NDE of composite materials by thermal method and shearography

This paper reports a comparison among different Thermal techniques and Shearography applied to a sandwich panel of composite material containing simulated defects. In particular, the detectability of the defects and the evaluation of the planar extension are examined. An important feature is also the classification of different kinds of defects. The experimental and data processing procedures are described for all methods. For the Thermal Method, a mathematical simulation of the thermal problem allows to better design the test. Automatic processing of data are presented giving outputs very simple to understand.