New ferroelectric polymer ultrasound contact transducers for nondestructive testing applications

The development of both single-element and multielement nondestructive testing (NDT) contact ultrasound transducers based on piezo-polymers is reported. The performance of single-element contact transducers is illustrated in pulse-echo and through-transmission waveforms taken from a variety of materials including nonplanar structures. Multielement transducer arrays based on the same design technology have also been developed. Nine-element arrays of two different 3×3 patterns have been constructed with overall thicknesses of 0.006-0.020 in., depending on the desired frequency of the design. Their flexible thin profile and broadband performance are illustrated in a novel NDT application