Ultrasonic Imaging of Ballistically Impacted Composite Armour

S.S. Samant1, A. Joshi2 & K.K.S. Mer3

Department of Mechanical Engineering, Govind Ballabh Pant Engineering College Pauri, India
E-mail : sanjaysama@gmail.com, amitjoshi_81@yahoo.co.in, kks_mer@yahoo.com

elastic modules, strength, stiffness, and other essential

parameters which are vital for analysis and design of
structures. An attempt to explain some problems of
ultrasonic characterization of the materials is made in
this work. Hashin-Shtrikman model is developed to
describe materials with porous matrix. By using this
model we can find shear module and young module and
also possible to conclude the matrix elastic properties.
Orazio et al [10] addressed the problem of developing
an automatic system for the analysis of ultrasonic data in
order to detect and classify internal defects in composite
material. In pre-processing they analyze only the portion
of signal between frontal echo and back echo. The
challenge is to modify the two signals in order to have
the same length. They developed normalization
technique which aligns all the signals to the length of
that signal which corresponds to the minimum thickness
of the analyzed component. The main objective was to
eliminate a number of samples in the portion of the
signal that was not significant for detect type
recognition without altering the shape of peaks. They
have used interpolation approach to align the signals to
the longest one. After normalization step(means separate
the defect echo from noise echoes) the ultrasonic signals
are ready to be proceed for defect detection in post
processing, according to neural network output a binary
image is produced containing black point for defective
areas and white points for defective areas. It also
classifies defect type, defect position or both using three
different neural network

Abstract - The ability of Kevlar-Polypropylene composite

armour to withstand the impact of projectile (calibre 7.62
mm) is investigated using immersion type ultrasonic cscan method. The Kevlar polypropylene composite
laminate is made of 36 Kevlar and 74 polypropylene layers
having thickness 20 mm and are subjected to bullet impact
with different striking velocities. At each location of the
probe ultrasonic features peak amplitude and signal
amplitude are extracted from digitized data and stored in
controlling PC. Using UPGMA clustering technique, c-scan
images of impacted zones of Kevlar polypropylene
composite plate has been generated. The extent of core
damage zone in the laminates correlated to the impact
velocities of projectile. It is observed that areas of core
damage zone are found to increase with the energy loss of
the bullet. The area of core damage zone increases rapidly
in case of shot lodging. Also peak amplitude and signal
energy features are more reliable and sensitive for
evaluation of damage in composite laminates.
Index Terms Ultrasonic c-scan, clustering technique,
feature extraction and composite armour.

I.

INTRODUCTION

Now a day, composites are increasingly being used

in aerospace, naval and automotive applications due to
their high strength and stiffness to weight ratio.
However, the mechanical properties of composite
materials may degrade severely in the presence of
damage. Damage from impact causes matrix cracking,
delaminations and fibre breakage in composite
structures, which are often difficult to be detected and
quantified for establishing the extent of the damage
zone. There are various Non-destructive testing methods
such as radiography, immersion type ultrasonic c-scan
facility, which are found to be more reliable and
sensitive for impact type of damage. Numerous
investigators have carried out experimental and
numerical investigations to study ultrasonic response to
composite defects.
In connection with NDE of composites, an
exhaustive review was made by Henneke [1] and
Edouard G. Nesvijski [8] explained that ultrasonic NDT
methods are an effective instrument for evaluation of

Fig: 1.1: Ultrasonic Immersion Type Test Facility

ISSN : 2319 3182, Volume-2, Issue-4, 2013

79

International Journal on Theoretical and Applied Research in Mechanical Engineering (IJTARME)

II. DESCRIPTION OF THE EXPERIMENT

2.1 Immersion Type Ultrasonic C-Scan Experimental
Setup:
An immersion tank setup developed in house for
automated scanning of composite laminates in normal
beam through pulse echo method. The facility is
comprised of an immersion tank made of acrylic glass
and a mounting frame furnished with two lead screws in
mutually perpendicular directions. Two stepper motors
drive the lead screws and a common nut, moving
linearly due to their rotation and holding the probe
holding device. The transducers fitted in the probe
holding device, can move along two mutually
perpendicular directions in precise steps and are capable
of scanning any predefined two-dimension region. The
transducers are connected to an ultrasonic board that
acts as the pulsar, receiver and digitizer of the ultrasonic
waveform. The present ultrasonic board is PCUS11,
which is operated by QUT99 software. The board
seamlessly interacts with the manufacturer supplied
software that has the capability to condition, gate and
zooming of the digitized signal. The composite laminate
is kept immersed in water and is held strictly parallel to
the plane of the movement of the transducer. The
minimum linear movement of stepper motor can be
adjusted by using the stepper motor controller.
Necessary setting may be given as input to the stepper
motor controller via a wired remote control. A
schematic diagram of the experimental set up is shown
in Fig. 2.1.

Fig: 1.2: Ballistic-ally Impacted Composite

When c-scanning over an impacted composite

laminate is to be done for making precise measurements,
an immersion technique as shown in Fig. 1.1, both the
transducer and the composite plate as shown in Fig. 1.2,
immersed in the couplant, which is typically water. This
method of coupling makes it easier to maintain
consistent coupling while moving and manipulating the
transducer and/or the part. Automated movement of the
transducer in x-y directions is also enabled in this
technique.
In the present work, ultrasonic (with high frequency
range) C-scan is performed on different composite
armours by normal incidence immersion type pulse echo
method. Automated ultrasonic data acquisition system
QUT99 software is used to operate the PCUS11
ultrasonic board and two stepper motors are used in
controlled movement of the ultrasonic probe in x-y
directions. During scanning of impacted armours
relevant portion of the ultrasonic waveform is digitized
at each point. Time domain and frequency domain
features are extracted from digitized waveform at each
point using codes that have been developed in-house.
Extracted feature values for the scanned points form the
object vector which is subjected to systematic
classification using clustering algorithms. Codes in
MATLAB have been developed for the purpose that
also generates corresponding C-scan images. Finally the
generated C-scan images are compared visually with the
extent of damage in the impacted region and a
correlation is drawn between the core areas of the
damage with the corresponding impact information. The
study is conducted for different composite plates that are
used as human armours and subjected to various degrees
of ballistic impacts.

Fig. 2.1: Schematic diagram of the experimental Set up

ISSN : 2319 3182, Volume-2, Issue-4, 2013

80

International Journal on Theoretical and Applied Research in Mechanical Engineering (IJTARME)

2.2 Ballistic Testing Set-Up:

the objects in the other. Thus, in revising the

resemblance matrix values between clustering steps,
finding the spanning objects having the average value of
as given by equation (2.1).

The Composite laminates were rigidly clamped

from two sides on holder and place in the line of fire of
a 7.62 mm calibre military rifle. The impact and residual
velocities were measured by the foil and counter
method. Each frame consisted of two thin aluminium
foil separated by a thin insulating paper board and were
connected to a timer. Two frames were separated by a
distance of 3m and placed as close to the impacted panel
and the velocity was calculated from the time taken by
the projectile to travel between two frames at a
measured distance apart. A similar set up was used
behind the laminate panel to record the exit velocity in
case of perforations.

(2.1)

2.3 Test Procedure

At first, a rectangular area is marked in the plate
around the impact zone for scanning. The area should be
adequate to include the damage zone, made primarily of
delamination, matrix crack and fibre breakage caused by
the ballistic impact. The area of scanning zone and
chosen step size of the linear movement of stepper
motor decide the total number of data points within the
area of scanned zone. Probe which is partially immersed
in liquid placed at top end corner of selected area and
follow the raster pattern of movement. Transmission of
ultrasonic signal is started by pressing the green button
in QUT99 data acquisition software. All the parameters
of QUT99 data acquisition software such as gain, shift,
frequency, pulse impedance, sampling rate and pulsar
energy etc. are adjusted and gates are so positioned that
we can digitize the data from the top surface echo.
During scanning of impacted armours the relevant
portion of the ultrasonic waveform is digitized at each
location of the probe. After digitizing, we extract
features such as signal energy, peak amplitude and
Shannon entropy etc. Consequently on the basis of these
features, we create an image of the scanned region and
attempt to characterize the damage therein for different
armours.

Fig. 2.2: Schematic presentation of the distance

calculation by the UPGMA method
III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
A
Kevlar Polypropylene composite plate is
subjected to ballistic impact at several regions with
different striking velocities. The striking velocity and
the residual velocity are measured during the impact.
Necessary zones for scanning around each impact area
are identified. The zones are scanned by normal
incidence immersion type pulse echo method. Details of
plate are

2.4 Cluster Analysis

The ultimate goal of any Cluster Analysis (CA)
algorithm is to find subgroups of data within a larger
dataset. Maximizing the similarity of "within-cluster"
observations while maximizing the differences between
the clusters is the desired trait of a Cluster Analysis
(CA) algorithm. Here the distance between two clusters
is defined as the average of distances between all pairs
of objects, where each pair is made up of one object
from each group. UPGMA consists of six basic
clustering methods but difference is the Execution of the
clustering method. In this method the similarity between
any two clusters as the arithmetic average of the
similarities between the objects in the one cluster and

Name of composite

Kevlar Polypropylene

Weight of composite
plate

2127.5 gm

Thickness

20 mm

No. of layers

Kevlar-36,Polypropylene-74

3.1 Parameters Considered During Scanning Of KevlarPolypropylene Composite

Laminate For All
Scanned Zone:

Area of scanned zone-1 is 72 mm (X direction)

x 72 mm (Y direction)

Steps of linear movement of the probe in both

X and Y directions are 3 mm.

Total no. of data points 25*25=625

ISSN : 2319 3182, Volume-2, Issue-4, 2013

81

International Journal on Theoretical and Applied Research in Mechanical Engineering (IJTARME)

Gain

34.6dB

Number of samples

986

Sampling rate

80MHz

Probe diameter

12.5mm

Pulse impedence

300

Pulser energy

350

Probe frequency

1MHz

Gate length

12.5 sec

Table 3.1: Parameters considered during scanning of

Kevlar-Polypropylene composite laminate for all
scanned zone
.

3.2 C-Scan Result Of Kevlar Polypropylene For Different Zones

Peak amplitude

Signal amplitude

Fig.3.2.1: C-scan images of Kevlar Polypropylene composite plate for zone-1

Peak amplitude

Signal amplitude

ISSN : 2319 3182, Volume-2, Issue-4, 2013

82

International Journal on Theoretical and Applied Research in Mechanical Engineering (IJTARME)

Fig.3.2.2: C-scan images of Kevlar Polypropylene composite plate for zone-2

Peak amplitude
Signal amplitude
Fig.3.2.3: C-scan images of Kevlar Polypropylene composite plate for zone-3
Scanned Zone

Striking Velocity( )
(m/s)

Residual
Velocity
( )(m/s)

Zone-1

477.8

62.5

Zone-2

594.8

Zone-3(shot

423.8

( - )
(m/s)

( )

Core Damage
Area
( )

415.3

473.69

879.2

440.2

154.6

400.01

431.2

423.2

423.2

1700.35

lodging case)
Table 3.2: C- scan result of Kevlar-Polypropylene composite plate based on Peak Amplitude feature for three
clusters

. In table 3.2, the core damage areas for zone-1, zone-2

and zone-3 with the striking velocity, residual velocity,
their difference and root of their squared difference are
shown. It is observed that in general, core damage area
is possibly more dependent on the difference of the
striking velocity and residual velocity. As the difference
increases the core damage area also tends to increase.
But the magnitude of striking velocity also seems to
play an important role in the core damage area.
However, the shot lodging case can be taken as a special
case where the core damage area increases rapidly. This
is evident from the images and the table 3.2

The ultrasonic normal incidence pulse echo

immersion facility is suitable for identification
of damage on composite plate.

However in case of shot lodging, this is also

expected as the impacting shot remains lodged
in the laminate and the entire kinetic energy of
the shot is expended in enlarging the core
damage region.

UPGMA clustering technique is found to be an

effective tool for systematic classification of
acquired data.
V. REFERENCES

IV. CONCLUSION
Based on the above result & discussions following
conclusions are made:

The core damage area is possibly more

dependent on the difference of the striking
velocity and residual velocity.

[1]

Henneke E G, II. Ultrasonic non destructive

evaluation of advanced composites, Nondestructive Testing of Fibre-reinforced Plastics
Composites, John Summerscales, editor 2, (1990)
55-159.

[2]

Michel S. Hughes, Analysis of digitized

waveforms using Shannon entropy: High speed
ISSN : 2319 3182, Volume-2, Issue-4, 2013

83

International Journal on Theoretical and Applied Research in Mechanical Engineering (IJTARME)

algorithms based on Greens function

Mallinckrodt Medical Inc., 675 McDonnell
Boulevard, St. Louis Missouri 63134.
[3]

[4]

M.V. Hosur, C. R. L. Murthy, T. S. Ramamurthy,

Anita Shet, Estimation of impact-induced
damage in CFRP laminates through ultrasonic
imaging NDT&E International, Vol. 31, No. 5,
(1998), pp. 359-374.
D.Datta, S.Samanta and P. Maity, Automated
imaging of composite specimens, Journal of Non
destructive testing and evaluation, Vol 3, 2004,
pp.21-27

[5]

R. J. Ball, D. P. Almond, The detection and

measurement of impact damage in thick carbon
fiber reinforced laminates by transient
thermography NDT&E International, Vol. 31,
No. 3, (1996), pp. 165-173.

[6]

Michael S. Hughes, A comparison of Shannon

entropy versus signal energy for acoustic
detection of artificially induced defects in
Plexiglas Center for Nondestructive evaluation
Iowa State University, Ames Iowa 50011.

[7]

[8]

Edouard G. Nesvijski, Some aspects of

ultrasonic testing of composites Center of
Technology, Federal University of Santa Maria,
Campus Universitario, Camobi, Santa Maria
97105-900, RS, Brazil.

[9]

Young-Fo Changa, Yushieh Ma, Chao-Ming Lin,

Jian-Hua Lee, Reverberation reduction in
ultrasonic images via predictive deconvolution
NDT&E International, Vol. 41, (2008), pp. 235
241.

[10]

T. DOrazio, M. Leo, A. Distante, C.

Guaragnella, V. Pianese, G. Cavaccini,
Automatic ultrasonic inspection for internal
defect detection in composite materials NDT &
E International, Volume 41, Issue 2, March 2008,
pp. 145-154.

M. Thavasimuthu,
C.
Rajagopalan, P.
Kalyanasundaram and Baldev Raj, Improving
the evaluation sensitivity of an ultrasonic pulse
echo technique using a neural network classifier
NDT&E International, Vol. 29, No. 3, (1996), pp.
175-179.

ISSN : 2319 3182, Volume-2, Issue-4, 2013

84