• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.9 no.1
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• pp.334-343
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• 2014

In this paper, we suggest a method to improve the fusion of an accelerometer and gyro sensor by using a Kalman filter to produce a more high-quality respiration signal to supplement the weakness of using a single accelerometer. To evaluate our proposed algorithm's performance, we developed a chest belt-type module. We performed experiments consisting of aerobic exercise and muscular exercises with 10 subjects. We compared the derived respiration signal from the accelerometer with that from our algorithm using the standard respiration signal from the piezoelectric sensor in the time and frequency domains during the aerobic and muscular exercises. We also analyzed the time delay to verify the synchronization between the output and standard signals. We confirmed that our algorithm improved the respiratory rate's detection accuracy by 4.6% and 9.54% for the treadmill and leg press, respectively, which are dynamic. We also confirmed a small time delay of about 0.638 s on average. We determined that real-time monitoring of the respiration signal is possible. In conclusion, our suggested algorithm can acquire a more high-quality respiration signal in a dynamic exercise environment away from a limited static environment to provide safer and more effective exercises and improve exercise sustainability.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.17 no.10
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• pp.1041-1048
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• 2004

Chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) process was studied in terms of tribology in this paper. CMP performed by the down force and the relative motion of pad and wafer with slurry is typically tribological system composed of friction, wear and lubrication. The piezoelectric quartz sensor for friction force measurement was installed and the friction force was detected during CMP process. Various friction signals were attained and analyzed with the kind of pad, abrasive and abrasive concentration. As a result of experiment, the lubrication regime is classified with ηv/p(η, v and p; the viscosity, relative velocity and pressure). The characteristics of friction and material removal mechanism is also different as a function of the kind of abrasive and the abrasive concentration in slurry. Especially, the material removal per unit distance is directly proportional to the friction force and the non~uniformity has relation to the coefficient of friction.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.1 no.4
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• pp.339-353
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• 2005

This paper presents the results of a feasibility study on an impedance-based damage detection technique using thickness modes of piezoelectric (PZT) patches for steel structures. It is newly proposed to analyze the changes of the impedances of the thickness modes (frequency range > 1 MHz) at the PZT based on its resonant frequency shifts rather than those of the lateral modes (frequency range > 20 kHz) at the PZT based on its root mean square (RMS) deviations, since the former gives more significant variations in the resonant frequency shifts of the signals for identifying localities of small damages under the same measurement condition. In this paper, firstly, a numerical analysis was performed to understand the basics of the NDE technique using the impedance using an idealized 1-D electro-mechanical model consisting of a steel plate and a PZT patch. Then, experimental studies were carried out on two kinds of structural members of steel. Comparisons have been made between the results of crack detections using the thickness and lateral modes of the PZT patches.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• v.15 no.1
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• pp.10-16
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• 1996

Ultrasonic motor is a motor driven by the stator via frictional contact forces generated from ultrasonic vibration of piezoelectric elements. In order to control the ultrasonic motor, it is essential to measure accurately the motor characteristics with respect to driving parameters such as frequency, voltage, phase difference and duty ratio of the driving signals. In this paper, a PC-interfaced evaluation device is developed, and the characteristic curves of the fabricated ultrasonic motor are measured with those parameters. All driving parameters are processed digitally. The developed evaluation device can facilitate charateristics measurements effectively, and provide a base for digital control of the ultrasonic motor.

• Transactions of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering
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• v.22 no.10
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• pp.1010-1019
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• 2012

Non-contact detection of internal defects in a rail using ultrasonic waves is discussed in this paper. Cracks in a rail may be the cause of a serious railway accident such as derailment if left undetected. Concurrent rail inspection method based on ultrasonic testing using piezoelectric transducers has several limitations as it should keep physical contact with the rail. This work suggests a non-contact detection of internal defects in a rail using ElectroMagnetic Acoustic Transducers (EMAT) which can produce and measure ultrasonic waves in a rail without any couplant. The EMATs for rail inspection are designed and fabricated and their working performance is verified through a series of experiments on various types of internal defects in test rails. The effect of lift-off between the transducers and the rail on the generated signals is also discussed.

• Composites Research
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.11-17
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• 2002

The piezoelectric thin film sensor can be used to interpret variations in structural and material properties, e.g. for structural integrity monitoring and assessment. To illustrate one of this potential benefit, PVDF (polyvinylidene fluoride) film sensors are used for monitoring impact damage in Gr/Ep composite panels. Both PVDF film sensors and strain gages are attached to the surface of Gr/Ep specimens. A series of impact tests at various impact energy by changing impact mass the height are performed on the instrumented drop weight impact tester. The sensor responses are carefully examined to predict the onset of impact damage such as indentation, matrix cracking, and delamination, etc. Test results show that the particular waveforms of sensor signals implying the damage initiation and development are detected above the damage initiation impact energy. As expected, the PVDF film sensor is found to be more sensitive to impact damage initiation event than the strain gage.

• Journal of Biomedical Engineering Research
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.7-14
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• 2011

This study suggested an optimized algorithm for detecting the loss of balance(LOB) in the seated position. And the sensitivity analysis was performed in order to identify the role of each design variable in the algorithm. The LOB algorithm consisted of data processing of measured signals, an internal model of the central nervous system and a control error anomaly(CEA) detector. This study optimized design variables of a CEA detector to obtain improved values of the success rate(SR) of detecting the LOB and the margin time(MT) provided for preventing the falling. Nine healthy adult volunteers were involved in the experiments. All the subjects were asked to balance their body in a predescribed seated posture with the rear legs of a four-legged wooden chair. The ground reaction force from the right leg was measured from the force plate while the accelerations of the chair and the head were measured from a couple of piezoelectric accelerometers. The measured data were processed to predict the LOB using a detection algorithm. Variables S2, h2 and hd are related to the detector: S2 represents a data selecting window, h2 a time shift and hd an operating period of the LOB detection algorithm. S2 was varied from 0.1 to 10 sec with an increment of 0.1 sec, and both h2 and hd were varied from 0.01 to 1.0 sec with an increment of 0.01 sec. It was found that the SR and MT were increased by up to 9.7% and 0.497 sec comparing with the previously published case when the values of S2, h2 and hd were set to 4.5, 0.3 and 0.2 sec, respectively. Also the results of sensitivity analysis showed that S2 and h2 had considerable influence on the SR while these variables were not so sensitive to the MT.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
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• v.34 no.6
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• pp.29-34
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• 2006

This study experimentally investigates the characteristics of Lamb wave propagating in a composite plate of varied thickness. In practical aerospace structures, there are so many parts that have varied thickness. Therefore, in order to employ the Lamb wave in a structural health monitoring of those parts, it is necessary to understand correctly the characteristics of Lamb wave for the structure with thickness variation. Thin surface-bonded piezoelectric transducers, which have great potential in integrated monitoring systems for structural health, were used to generate and receive Lamb waves. The predicted propagation velocity under the assumptions of ideal mode conversions was compared with the experimentally measured one. The validity of the results was supported by the frequency analysis of the signals. Consequently, the results show that the transient region is occurred when Lamb waves propagate across the region that thickness variation over some gradient exists.

• The Journal of Engineering Geology
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.59-64
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• 1996

Acoustic Emission(AE) signals are emitted by a sudden release of strain energy associated with material damage. A multi-channels of LeCroy system and piezoelectric pressure transducers are employed for AE measurement to investigate the roles of AE in the propagation of macro cracks as well as the characteris-tics of AE wave in occurrence, amplitude and dominant frequency with changes in macro loading modes. Deduced crack opening volume of micro cracks varied widely and implies that AE events could be caused by crystal dislocations on a small scale and grain boundary movements on a large scale. Amplitude of first arrival AE wave emitted during mode I test was approximately 3 times higher than those from mixed mode test, while the number of AE count in mode I test was only 25% of mixed mode. It may imply that the total energy required for generation of a given fracture surface is similar regardless in change of macroloading modes.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.308-317
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• 2009

In the present work, a sensor system composed of an oscillator sensor and a Lamb wave sensor is proposed for the purpose of structural health monitoring. The oscillator sensing system detecting the shift of a structural resonant frequency in proportion to the amount of defects in the structure is a pretty sensitive and simple device, but its detectable range is limited to its local zone. The Lamb wave sensor system, however, is applicable to global detection of the defects. This study is aimed at investigating the feasible combination of the two systems to exploits their merits simultaneously. The scheme to use PZT patches as the oscillator sensor as well as the Lamb wave sensor was proposed to identify the position, length and number of cracks by means of TOF and amplitude of signals, and its validity was confirmed through experiments.