Simple methods for reducing the pulsed thermographic responses of delaminations tend to overestimate the size of the delamination, since the heat diffuses in the plane parallel to the surface. The result is a temperature profile over the delamination which is larger than the delamination size. A variational approach is presented for reducing the thermographic data to produce an estimated size for a flaw that is much closer to the true size of the delamination. The method is based on an estimate for the thermal response that is a convolution of a Gaussian kernel with the shape of the flaw. The size is determined from both the temporal and spatial thermal response of the exterior surface above the delamination and constraints on the length of the contour surrounding the delamination. Examples of the application of the technique to simulation and experimental data are presented to investigate the limitations of the technique.

Date Published: 12 May 2015
PDF: 11 pages
Proc. SPIE 9485, Thermosense: Thermal Infrared Applications XXXVII, 94850D (12 May 2015); doi: 10.1117/12.2176292

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 9485:
Thermosense: Thermal Infrared Applications XXXVII
Sheng-Jen (Tony) Hsieh; Joseph N. Zalameda, Editor(s)