A New Internal Detection Method for Fluid Transportation Pipeline Leak Based on Active Electrolocation

Pipeline leak internal inspection method is a key technology of safety assessment for industrial pipeline. Weakly electric fish can sense its surrounding environment by generating electric fields and detecting distortions through their active electrolocation system. In this paper, a new internal inspection leak method for fluid transportation pipeline, the active electrolocation internal inspection method, is proposed to pipe detection which is inspired by active electrolocation system of weakly electric fish. An experimental system for fluid transportation pipe leak detection based on active electrolocation has been constructed. To test the feasibility of this method and this experimental system's performance, the detecting property of this method with different working conditions for different material pipe, metallic and non-metallic pipes, were studied in this paper. And then, FFT (fast Fourier transformation) and joint time-frequency analysis was applied to analyze and process experimental data. FFT provides an available method to analyze the experimental results in the frequency domain at different point. Meanwhile, the joint time-frequency analysis method can achieve the observation any frequency component in the whole time domain. Finally, the positioning error and relative error of this method has been discussed and analyzed in this paper. In our study, experimental results show that leak spot in seamless steel pipe and PVC (polyvinyl chloride polymer) pipe with different working conditions can be effectively detected by the method. The internal inspection method for fluid transportation pipeline leak based on active electrolocation was validated by our study, which lays a foundation of a new online detection in pipe engineering field. A new internal inspection method for fluid transportation pipeline based on active electrolocation has been developed.