A study on detection of defect in solid propellant using ultrasonic simulation

This paper is concerned with the development of ultrasonic non-destructive testing (UT) method for a solid propellant. Solid propellants are fuels for motive force of a rocket motor. In general, the radiographic testing (RT) has been used to detect a defect in solid propellants. Since the use of RT needs much cost and time, it is strongly desirable to develop an alternative non-destructive testing method for solid propellants. Therefore, in this study, the use of UT, which is simple and widely used for various inspection for structures, is considered for detection of a defect in solid propellants. The voxel-based finite element method (FEM) is used to understand the ultrasonic wave propagation and scattering behavior in solid propellants. The fundamental elastodynamic theory and the FEM formulation used in this study are introduced. Some numerical results for UT simulation in which the complicated solid propellant geometry is considered are demonstrated to show the potential of the application of UT to on-site UT experiments.