Managing uncertainties in fatigue damage prognosis using piezoelectric transducers

Damage Prognosis is estimating the systems remaining lifespan by measuring the current state of the system, estimating the future loading environment for the system, and predicting through simulation. An accurate Prognosis could help to predict the structural failure before it take place, hence to prevent unwanted losses of structure and human lives. Damage Prognosis is affected by many aspect of uncertainties, which are physical variability, material variability, data uncertainty and modelling errors. In this research, data uncertainty is investigated by experiments and numerical studies. The experiments were carried out on laboratory aluminium plate specimens by Lamb Wave Method, and Monte Carlo simulation is used for numerical studies. However, the proposed method of Damage Prognosis is not ideal, as it always underestimated the lifespan of the specimen. Further study is necessary to improve the accuracy of the prediction.Bachelor of Engineering (Civil