High-temperature integrated and flexible ultrasonic transducers for nondestructive testing

Integrated ultrasonic transducers (IUTs) and flexible ultrasonic transducers (FUTs) are presented for nondestructive testing at high temperatures. These transducers are made of sol–gel-sprayed piezoelectric thick (>40 μm) ceramic films. The ceramic materials are lead-zirconate-titanate, bismuth titanate and lithium niobate which are for thickness measurements up to 150, 400 and 800 °C, respectively. The IUT can also be deposited onto one end of a long ultrasonic delay line to perform nondestructive testing at the other end at even higher temperatures. FUTs made of bismuth titanate films onto thin stainless steel foils are also used for thickness measurements at 300 °C with a high-temperature couplant sandwiched between the FUT and a steel substrate. All experiments at high temperatures were performed in pulse-echo mode and ultrasonic echoes with signal-to-noise ratios above 20 dB were obtained. The center operation frequencies of both IUTs and FUTs range from 4.4 to 10.7 MHz.