Article
The SBFEM to simulate the scattering of ultrasonic guided waves interacting with defects in 3D plate structures (en)
* Presenting author
Abstract:
In the field of guided waves for non-destructive testing, the interaction of these waves with damages or other discontinuities in a structure is critical. When a guided wave mode travels and hits a defect, it scatters in all directions, converting to other modes and reflecting the existing one. These interactions are captured in scattered far field complex amplitudes and characterise the elastodynamic behaviour of a defect completely. Simulating these interactions is challenging, and analytical solutions only exist for simple geometries. Still, using general tools like the finite element method results in large, usually costly models. We employ a method based on a numerical implementation of the Kirchhoff–Helmholtz integral that allows the computation of the scattering matrices using a model containing only the damaged region. However, classical techniques to resolve the far field and low-order elements are commonly used, leading to large models yet more efficient than using other strategies.We propose using the SBFEM as an alternative to enhance the computation of the far field scattering. The damaged region is discretised using high-order polyhedral elements, while the far field is constructed using a modified version of the SBFEM. Examples compared to the literature demonstrate the validity of the approach.