Acoustoelasticity phenomenon used for nondestructive evaluation of in-plane principal stresses

The article contains results of theoretical and experimental investigations of the main problems of the acoustoelasticity phenomenon application for the nondestructive evaluation of stressed (strained) state of materials and constructions for commercial application spent by the author for the last 30 years. Results of researches concerned with acoustoelastic determination of mechanical stresses in special-purpose engineering constructions with large dimensions are summarized in the article. The manuscript covers as well the acoustoelastic effect application for investigation of the stressed state of wider class of industrial objects studied for the last 10 years within the framework of a proper “conversion program”. The basic foundations of the acoustoelasticity phenomenon application for biaxial stress evaluation with the help of bulk waves propagated normally to the plane of stresses are established. The practical problems of determination of in-plane principal stresses in real objects in a case of the acoustical tensometry (i.e. stress monitoring in process of manufacturing and exploitation of the objects) are considered. Some practical examples of the acoustoelasticity phenomenon application for biaxial stress evaluation are described.