The shear horizontal guided wave fundamental mode (SH0) has the particularity of being the only non-dispersive plate guided wave mode. This characteristic makes this ultrasonic guided wave mode very attractive in non-destructive testing, facilitating signal processing for long range inspections. It is, however, difficult to generate only a single guided wave mode when using piezoelectric transduction. This work aims to develop a piezoelectric transducer capable of generating a virtually pure plane zeroth order shear horizontal wave. The chosen material was the PZT-5H for its dominant d15 piezoelectric constant, which makes it a perfect candidate for SH-wave generation. The transducer dimensions were optimised using an analytical model based on the Huygens’ principle of superposition and the dipole pattern of a shear point source. A 3D multiphysics finite element model was then used to validate the analytical model results. Experimental validation was finally conducted with a laser Doppler vibrometer (LDV) system. Excellent agreement between the analytical model, finite element model and experimental validation was seen.

Structural health monitoring is a prominent alternative to the scheduled maintenance of safety-critical components. The nondispersive nature as well as the through-thickness mode shape of the fundamental shear horizontal guided wave mode (SH ${}_0$ ) make it a particularly attractive candidate for ultrasonic guided wave structural health monitoring. However, plane wave excitation of SH ${}_0$ at a high level of purity remains challenging because of the existence of the fundamental Lamb modes (A ${}_0$ and S ${}_0$ ) below the cutoff frequency thickness product of high-order modes. This paper presents a piezoelectric transducer concept optimized for plane SH ${}_0$ wave transduction based on the transducer geometry. The transducer parameter exploration was initially performed using a simple analytical model. A 3D multiphysics finite element model was then used to refine the transducer design. Finally, an experimental validation was conducted with a 3D laser Doppler vibrometer system. The analytical model, the finite element model, and the experimental measurement showed excellent agreement. The modal selectivity of SH ${}_0$ within a 20 ${}^{\circ }$ beam opening angle at the design frequency of 425 kHz in a 1.59 mm aluminum plate was 23 dB, and the angle of the 6 dB wavefront was 86 ${}^{\circ }$ .

Paratellurite, also known as α-tellurium dioxide, is a ceramic that is primarily employed for its interesting optical properties. However, this material’s crystal structure belongs to the 422 symmetry class that allows a unique piezoelectric behavior to manifest itself: deformation in pure face-shear. This means that crystal symmetry necessitates the piezoelectric tensor to have only a single non-zero coefficient, d₁₂₃ = d₁₄: such unique behavior has the potential to enable novel gyroscopic sensors and high-precision torsional microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) actuators, as pure face-shear can be used to induce pure torsion. Although α-TeO₂ is one of the few known materials belonging to this symmetry class, considerable uncertainty in its single piezoelectric coefficient exists, with the few reported literature values ranging from 6.13 to 14.58 pC/N; this large uncertainty results from the difficulty in using conventional piezoelectric characterization techniques on paratellurite, limiting measurements to indirect methods. The novel applications that would be enabled by the adoption of this extraordinary material are frustrated by this lack of confidence in the literature. We therefore leverage, for the first time, a first-principles analytical physical model with electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) to determine, directly, the lone piezoelectric coefficient d₁₂₃ = d₁₄ = 7.92 pC/N.