A. Nazari - Department of Rail Way Engineering, Iran University of Science and Technology, Tehran, Iran.
P. Hosseini Tehrani - Department of Rail Way Engineering, Iran University of Science and Technology, Tehran, Iran.

Thermographic method was proposed to be a highly effective nondestructive testing (NDT) method, especially when it comes to composite and polymer materialsused in automotive, railway and aerospace engineering, nuclear and oil industries. In this paper the application of infrared thermography inorder to detect the internal defects of polymer materials using cylindrical specimenare studied. The heat wave, generated by the thermo-mechanicalcoupling and the intrinsic energy dissipated during mechanical loading of the sample wasdetected by an infrared camera. The experimental results show that the local heating of polymer sample under monotonic loading is sensitive and accurate enough to manifest invisible crack and defect. It is shown that the evolution of the temperature field can be used to investigate the damage localization and to monitor the current location of the crack tip. This should help to investigate the behavior of defect during loading. Based on results, good predictions were confirmed to assess internal defect by means of Thermography.

Thermographic Method, Non destructive testing, edge crack, monotonic loading