Abstract

Harnessing of ultrasonic guided waves confined in local features such as bends and welds, known as feature-guided waves (FGW) has emerged as a promising technique for non-destructive testing and structural health monitoring of industrial and aerospace structures [1,2]. Conventional techniques to detect such waves such as piezoelectric transducers and Doppler vibrometers are not practical for field applications [2]. In this paper, we introduce a fiber Bragg grating (FBG)–based technique which uses FGW to detect anomalies or defects in plate structures with transverse bends. We demonstrate that we are able to obtain good consistency between simulation and experimental results, both in the case of defect-free bent plates and those with transverse defects.

© 2016 Optical Society of America