Wilcox Paul D, Croxford Anthony J, Budyn Nicolas, Bevan Rhodri L T, Zhang Jie, Kashubin Artem, Cawley Peter
Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of Bristol, Queen's Building, University Walk, Bristol BS8 1TR, UK.
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Imperial College, Exhibition Road, London SW7 2AZ, UK.
Proc Math Phys Eng Sci. 2020 Nov;476(2243):20200086. doi: 10.1098/rspa.2020.0086. Epub 2020 Nov 18.
State-of-the-art ultrasonic non-destructive evaluation (NDE) uses an array to rapidly generate multiple, information-rich views at each test position on a safety-critical component. However, the information for detecting potential defects is dispersed across views, and a typical inspection may involve thousands of test positions. Interpretation requires painstaking analysis by a skilled operator. In this paper, various methods for fusing multi-view data are developed. Compared with any one single view, all methods are shown to yield significant performance gains, which may be related to the general and edge cases for NDE. In the general case, a defect is clearly detectable in at least one individual view, but the view(s) depends on the defect location and orientation. Here, the performance gain from data fusion is mainly the result of the selective use of information from the most appropriate view(s) and fusion provides a means to substantially reduce operator burden. The edge cases are defects that cannot be reliably detected in any one individual view without false alarms. Here, certain fusion methods are shown to enable detection with reduced false alarms. In this context, fusion allows NDE capability to be extended with potential implications for the design and operation of engineering assets.
先进的超声无损检测（NDE）使用阵列在安全关键部件的每个测试位置快速生成多个信息丰富的视图。然而，用于检测潜在缺陷的信息分散在各个视图中，并且典型的检查可能涉及数千个测试位置。解释需要熟练的操作员进行细致的分析。在本文中，开发了多种融合多视图数据的方法。与任何单个视图相比，所有方法都显示出显著的性能提升，这可能与无损检测的一般情况和边缘情况有关。在一般情况下，至少在一个单独的视图中可以清楚地检测到缺陷，但具体取决于缺陷的位置和方向。在这里，数据融合带来的性能提升主要是选择性地使用最合适视图中的信息的结果，并且融合提供了一种大幅减轻操作员负担的方法。边缘情况是指在任何单个视图中都无法可靠检测而不产生误报的缺陷。在这里，某些融合方法显示能够在减少误报的情况下进行检测。在这种情况下，融合使无损检测能力得以扩展，对工程资产的设计和运行可能产生潜在影响。
