Correlation of Ultrasonic Imaging and Destructive Analyses of Low Energy Impact Events

Some of the most critical flaws encountered during the service life of a composite component can result from impact damage due to foreign objects (FOD). Impact damage can produce significant degradation of the material’s structural integrity. Destructive sectioning [1] or de-plying [2,3] of impact damaged laminates has proven that damage is manifested in the form of interlaminar delaminations, each of different size, shape and ply interface orientation through the thickness. Unfortunately, the extent of the delamination damage, especially at low level impact sites, may not be visually identified from surface features. The seriousness of this problem has led to much work in both the nondestructive evaluation and mechanics communities to characterize and assess the effects of such damage