Detection of flaws in sandwich plates

Abstract

A technique is presented to characterize rectangular flaws in sandwich plates. The scattered wave fields in the frequency domain for sandwich plates with rectangular flaws are calculated by using the strip element method. In the present technique, the length of a rectangular flaw in a sandwich plate is determined from the displacement distribution curve on the upper surface of the plate. The damage factor of the flaw is determined from the mean value of the peaks of the additional oscillations on the displacement distribution curves. An approximate polynomial formula of degree three for the prediction of the damage factor of flaws in sandwich plates is also proposed. Numerical experiments are made to demonstrate the present technique. Copyright © 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd.