the calibration was
done using a known resistance of 665 X and by running
‘‘AD5933 Evolution Software’’ for unknown impedance
measurement. Once the calibration is done, it can be used
for the calculation of any unknown impedance between the
VOUT and VIN pins. The response signal from the
impedance was sampled by the on-board ADC and Discrete
Fourier Transform (DFT) processed with an on-board DSP
engine. The DFT algorithm returns both, a real (R) and
imaginary (I) data-word at each frequency point along the
sweep.
813
3.2 Repeatability test using AD5933
Firstly, the repeatability test for undamaged state has been
checked. For each sensor, the real and impedance signa-
tures have been extracted in the frequency range of 50–
80 kHz in 40 Hz step which is calculated by Eq. (4)
Stop frequency ¼ Start frequency
þ ðstep  no of inceremetÞ ð4Þ
Three signatures have been taken at an interval of 12 h
to verify the repeatability of the signature from both the
PZT sensors (Fig. 5). As the real part is more sensitive to
damage/looseness, only real part of impedance signature is
extracted and plotted for selected frequency range.
Further to this, for the repeatability, the signatures
obtained in a selected frequency range of (1) 60–62 kHz
and (2) 68–70 kHz in undamaged and damaged condition
is shown in Fig. 6a–d, which shows good agreements
between the data sets. Overall, it can be observed that the
signatures have similar trend in both the conditions.
To confirm the repeatability of data obtained from the
evaluation board AD5933, ANOVA test and Pearson’s
correlation coefficient was calculated over the datasets for
both conditions of undamaged and damaged as listed in
Table 2. The p value was found at 0.945, 0.988 for dam-
aged condition and 0.972, 0.953 for undamaged condition.
The p value greater than 0.05, shows insignificant differ-
ence between data sets, so there is a high reliability among
the data obtained from the evaluation board AD5933.
Along with the ANOVA test, Pearson’s correlation coef-
ficient was also calculated between these three data sets
and found nearly equal to 0.99, which shows high corre-
lation between data sets. Insignificant difference from
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Fig. 3 Experimental setup with a a fabricated jointed structure, b User interface Software c AD5933 Impedance measurement system, d PZT
patches attached to host structure

Table 1 Material properties of

Properties Value
Piezoelectric (actuator/sensor)
Piezoelectric coupling coefficient kp 0.63
k33 0.73
Piezoelectric charge constants d33 (910-12 C/N) 550
d31 (910-12 C/N) –265
Piezoelectric voltage constants g33 (910-3 Vm/N) 19
g31 (910-3 Vm/N) –9
Relative dielectric constant, KT3 (low signal) 3100
Density, (kg/m3) 7500
Elastic constants, short circuit sE11 (910-12 m2/N) 21
sE33 (910-12 m2/N) 15

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Journal of Civil Structural Health Monitoring (2018) 8:809–822 815

Fig. 4 Schematic representation Section-2

PZT sensor Section-1 Plate-1
of PZT transducer surface
bonded on the specimens

1st 2nd 3rd 4th

610m
620mm 620mm

Fig. 5 Impedance (real part) signatures of structures for repeatability test in undamaged condition

ANOVA test and high correlation factor from Pearson’s
correlation indicates high repeatability between three
datasets.
The impedance signatures were acquired for different
looseness condition for selected frequency range. Apart
from acquiring a signature from a frequency sweep, the
next step was to extract the impedance signature and
quantify the level of damage using statistical techniques.
The most widely used indices are the root mean square
deviation (RMSD) and the correlation coefficient deviation

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Fig. 6 Repeatability of signatures of structure in a undamaged condition a 60–62 kHz b 68–70 kHz, damaged condition c 60–62 kHz
b 68–70 kHz

Table 2 ANOVA and

(Sample size = 51)
correlation coefficient of
undamaged and damaged Undamaged condition Damaged condition
conditions
Frequency range 60–62 kHz 68–70 kHz 60–62 kHz 68–70 kHz
ANOVA test P value P value P value P value
0.972 0.953 0.945 0.988
Pearson’s correlation coefficient 0.998 0.996 0.997 0.995

metric (CCDM). These indices compare two electrical the clear presence of structural damage. Since the real part
impedance signatures, where one is acquired when the of the impedance signature is more reactive to damage or
structure is considered healthy and is used as a reference, changes in the structure’s integrity than the imaginary part,
commonly called the baseline therefore only the real part of the signature was used in this
sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
Pi¼N ffi study. The RMSD index can be calculated from Eq. (5).
2
i¼1 f Re ð Z d ð x i Þ Þ  ðRe ð Z 0 ð x i Þ Þ g The CCDM index is based on the correlation coefficient
RMSD ¼ Pi¼N 2
ð5Þ
i¼1 Re ð Z 0 ð x i Þ Þ and is simply given by Eq. (6)
where Z0 ðxÞ is the impedance of the PZT measured in the CCDM ¼ 1  CC ð6Þ
healthy condition (baseline), Zd ðxÞ is the impedance in the
where CC is the correlation coefficient calculated using the
concurrent condition, and N is the number of frequency
real part of the electrical impedance signatures for the
points. With the RMSD metric, the difference between the
structure under undamaged and damaged conditions in the
baseline reading and the subsequent reading increases with
selected frequency range.
increasing numerical value of the metric, which indicates

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4 Result and discussion
First the impedance signature was obtained from the
structure in undamaged condition (tight condition of nut
and bolts) which is known as baseline signature. After that,
the impedance signatures were obtained from the structure
in damaged condition by loosening the nuts and bolts on
the structure which is at a distance of 35, 200, 370, and
540 mm from the PZT transducer. The different conditions
for joint bars structure are given in Table 3; where, the
undamaged as well as damaged scenarios are described
from state # 1 to state # 15. The first three states (state # 1
to state # 3) are undamaged states with all the nuts and
bolts in fixed condition. The state # 4 onwards is damaged
state.
In the experiment, different bolted looseness statuses
were realized by twisting the nut connected with and
hexagonal socket wrench head and then required amount
of force was applied using torque wrench having the
range from 25 to 135 Nm to added pre-load to the bolt
joint with an intentional interval of 15 Nm to cover
entire range. However, there may be some deviation
from the exact torque value. During the experiment,
three looseness conditions of bolt were obtained by the
use of three different torque degrees. The torque degree
changes from the tightness status of 85 Nm to the
completely loose status of 0 Nm (Removed state) as
provided in Table 4. The difference in pre-load status for
loose condition and tight condition can be identified and
found the bolt pre-load degradation in actual real-life
application.
Table 4 Three different damage states and corresponding applied
torque degrees
Looseness status Undamaged state Loose state Removed state
Torque (Nm) 85 70–65 0
The impedance spectrums measured using AD5933 of
corresponding nut and bolt being loosened by impedance
converter system on frequency range 60–80 kHz is shown
in Fig. 7a–d. The real part of impedance spectrum for the
undamaged state # 1, where all the bolts are in tight con-
dition and damaged state # 4 where only the first nut and
bolt is loose is shown in Fig. 7a. The other loose states
where second, third and fourth bolt are loose, were inves-
tigated with comparison to undamaged state as shown in
Fig. 7b–d. The real part of impedance spectrum before and
after removal of nuts and bolts from the structure is shown
in Fig. 8a–d. There is a shift, split and extra peak observed
as compared to undamaged state for different damaged
state, which can be easily predicted in the impedance
spectrum. The impedance signatures in the condition of
looseness of four bolts are similar at some frequencies as in
case of the removed bolts.
The RMSD and CCDM indices were computed by
Eqs. (5) and (6) for frequency range 50–80 kHz with step
size of 40 Hz. These frequency ranges are selected
experimentally as these offer high repeatability in both
cases, i.e., in undamaged and damaged conditions. Dif-
ferent ranges can be selected for other structures,

Table 3 Damage scenarios on structure

Damage state Damage condition Description

State #1 Undamaged Baseline condition—all nut and bolt are in tight condition
State #2 Undamaged Baseline condition—all nut and bolt are in tight condition after 12 h of undamaged state #1
State #3 Undamaged Baseline condition—all nut and bolt are in tight condition after 24 h of undamaged state #1
State #4 Damaged Loose first nut and bolt and others are in tight condition
State #5 Damaged Removed first nut and bolt and others are in tight condition
State #6 Damaged Loose second nut and bolt and retighten the first nut and bolt and others are in tight condition
State #7 Damaged Removed second nut and bolt and others are in tight condition
State #8 Damaged Loose first and second nut and bolts and others are in tight condition
State #9 Damaged Removed first and second nut and bolts and others are in tight condition
State #10 Damaged Loose third nut and bolt and retighten the first and second nut and bolts
State #11 Damaged Removed third nut and bolt others are in tight condition
State #12 Damaged Loose fourth nut and bolt and retighten the third nut and bolt
State #13 Damaged Removed fourth nut and bolt and others are in tight condition
State #14 Damaged Loose third and fourth nut and bolts and others are in tight condition
State #15 Damaged Removed third and fourth nut and bolts and others are in tight condition

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Fig. 7 Real part of impedance spectrum acquired before and after removal of nut and bolt
transducers and type of damage. In this case, the proposed
system examines the structure with frequency range from
50 to 80 kHz. The impedance signatures obtained from the
structure in undamaged and different levels of damaged
conditions for the frequency range 72–73 kHz are shown in
Fig. 9. For reasonable comparison among the signature
only narrow bands of frequencies were selected.
As shown in Fig. 9, it has been observed that the
looseness of nut and bolts caused substantial variation in
impedance signatures, particularly for the nut and bolt
looseness at distances of 35 mm and 200 mm from the
PZT transducer for the selected range. There is a shift in
resonance peak for the damaged state 7, 11, and 13. In this
case, only one nut and bolt was removed from structure,
which was at a distance of 200, 370, and 540 mm,
respectively. Further, there is a shift as well as split in
frequency for two damaged states, where two nut and bolts
which were at a distance of 35 mm and 200 mm were
removed. These results confirmed that the real part of
impedance signature is sensible and feasible to detect
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Journal of Civil Structural Health Monitoring (2018) 8:809–822
structural looseness and that data is valuable for looseness
damage investigation of the host structure. These analyses
provide only qualitative results for different looseness
conditions but for more accurate comparisons, a quantita-
tive analysis was required which was possible through the
damage indices RMSD and CCDM. The RMSD indices
computed using the frequency ranges of 72–73 kHz has
been shown in Fig. 10. The RMSD index value obtained
for the structure in damaged condition were found more
than undamaged state.
A comparison between the CCDM indices of different
damaged conditions at selected frequency is shown in
Fig. 11. The result demonstrates an increasing trend during
the increasing damage condition. The ratio between the
damaged conditions and undamaged condition was 4.82,
10.86, 16.18, and 19.23 as looseness progresses from first
nut and bolt to fourth one. Further, to find out the differ-
ence between loose (70–65 Nm torque) and removed
(0 Nm torque) state of nut and bolts, RMSD indices were
calculated for both the states (Fig. 12).
Journal of Civil Structural Health Monitoring (2018) 8:809–822
Fig. 8 Real part of impedance spectrum acquired before and after losing of nut and bolt
For the damaged structure, the RMSD indices of
removing state was found more than the loose state;
however, for the healthy structure, the indices were lower
than 0.05 which indicates good comparison between
undamaged state and loose states. Hence, it is concluded
that the impedance analysis using AD5933 is able to
diagnose the looseness in bolted joint structure or any real-
life structure. Consequently, the results presented in this
investigation demonstrate the effectiveness of the piezo-
electric sensors with EMI technique.
5 Conclusion
The main objective of this study was to design and
implement an impedance-based SHM system which can be
used as investigational work for the looseness assessment
of a bolted structure. In this paper, impedance chip
AD5933 has been used successfully to monitor looseness
819
of prototype structure. The incipient as well as severe
looseness damages in the prototype were successfully
detected and located. Different tests have been carried out
to prove the feasibility of EMI as an embedded method for
monitoring the structure and its deterioration of bolted
joint. The signal obtained from the AD5933 evaluation
board exhibits high level of repeatability during undam-
aged and damaged states. Insignificant difference between
datasets having p value greater than 0.05 and the Pearson’s
correlation coefficients about 0.99 was found. Single as
well as multiple damages on prototype structure can be
easily detected by miniature impedance chip. The experi-
ment was successful detecting the looseness in the structure
by both qualitatively and quantitatively. The RMSD of
signature has been effectively calibrated with different
looseness conditions of bolt. The use of the RMSD and
CCDM index in conjunction with monitoring the impe-
dance peak and resonant shift via graph shows as a more
reliable method of monitoring bolted joint structure with
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820 Journal of Civil Structural Health Monitoring (2018) 8:809–822

Fig. 9 Impedance signature obtained from the structure in the undamaged and damaged conditions within selected frequency range

Fig. 12 RMSD indices comparison in loose state and removed state

of nut and bolts
Fig. 10 RMSD indices obtained from the structure in the undamaged
state and damaged conditions
the structural signature. Therefore, real structure looseness
under application could be detected with high probability.
This sensitivity analysis for the EMI technique was per-
formed for a bolted splice joint structure of aluminium and
iron. Also, the sensitivity of the EMI technique can be
further analysed with multiple sensors. Future work will be
to evaluate the sensitivity of the technique for bolted joint
structures with loading condition and different looseness
levels.

Acknowledgements The authors are thankful to CSIR-Central Sci-

Fig. 11 CCDM indices obtained from the structure in different
damaged conditions
entific Instruments Organisation (CSIO), Chandigarh for providing
infrastructure to conduct the experiments. The first author is grateful
to Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE), New Delhi for
providing the fellowship also thankful to National Institute of Science
and Technology, Berhampur for carrying out the research work.

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