ACTIVE THERMOGRAPHY FOR MATERIALS NON-DESTRUCTIVE TESTING

Active thermography is an advanced experimental procedure, which uses a thermography measurement of a tested material thermal response after its external excitation. This principle can be used also for non-contact infra-red non-destructive testing (IRNDT) of materials. The IRNDT method is based on an excitation of a tested material by an external source, which bring some energy to the material. Halogen lamps, flash-lamps, ultrasound generator or other source can be used as the excitation source for IR-NDT. The excitation causes a tested material thermal response, which is measured by an infra-red camera. It is possible to obtain information about the tested material surface and sub-surface defects or material inhomogeneities by using a suitable combination of excitation source, excitation procedure, infra-red camera and evaluation method. Active thermography and IR-NDT methods are introduced in this contribution. Different IRNDT configurations and their possibilities and limitations are described. The usage of the IRNDT for specific applications is shown in the contribution.