Ultrasonic tomographic imaging of an encased highly-attenuating solid media

Ultrasonic tomographic imaging has been performed on a highly-attenuating filled hydroxyl-terminated polybutadiene, cast into a steel case. Extremely low signal levels due to the attenuation and scattering properties of the polymer were present. Complications also arose from high amplitude guided waves within the steel case, which tended to mask directly-transmitted signals through the propellant. These were solved using specially-designed and pulse-compression signal processing. Images will be presented to demonstrate the technique.