Langasite surface acoustic wave devices can be used to implement harsh-environment wireless sensing of gas concentration and temperature. This paper reviews prior work on the development of langasite surface acoustic wave devices, followed by a report of recent progress toward the implementation of oxygen gas sensors. Resistive metal oxide films can be used as the oxygen sensing film, although development of an adherent barrier layer will be necessary with the sensing layers studied here to prevent interaction with the langasite substrate. Experimental results are presented for the performance of a langasite surface acoustic wave oxygen sensor with tin oxide sensing layer, and these experimental results are correlated with direct measurements of the sensing layer resistivity.

Strain monitoring is a nondestructive inspection method that can reveal the redistribution of internal forces, or the presence of anomalous loadings, in structures. Surface acoustic wave (SAW) devices are small, robust, inexpensive solid-state components in which a wave propagates along the surface of a piezoelectric material, and such devices are used in large numbers commercially as delay devices and as filters. Changes in strain or temperature cause shifts in the acoustic wave speed, by which such SAW devices can also serve as sensors. We present analytical, FEM simulation, and experimental studies on SAW devices fabricated in our laboratory on lithium niobate wafers, with an inter-electrode spacing of 8 micrometers. We discuss the change in wave speed with temperature and with strain, we outline the influence of rotated cuts for the piezoelectric substrate, and we show results of laboratory sensing experiments. Moreover, an electrode on a SAW device can be terminated as an antenna and interrogated with a wireless RF probe to act as a passively-powered device, and we present laboratory results incorporating such wireless performance in our research investigation. We pattern one set of electrodes on the SAW device as a transducer connected to the antenna, and other sets of electrodes on the device acting as reflectors of the surface acoustic wave. At the RF frequencies used for SAW devices, it is realistic to use directional antennas on the probe unit to achieve reasonable stand-off distances.

We report on the application of wafer-type PZT transducers to the detection of flaws in steel plate girders. In these experiments one transducer is used to emit a pulse and the second receives the pulse and reflections from nearby boundaries, flaws, or discontinuities (pitch-catch mode). In this application there will typically be numerous reflections observed in the undamaged structure. A major challenge is to recognize new reflections caused by fatigue cracks in the presence of these background reflections. A laboratory specimen plate girder was fabricated at approximately half scale, 910 mm deep with an h/t ratio of 280 for the web and a b/t ratio of 16 for the flanges, and with transverse stiffeners fabricated with a web gap at the tension flange. Two wafer-type transducers were mounted on the web approximately 175 mm from the crack location, one on each side of the stiffener. The transducers were operated in pitch-catch mode, excited by a windowed sinusoid to create a narrowband transient excitation. The transducer location relative to the crack corresponded to a total included angle of roughly 30 degrees in the path reflecting from the crack. Cyclic loading was applied to develop a distortion-induced fatigue crack in the web at the web gap location. After appearance of the crack, ultrasonic measurements were performed at a range of center frequencies below the cutoff frequency of the A1 Lamb wave mode. Subsequently the crack was extended mechanically to simulate crack growth under primary longitudinal (bending) stress and the measurements were repeated. Direct differencing of the signals showed arrivals at times corresponding to reflection from the crack location, growing in amplitude as the crack was lengthened mechanically. These results demonstrate the utility of Lamb waves for crack detection even in the presence of numerous background reflections.