Ultrasonic guided wave testing on pipeline corrosion detection using torsional T(0,1) guided waves

Abstract

Ultrasonic guided wave testing (UGWT) is used in rapid screening to detect, locate and classify corrosion defects. This non-destructive testing technique can perform wide-range inspection from a single point, thus reducing the time and effort required for NDT. However, the mode conversion phenomena and the dispersive nature of the guided waves make corrosion detection difficult. Hence, the parametric studies on the response signals of a T (0, 1) wave from pipe defects were presented in this paper. Firstly, a mathematical model of 6-inch schedule 40 pipes was developed. The corrosion profile of various geometries was then constructed on the outer surface of the pipeline by varying the circumferential length and depth. The numerical study was performed to analyse the characteristics of the response signals when a torsional guided wave impinges on the corroded pipelines. A five-cycle Hanning tone-burst signal with a central frequency of 30k Hz was used throughout the study. The results demonstrated that mode conversion to a flexural mode F (1, m) occurs when the stimulated T (0, 1) strikes non-symmetric defects. Nonetheless, as the circumferential extent of the corrosion increased, the response signals tended to behave symmetrically, and there was less mode conversion detected. Thus, the presence of flexural mode F (1, m) can be used as the criteria to distinguish symmetric and asymmetric faults. In addition, the results demonstrated that the reflection coefficients increase monotonically with the defect's depth due to the increases in the estimated cross-sectional area loss (ECL). As a result, a more significant proportion of the transmission wave was reflected. These findings serve as guidelines for on-site inspections. With the known speed of guided wave propagation, it is possible to precisely forecast the position of faults.