Structural health monitoring (SHM) is a rapidly growing field focused on detecting damage in complex systems before catastrophic failure occurs. Advanced sensor technologies are necessary to fully harness SHM in applications involving harsh or remote environments, life-critical systems, mass-production vehicles, robotic systems, and others. Fiber Bragg Grating (FBG) sensors are attractive for in-situ health monitoring due to their resistance to electromagnetic noise, ability to be multiplexed, and accurate real-time operation. Ultrasonic additive manufacturing (UAM) has been demonstrated for solid-state fabrication of 3D structures with embedded FBG sensors. In this paper, UAM-embedded FBG sensors are investigated with a focus on SHM applications. FBG sensors embedded in an aluminum matrix 3 mm from the initiation site are shown to resolve a minimum crack length of 0.286 ± 0.033 mm and track crack growth until near failure. Accurate crack detection is also demonstrated from FBGs placed 6 mm and 9 mm from the crack initiation site. Regular acrylate-coated FBG sensors are shown to repeatably work at temperatures up to 300 ∘ C once embedded with the UAM process.
more »
« less
Weigh-In-Motion System in Flexible Pavements Using Fiber Bragg Grating Sensors Part A: Concept
Weight data of vehicles play an important role in traffic planning, weight enforcement, and pavement condition assessment. In this paper, a weigh-in-motion (WIM) system that functions at both low-speeds and high-speeds in flexible pavements is developed based on in-pavement, three-dimensional glass-fiber-reinforced, polymer-packaged fiber Bragg grating sensors (3D GFRP-FBG). Vehicles passing over the pavement produce strains that the system monitors by measuring the center wavelength changes of the embedded 3D GFRP-FBG sensors. The FBG sensor can estimate the weight of vehicles because of the direct relationship between the loading on the pavement and the strain inside the pavement. A sensitivity study shows that the developed sensor is very sensitive to sensor installation depth, pavement property, and load location. Testing in the field validated that the longitudinal component of the sensor if not corrected by location has a measurement accuracy of 86.3% and 89.5% at 5 mph and 45 mph vehicle speed, respectively. However, the system also has the capability to estimate the location of the loading position, which can enhance the system accuracy to more than 94.5%.
more »
« less
- Award ID(s):
- 1750316
- PAR ID:
- 10145304
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- IEEE Transactions on Intelligent Transportation Systems
- ISSN:
- 1524-9050
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 1 to 12
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
Additive manufacturing (AM) enables the spatially configurable 3D integration of sensors in metal components to realize smart materials and structures. Outstanding sensing capabilities and size compatibility have made fiber optic sensors excellent candidates for integration in AM components. In this study, fiber Bragg grating (FBG) sensors were embedded in Inconel 718 tensile coupons printed using laser powder bed fusion AM. On-axis (fiber runs through the coupon’s center of axis) and off-axis (fiber is at 5° and 10° to the coupon’s center of axis) sensors were buried in epoxy resin inside narrow channels that run through the coupons. FBGs’ spectral evolutions during embedment in the coupons were examined and cyclic loading experiments were conducted to analyze and evaluate the sensor integration process, complex strain loading, process flaws, and sensing performance. This study also demonstrates that the AM process-born deficiencies such as poor surface finish and staircase effects can be detrimental to the embedded sensors and their sensing performance.more » « less
-
Fiber Bragg grating (FBG) sensors have been applied to assess strains, stresses, loads, corrosion, and temperature for structural health monitoring (SHM) of steel infrastructure, such as buildings, bridges, and pipelines. Since a single FBG sensor measures a particular parameter at a local spot, it is challenging to detect different types of anomalies and interactions of anomalies. This paper presents an approach to assess interactive anomalies caused by mechanical loading and corrosion on epoxy coated steel substrates using FBG sensors in real time. Experiments were performed by comparing the monitored center wavelength changes in the conditions with loading only, corrosion only, and simultaneous loading and corrosion. The theoretical and experimental results indicated that there were significant interactive influences between loading and corrosion for steel substrates. Loading accelerated the progress of corrosion for the epoxy coated steel substrate, especially when delamination in the epoxy coating was noticed. Through the real-time monitoring from the FBG sensors, the interactions between the anomalies induced by the loading and corrosion can be quantitatively evaluated through the corrosion depth and the loading contact length. These fundamental understandings of the interactions of different anomalies on steel structures can provide valuable information to engineers for better management of steel structures.more » « less
-
Steel, which has high tension and compression strength, is a widely used civil engineering material in constructing building, bridge, pipelines, and other structures. However, steel has a well-known weakness, which is suspected to corrosion. Steel corrosion would significantly impact the reliability and safety of steel structures. Accurately locating and assessing the corrosion of steel structures would contribute to timely maintenance and thus, extend the service life of the steel structures. Although advances have been made to use nondestructive evaluation (NDE) technologies to locate and assess corrosion on steel structures, due to the lack of labor and budget for frequent NDE assessment on steel structures, remote and real-time approaches to locate and assess corrosion are still in great needs. Fiber optic sensors, especially, fiber Bragg gating (FBG) sensors, with unique advantages of real-time sensing, compactness, immune to EMI and moisture, capability of quasi-distributed sensing, and long life cycle, will be a perfect candidate for long-term corrosion assessment. However, due to the fact that FBG is a localized sensor, it is very challenging to locate corrosion using FBG sensors. In this study, algorithms are developed to locate corrosion on steel structures using FBG sensors. Detail sensing principle, localization algorithm development and calibration are introduced in this paper together with experimental validation testing. Upon validation, the developed corrosion localization algorithm could give some guidance to locate corrosion using in-situ FBG sensors on steel structures across nation and would possibly reduce the corrosion induced tragedies.more » « less
-
This study presents an experimental investigation on the combined effect of mechanical loads and corrosion using the designed polytetrafluoroethylene tube-packaged fiber Bragg grating (FBG) sensors, as to implement long-gauge FBG (LFBG) sensors in corrosion detection practices for structural health monitoring. A simplified LFBG-based sensing model was proposed for strain measurement in terms of the Bragg wavelength change. Correspondingly, a systematic corrosion assessment strategy was developed to estimate corrosion severity and average corrosion rate. Upon this, the experimental study was performed on epoxy-coated steel specimens embedded with LFBG sensors, where the loading, corrosion, and combined loading–corrosion tests were used to explore the effect of mechanical loads on corrosion behavior. Test results revealed that the specimens subjected to combined conditions exhibited more severe corrosion damage. The maximum mass loss was observed to be 1.82 and 2.43 in percentage under individual corrosion and combined loading–corrosion conditions, respectively. Also, the pit depth under combined conditions was found to develop rapidly in the early stage. The pit depth severity ratio was around 0.2–0.8 during the 67 days of exposure, indicating an evident impact of loading on corrosion severity. Furthermore, the maximum average corrosion rate under combined conditions was found to be 5.66 times that under individual corrosion conditions.more » « less
An official website of the United States government

