EngD student, 2016 intake

University: Imperial College London

Sponsoring company: Guided Ultrasonics Ltd. (GUL)

Background: Diploma in Physics at the University of Tuebingen, Germany, December 2015.

Quantification of the remaining wall thickness of plates or plate-like structures in the presence of corrosion is extremely important in the petrochemical industry, and there are numerous scenarios where established technologies are unable to achieve this. Guided wave tomography utilises ultrasonic guided waves which travel within the plate and encode information about the wall loss as the waves are scattered from defects. It is possible to reconstruct an image of the wall thickness by exciting and measuring these defects with transducer arrays. Furthermore, the tomography technique does not require access to all points on the surface and therefore has potential in cases where the surface is not ideal for ultrasonic transduction.

This EngD project will focus on the case where corrosion occurs on the accessible surface of the component on which measurements need to be made, especially in the areas around gravity or clamp supports. In addition, the case of liquid loading will be analysed during experiments and simulations.