Millimeter-Wave Radar Sensor for Automated Tomographic Imaging of Composite Materials in a Manufacturing Environment

To unlock the full potential of composite materials, reliable measurement methods during and after their manufacturing are required. Established measuring methods are commonly based on ultrasound or thermographic imaging techniques and offer only a limited usability. A promising alternative to the a...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published inIEEE sensors letters Vol. 5; no. 3; pp. 1 - 4
Main Authors Meier, Dominik, Zech, Christian, Baumann, Benjamin, Gashi, Bersant, Malzacher, Matthias, Schlechtweg, Michael, Kuhn, Jutta, Rosch, Markus, Reindl, Leonhard M.
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Piscataway IEEE 01.03.2021
The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
Subjects
Automation
Classification
Composite materials
Fault detection
Imaging
Imaging techniques
Industrial robots
Manufacturing
Measurement methods
Microwave/millimeter wave sensors
Millimeter waves
millimeter-wave (mmW) radar
nondestructive testing
Radar
Radar imaging
Resins
robot programming
Robots
Service robots
Thermography
Tomography
Ultrasonic testing
Online AccessGet full text

Cover

More Information
Summary:To unlock the full potential of composite materials, reliable measurement methods during and after their manufacturing are required. Established measuring methods are commonly based on ultrasound or thermographic imaging techniques and offer only a limited usability. A promising alternative to the aforementioned methods are millimeter-wave-based systems. It has already been demonstrated that such systems can provide a tomographic representation of composite materials, enabling the detection, localization, and classification of critical defects within the component. The tomographic millimeter-wave imaging system presented here is operating in the W band and is packaged for the operation in a manufacturing environment. For this purpose, it is enclosed by a dustproof housing and can be mounted on an industrial robot, which enables the development of an automated measurement procedure during and after the manufacturing process of composite materials. The direct integration of the measurement system into the manufacturing process allows for early-stage fault detection and classification, which is essential for the production of high-quality, high-performance, and highly reliable composite materials.
ISSN:2475-1472
2475-1472
DOI:10.1109/LSENS.2021.3055060