Degradation of a pipe can be easily detected. A piping inspection system 1 includes an excitation unit 100, a wave detection unit 210, and a diagnosis unit 220. The excitation unit 100 excites waves of different wave modes simultaneously at a first position of a pipe 300. The wave detection unit 210 detects the waves of different wave modes at a second position of the pipe 300. The diagnosis unit 220 diagnoses degradation of the pipe 300 based on a velocity of one of the waves of different wave modes, the velocity being calculated by using a detection time difference between the waves of different wave modes.

An inspection robot incudes a robot body, at least two sensors, a drive module, a stability assist device and an actuator. The at least two sensors are positioned to interrogate an inspection surface and are communicatively coupled to the robot body. The drive module includes at least two wheels that engage the inspection surface. The drive module is coupled to the robot body. The stability assist device is coupled to at least one of the robot body or the drive module. The actuator is coupled to the stability assist device at a first end, and coupled to one of the drive module or the robot body at a second end. The actuator is structured to selectively move the stability assist device between a first position and a second position. The first position includes a stored position. The second position includes a deployed position.

Described herein are Compressive Sensing algorithms developed for automated reduction of NDE/SHM data from pitch-catch ultrasonic guided waves as well as a methodology using Compressive Sensing at two stages in the data acquisition and analysis process to detect damage: (1) temporally undersampled sensor signals from (2) spatially undersampled sensor arrays, resulting in faster data acquisition and reduced data sets without any loss in damage detection ability.

The present invention relates to a technology for measuring a nonlinear parameter of an object to be measured, and more particularly, to an apparatus and method for measuring a nonlinear parameter of an object to be measured.

A method for monitoring a service state of a switch rail based on feature fusion includes: mounting an ultrasonic guided wave monitoring apparatus on the switch rail to perform online defect identification and simulation of the switch rail, and establishing a baseline signal library, where the ultrasonic guided wave monitoring apparatus generates a guided wave signal propagating along the switch rail and receives an echo signal of the guided wave signal; performing feature extraction; extracting a healthy feature vector, and nondimensionalizing; selecting a defect-sensitive feature, and acquiring, by a BPSO algorithm, a best feature subset; training an LS-SVM through the best feature subset by a cross-validation method to acquire an automatic online defect identification model of the switch rail based on the LS-SVM; and monitoring the switch rail by the automatic online defect identification model of the switch rail based on the LS-SVM.

A sensor for ultrasonically measuring a portion of a structure having a temperature significantly above room-temperature, the sensor comprising: a high-temperature portion for intimate contact with the structure, the high-temperature portion comprising at least: at least one transducer for converting a first signal to an ultrasonic transmit signal, and for converting an ultrasonic reflected signal to a second signal; a low-temperature portion comprising at least: at least one digital sensor interface (DSI) to which the transducer is electrically connected, the DSI being configured to transmit the first electrical signal and receive the second electrical signal, and to generate an A-scan signal based on the first and second electrical signals; a wireless interface for transmitting a digital signal based directly or indirectly on at least said A-scan signal; and a battery for powering the DSI and the wireless interface; and an elongated member containing one or more electrical conductors for conducting the first and second signals between the transducer and the DSI, the elongated member being configured to offset the low-temperature portion a sufficient distance away from the high-temperature portion such that the low-temperature portion is subjected to significantly less heat from the structure compared to the high-temperature portion.

According to an embodiment, a structure evaluation system includes a plurality of sensors, a position locator, a velocity calculator, and an evaluator. The sensors detect an elastic wave generated from a structure. The position locator derives a wave source distribution of the elastic waves generated from the structure, on the basis of the elastic waves. The velocity calculator derives a propagation velocity of the elastic wave generated from the structure, on the basis of the elastic waves. The evaluator evaluates the soundness of the structure on the basis of the wave source distribution and the propagation velocity of the elastic waves.

A method and system for cement evaluation. The method may include disposing an acoustic logging tool into a pipe string that is disposed in a first casing of a wellbore, transmitting an acoustic wave at a first location within the wellbore from an acoustic source disposed on the acoustic logging tool, and recording one or more acoustic signals with one or more receivers on the acoustic logging tool at the first location. The method may further include performing a multichannel multimode dispersion analysis of the one or more acoustic signals, extracting one or more fluid modes propagating in the first casing from the dispersion analysis, extracting one or more pseudo-lamb waves propagating in the first casing from the dispersion analysis, extracting one or more pseudo-SH-plate waves propagating in the first casing from the dispersion analysis, and identifying a bonding condition between the first casing and a cement.

According to one embodiment, a detection system is provided that detects a state of a structure consisting of a first member that supports a traveling surface along which a vehicle travels from downward; a second member provided on an opposite side of the traveling surface with respect to the first member; and a welded portion that is provided along an end of the second member facing the first member and fixes the first member and the second member. The detection system includes: a first sensor group including first AE sensors; a second sensor group including second AE sensors; and a position orientator that performs separately a first determination that determines a generation source position of elastic waves based on the detection results of the first AE sensors and a second determination that determines the generation source position of elastic waves based on the detection results of the second AE sensors.

The present disclosure relates to methods and apparatus for launch and recovery of a remote inspection device within a liquid storage tank. In one embodiment, the tank is accessed by opening an entrance hatch and then injecting a vapor suppression foam across a surface of a stored liquid mass to form a foam layer. A launching system having a remote inspection device is attached to the entrance hatch to define a launch and recovery space sealed from an external environment and isolated from the stored liquid mass in the tank via a valve and the foam layer. The launch and recovery space is purged of hazardous vapors by injection of an inert gas prior to launch and recovery of the remote inspection device. Prior to removal of the launching system, the surface of the stored liquid mass is re-coated with vapor suppression foam.