Repair of Cracked Structures under Dynamic Load Using Electromechanical Admittance Approach

In the present paper, the repair of a cracked structure under dynamic load using the electromechanical admittance (EMA) approach is investigated. Conceptually, appropriate electrical field are applied on the outer surfaces of piezoelectric (PZT) patches to effect closure of the crack. This has the effect of altering the electromechnaical (E/M) admittance signature, extracted at the electrical terminals of a specific PZT patch, considered as an admittance calculating sensor (ACS) patch, towards that of the healthy structure, which is the criterion concept used for the repair in this paper. To demonstrate the present repair methodology, a cantilever 3D beam numerical example is considered in combination with a FEM-based minimization of the difference between the healthy and cracked structure’s (E/M) admittance signature, for specific frequency ranges.