Personal glimpses from the 2014 Aerospace Symposium
16/06/2014
Dave Clarke, Chair, West of England Branch, reports
The morning of Wednesday, 31 April arrived and the 2014 Aerospace Symposium started. There were around 50 delegates, 15 speakers and 34 exhibitors at this event, which continues to be a great window to the world of aerospace NDT. The papers followed the four themes that were introduced in the previous symposia:- The State of the Industry – providing a snapshot of where current NDT regulation and use is at present.
- Spotlights – focusing on three current projects.
- Changes in the Air – looking at the NDT of new materials and processes.
- Quantum Leaps – looking at some of the long-term future research.
After a well-earned coffee break, which allowed delegates time to visit the excellent exhibition, Stuart Ratcliff of GKN spoke about the NDT performed at the Severn Beach Facility, followed by Tony Dunhill providing an insight into the NATO AVT224 project. From these two talks, for me, three themes emerged – the increasing use of phased array technologies and the need for collaboration on test results and the sharing of test information.
After a buffet lunch, in which there was ample time to visit the exhibition and talk with the various exhibitors, a spotlight was put on 10 of them. This spotlight allowed each exhibitor two minutes to explain something about their company and equipment. This was followed by three papers about the NDT of composites from Tim Young of the National Composites Centre at Bristol, Robert Smith of the University of Bristol and Tony Dunhill of Rolls-Royce. Once again, the emphasis seemed to be on the use of modelling to investigate complex composite problems, such as fibre wrinkling, and the use of more complex forms of ultrasonic testing using multi-element probe techniques.Next, Daryl Almond, from the University of Bath, gave an explanation of software that he has developed, which allows users to see if any particular NDT problem could be solved using infrared/thermography techniques. The last speaker of the day, Tom Danvers of Rolls-Royce, explained the strategy of developing an ‘NDT toolbox’ of techniques to help keep engines running and testing performed ‘on wing’.
Day two of the symposium arrived and throughout the day the emphasis was more on the future of technology and less on its current commercial use. The first paper was presented by Ian Cooper of TWI on the development of a robotic system to fast scan complex-shaped components. This was a theme that would be taken up later by two speakers from Strathclyde University. The next paper was given by Rob Hughes, working for Rolls-Royce, on the development of eddy current arrays and their improvement. He used a very informative animated video to demonstrate the principle of eddy currents, one which would be very useful in an NDT school as part of its eddy current training. Lastly, before a coffee break, Bob Lasser of Imperium presented a very informative paper on the use of ultrasound through an acoustic camera that allowed ‘real-time’ scanning of, mainly, composite components.After the coffee break, two speakers from Strathclyde University, Gareth Pierce and Tony Gachagan, continued the theme of scanning complex components using ultrasound techniques associated with robotic systems to position the probe arrays. These two talks included the use of new advanced computational techniques to analyse the results. Robotics certainly seems to me to be the way to develop systems that can more easily scan complex shapes, delivering a flexibility that rigid systems are less able to deliver.
Just before lunch, another group of exhibitors were able to highlight their wares.
After lunch there were just two papers left, both on the future of NDT. Keith Newton, Director of RCNDE, gave the delegates a summary of the research taking place at several universities that is being jointly funded by the Research Council and industry. This was the vision of the future as seen by those in academia as well as experts in industry. The future seems bright and positive, with useful research being performed. The last paper of the symposium took the delegates into the realms of electronic noise and how, by the use of non-linear information, results can be improved and technique sensitivities improved.
NDT is alive and well within the aerospace industries and the future looks bright and exciting. Those of us of more advanced years should enthuse with the young potential engineers of the future to let them know that NDT is where they ought to be.
My thanks to all the speakers, exhibitors and delegates who made the symposium a place to be and an enjoyable one as well. Thanks should also go to all the BINDT and organising staff who made everything flow, especially when some things did not work as planned, for example the initial projector problems. These were all overcome, though, by smiles and adaptation.
