Integration of acoustic emission systems within Integri-Tech^TM analysis system for structural health monitoring of pressurised engineering plant

The aim of this Acoustic Emission (AE) based Structural Health Monitoring project is to enable accurate location of AE sources in pressurised engineering plant and to use AE source location data to establish defect locations for use within Integri-Tech^TM; a finite element based analysis, monitoring and fitness for service assessment system. Integri-Tech^TM is a windows based system which carries out combined analysis and assessment providing fatigue life and remnant life calculations and inspection priorities presenting the results in an accessible web portal format. The software uses finite element stress models created in the companion software Model Wizard. The AE monitoring system that has been developed can be used with an array of up to four AE broad band sensor channels with associated signal processing. Using a flexible approach in MATLAB, the authors have developed algorithms which were used for analysing the received AE signals to extract information about the nature and location of the source. The ability to carry out source location and possibly perform real time monitoring (detecting cracking as it occurs) is attractive feature of the AE system developed for this project. The time of arrival (TOA) data was used by Integri-Tech^TM software to calculate source location using its own built-in algorithm, and this was verified independently using a MATLAB approach. (paper)