Neural network-based automated assessment of fatigue damage in mechanical structures

Abstract

This paper proposes a methodology for automated assessment of fatigue damage, which has been tested and validated with polycrystalline-alloy (Aℓ7075-T6) specimens on an experimental apparatus. Based on an ensemble of time series of ultrasonic test (UT) data, the proposed procedure is found to be capable of detecting fatigue-damage (at an early stage) in mechanical structures, which is followed by online evaluation of the associated risk. The underlying concept is built upon two neural network (NN)-based models, where the first NN model identifies the feature of the UT data belonging to one of the two classes: undamaged structure and damaged structure, and the second NN model further classifies an identified damaged structure into three classes: low-risk, medium-risk, and high-risk. The input information to the second NN model is the crack tip opening displacement (CTOD), which is computed by the first NN model via linear regression from an ensemble of optical data, acquired from the experiments. Both NN models have been trained by using scaled conjugate gradient algorithms. The results show that the first NN model classifies the energy of UT signals with (up to) 98.5% accuracy, and that the accuracy of the second NN model is 94.6%.