An omnidirectional shear horizontal wave transducer based on ring array of face-shear (d24) piezoelectric ceramics

TL;DR

This paper introduces an omnidirectional shear horizontal wave transducer using a ring array of face-shear piezoelectric ceramics, enabling effective non-destructive testing and structural health monitoring with improved omnidirectional wave generation and reception.

Contribution

The paper proposes a novel ring-array transducer based on face-shear (d24) piezoelectric ceramics for omnidirectional SH wave generation and reception, supported by simulations and experiments.

Findings

Exhibits good omnidirectional properties in experiments

Effective as both transmitter and receiver of SH waves

Potential to enhance NDT and SHM applications

Abstract

The non-dispersive fundamental shear horizontal (SH0) wave in plate-like structures is of practical importance in non-destructive testing (NDT) and structural health monitoring (SHM). Theoretically, an omnidirectional SH0 transducer phased array system can be used to inspect defects in a large plate in the similar manner to the phased array transducers used in medical B-scan ultrasonics. However, very few omnidirectional SH transducers have been proposed so far. In this work, an omnidirectional SH wave piezoelectric transducer (OSH-PT) was proposed which consists of a ring array of twelve face-shear (d24) trapezoidal PZT elements. Each PZT element can produce face-shear deformation under applied voltage, resulting in circumferential shear deformation in the OSH-PT and omnidirectional SH waves in the hosting plate. Both finite element simulations and experiments were conducted to examine the performance of the proposed OSH-PT. Experimental testing shows that the OSH-PT exhibits good omnidirectional properties, on matter it is used as a SH wave transmitter or a SH wave receiver. This work may greatly promote the applications of SH waves in NDT and SHM.