A novel inner surface enhancement method for holes utilizing ultrasonic cavitation.

Holes in housings, shafts and flanges lead to stress concentrations when the components are working under high dynamic loads. Peening methods are commonly used to improve the stress concentration and extend the working life. These methods, however, are difficult to treat the inner surface of the holes in the components because these surfaces are fully shadowed and limit the access of the shot streams, water jets or laser beams. A new developed method using ultrasonic cavitation can be expected to solve these problems by using a sonotrode with a special shape. The working principle is that the fluid enters through a narrow gap between the sonotrode and the inner surface to create a cavitation. In this paper, a new sonotrode was designed and manufactured, then tested at a resonance frequency of 23.8 kHz. The sono-chemiluminescence experiments were carried out to detect the cavitation intensity on the inner surfaces. The stainless-steel tubes were treated, and their surface properties were evaluated as well. The results show that the cavitation intensity is strongest at the working distance of 1 mm. The hardness increased by about 12% without the significant change of surface roughness.

Finite Element Calculation with Experimental Verification for a Free-Flooded Transducer Based on Fluid Cavity Structure.

A free-flooded transducer that couples the vibration of a longitudinal vibration transducer and the fluid cavity of an aluminum ring was investigated. Given the transducer is based on a fluid cavity structure and has no air cavity, it can resist high hydrostatic pressure when working underwater, which is suitable for application in the deep sea. At first, the structure and working principle of the transducer were introduced. Then, the axisymmetric finite element model of the transducer was established; and the transmitting voltage response, admittance, and radiation directivity of the transducer were simulated using the finite element method. According to the size of the finite element model, a prototype of the transducer was designed and fabricated, and the electro-acoustic performance of the prototype was measured in an anechoic water tank. The experimental results were consistent with the simulation results and showed a good performance of the transducer. Finally, the improvement of the radiation directivity of the transducer by the optimal design of the free-flooded aluminum ring was obtained using the finite element method and verified by experiments.

A sidelobe suppressing near-field beamforming approach for ultrasound array imaging.

A method is proposed to suppress sidelobe level for near-field beamforming in ultrasound array imaging. An optimization problem is established, and the second-order cone algorithm is used to solve the problem to obtain the weight vector based on the near-field response vector of a transducer array. The weight vector calculation results show that the proposed method can be used to suppress the sidelobe level of the near-field beam pattern of a transducer array. Ultrasound images following the application of weight vector to the array of a wire phantom are obtained by simulation with the Field II program, and the images of a wire phantom and anechoic sphere phantom are obtained experimentally with a 64-element 26 MHz linear phased array. The experimental and simulation results agree well and show that the proposed method can achieve a much lower sidelobe level than the conventional delay and sum beamforming method. The wire phantom image is demonstrated to focus much better and the contrast of the anechoic sphere phantom image improved by applying the proposed beamforming method.

Robust high-order superdirectivity of circular sensor arrays.

This paper presents a detailed study of the high-order superdirectivity of circular sensor arrays, which is aimed at completing the authors' recently proposed analytical superdirectivity model. From the limit expression of the maximum directivity factor, it is shown that the circular arrays possess good potential for directivity improvement. It is found that the sensitivity function used as a robustness measurement can also be accurately decomposed into a series of closed-form sensitivity functions of eigenbeams, similar to the optimal beampattern and its corresponding directivity factor. Moreover, the performance of eigenbeams can be regarded as an indicator of error sensitivity, and the robustness constraint parameters can be estimated easily. Two specific approaches are proposed for obtaining robust superdirectivity on the basis of robustness analyses, and their performance is demonstrated experimentally.

Broadband pattern synthesis for circular sensor arrays.

The solutions of pattern synthesis are derived for circular sensor arrays based on the criterion of minimizing the mean square error between the desired and synthesized beampatterns. Specifically, the optimal weighting vector, the output beam, and the minimum mean square error are all expressed in closed-form exactly when the desired beampattern is properly formulated. These results provide a more effective and convenient scheme for designing practical frequency-invariant beamformers. Simulations and experimental results demonstrate the performance of the proposed approach.

Optimization of acoustic emitted field of transducer array for ultrasound imaging.

A method is proposed to calculate the weight vector of a transducer array for ultrasound imaging to obtain a low-sidelobe transmitting beam pattern based on the near-field response vector. An optimization problem is established, and the second-order cone (SOC) algorithm is used to solve the problem to obtain the weight vector. The optimized acoustic emitted field of the transducer array is then calculated using the Field II program by applying the obtained weight vector to the array. The simulation results with a 64-element 26 MHz linear phased array show that the proposed method can be used to control the sidelobe of the near-field transmitting beam pattern of the transducer array and achieve a low-sidelobe level. The near-field sound pressure distribution of the transducer array using the proposed method focuses much better than that using the standard delay and sum (DAS) beamforming method. The sound energy is more concentrated using the proposed method.

Optimization of transmitting beam patterns of a conformal transducer array.

A method is presented to calculate the driving-voltage weighting vector of a conformal array of underwater acoustic transmitting transducers to obtain a low-sidelobe beam pattern based on the measured receiving array manifold. The relationship among three quantities is given, which are, respectively, the radiated acoustic field, the measured receiving array manifold matrix and the driving-voltage weighting vector of the transducer array. Then, the driving-voltage weighting vector of the array is calculated using the optimization method to obtain a low-sidelobe transmitting beam pattern. At the frequency of 12.5 kHz, the receiving array manifold matrix of a 27-element conformal array is measured in an anechoic water tank. The driving-voltage weighting vector of the array is calculated using the proposed method. In addition, the computer simulation and experiments are carried out. The results agree well and show that the proposed method can obtain a low-sidelobe transmitting beam pattern and at the same time provide the largest amplitude of pressure in the axial direction when the maximum amplitude of the driving voltages of the array elements keeps unchanged.