Young׳s Modulus evaluation using Particle Image Velocimetry and Finite Element Inverse Analysis

Most of the conventional design solutions using the Finite Element Method (FEM) have the material׳s properties defined. This is necessary to set those properties from commercial software library to run the simulations. However, some material׳s properties are not standardized which can provide unreliable results due to wrong input data to the simulations. In this case, non-destructive mechanical tests for measuring deformations can be used to generate displacements values in order to provide the material behavior through FEM inverse analysis methods. This paper is focused on using Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) together with the Particle-Swarm Optimization (PSO) algorithm and the FEM inverse analysis to investigate Young׳s Modulus of the material ASTM A36 steel. The displacements of a cantilever beam were measured by means of PIV association to the speckle patterns provided by a laser beam. The results indicated Young׳s Modulus estimation error around 5% compared to the original material properties. It shows the potentiality of PIV associated to PSO in order to determine the mechanical properties of steel via the FEM inverse analysis in a robust and low cost procedure.