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Acoustic Emission
(AE)
The application of load to, or harsh environment on, a material
can produce internal modifications, such as crack growth,
local plastic deformation, corrosion and phase changes, which
are accompanied by the emission of acoustic waves (Acoustic
Emission). These waves contain information on the internal
behavior of the material and the processes taking place. AE
makes it possible to detect defect growth, as it happens,
for a variety of applications in testing and research.
AE-sensors convert the surface movements of the material
into an electric AE-signal. From the AE-signals, usually short
bursts, the AE-system extracts AE-parameters, including peak
amplitude, rise time, energy, etc., and stores them on disk.
External parameters such as load, temperature, etc., are stored
as well. In parallel, the waveform of the bursts can be stored
in a transient recorder file. Differences in arrival time
at different sensor positions are used to calculate the location
of each AE-source. The concentration of location results indicates
a potential defect.
The AMSY4 family of AE-systems is the result of over 10 years
experience in the development of high-end digital AE-systems.
It utilizes built-in, high performance Pentium PCs and modern
32-bit Windows software to acquire, analyze and visualize
the AE-data. Systems with 1 to 6 AE-channels are mostly used
with small samples in the laboratory. For large structures
in the field, such as bridges or reactors, AMSY4 systems with
100 AE-channels and more are in use. |
