Active chaotic excitation for bolted joint monitoring

Recent research has shown that high frequency chaotic excitation and state space reconstruction may be used to identify incipient damage (loss of preload) in a bolted joint. In this study, a new experiment is undertaken with updated test equipment, including a piezostack actuator that allows for precise control of bolt preload. The excitation waveform is applied to a macro-fiber composite (MFC) patch that is bonded to the test structure and is sensed in an active manner using a second MFC patch. A novel prediction error algorithm, based on comparing filtered properties of the guided chaotic waves, is used to determine the damage state of a frame structure and is shown to be highly sensitive to small levels of bolt preload loss. The performance of the prediction error method is compared with standard structural health monitoring damage features that are based on time series analysis using auto-regressive (AR) models.