Real Time Damage Monitoring of Composite Vehicle Armor Structure Integrity Using Embedded Sensors

Composite materials are increasingly employed in vehicle armor due to their high strength to mass ratio. The complex structure of composite vehicle armor panels leads to complex modes of failure of such panels when exposed to battlefield environment. There is a need to develop NDT/NDE technology to assess the health state of such panels on the battlefield. Luna Innovations proposes to develop an all-fiber optic ultrasonic NDE solution to address this problem. The key component of SHM system is a highly multiplexible transducer generating ultrasonic waves in the predefined locations of the optical fiber. Using such a technique, 10s of transducers and 1000s of sensors can be placed on the optical fibers embedded or surface-mounted to the composite panel. In Phase I the feasibility of the solution will be experimentally demonstrated and the model of the wave propagation in armor panel will be developed. In Phase II, sensors, transducers will continue to be refined and instrumented panels will undergo extensive testing and validation. In Phase III, Luna will commercialize the developed technology. The developed technology will be used on the FCS Armor ATO, TWVS ATO and on various army light weight vehicles including JLTV, MMWV and MRAP.