A data fusion based approach for evaluation of material loss in corroded aluminum panels

Nondestructive Testing (NDT) is used to detect hidden corrosion in ageing aircraft structures. Use of any single NDT modality provides an incomplete picture of the corrosion environment. Data fusion techniques can be used for improved visualization and automated detection of hidden corrosion in multilayered structures. This work investigates a data fusion based technique using ultrasound measurements from corroded aircraft samples for estimating material loss. Experimental results are presented and suggestions for future work are made for evaluating residual structural integrity of the panels for a damage tolerance approach to corrosion mitigation.