Rotating electric field sensor for nondestructive evaluation of nonmetallic engineered components
Improvements in performance of products with nonmetallic engineered materials are obtained at the cost of increased complexity of product design, manufacture, and maintenance. NDE (nondestructive evaluation) techniques have been developed for verifying design models, identifying manufacturing flaws, and assessing service-related damage. This project involved developing a new NDE method that provides additional information; the sensor measures changes in an imposed electric field to obtain electrical impedance images of a component. Effective sensing volume and orientation of imposed electric field may be varied to optimize field interaction with the internal structure of a part. These interactions are combined into multidimensional impedance images that reflect variations in the mechanical geometry and internal structure of a part. Location of an impedance anomaly may be correlated with the location of a flaw.