Sudden, catastrophic fatigue failures in 40-50 year old U.S. Navy cranes were posing a significant danger to personnel and equipment. TRI Austin used acoustic emission (AE) NDE techniques to successfully detect fatigue crack growth under laboratory conditions and developed new AE standards, certification procedures, and new crane AE training services for NDE inspection vendors.
Photo 2 – crane acoustic emission (CAE) test stand that was built in Phase I to apply both service and certification loads to crane drive shafts.