NDT TECHNIQUES

Pulsed Eddy Current (PEC)

&
Long Range Ultrasonic Test (LRUT)
By: Abhinav
Kumar Jha
Inspection
Department

CONTENT
1. PEC
Working principle
Application and Defects Detected
Advantages and Limitations

2. LRUT
Working principle
Application and Defects Detected
Advantages and Limitations

PULSED EDDY CURRENT

WORKING PRINCIPLE
A pulsed magnetic field is sent by the probe coil. This
penetrates through any non-magnetic material between the
probe and the object under inspection (e.g. insulation
material). The varying magnetic field will induce eddy currents
on the surface of the object. The diffusive behaviour of these
eddy currents is related to the material properties and the wall
thickness of the object.
Step function voltage is used to excite the coil instead of
sinusoidal AC voltage as it contains a large range of
frequencies.

PULSED EDDY CURRENT

APPLICATIONS

DEFECTS DETECTED

Corrosion
under
insulation: pipes, vessels,
columns, heat exchanger
shells and storage tanks.
High
temperature
application:
Heat
exchangers shells etc.
In-service
corrosion
monitoring
In-service
assessment
of
heavily
corroded
pipes and vessels.

Relative Wall thickness

loss.
CUI
Inspection under
insulation

PULSED EDDY CURRENT

ADVANTAGES

LIMITATIONS

No
need
for
direct
contact.
Wall thickness can be
measured
through
insulation. (~200mm)
PEC can measure through
aluminum and stainless
weather sheeting.
No
need
for
surface
penetration.
Corrosion
product
need
not
be
removed (<20mm).
Wide
temperature
range
(-100
-500

Only applicable to carbon

steel and low-alloy steel.
Non-magnetic materials
can not be tested.
PEC find the average
thickness of its foot print
so smallest defect that can
be detected is about 50%
of insulation thickness so
small localized pitting
and small leaks may not
be detected.
Geometry of the test
sample should be fairly
simple.
Readings
are

LONG RANGE UT
WORKING PRINCIPLE
LRUT employs low frequency guided
waves, propagated from a ring of
transducers fixed around the pipe.
Wherever the wave encounters a change
in pipe wall thickness, a proportion of
energy
is reflected back to the
transducers, thus providing a mechanism
for detection of discontinuities.
In case of a pipe feature such as a
girth weld joint, increase in thickness
is symmetrical around the pipe, so the
advancing circular wave front is also
reflected uniformly.
In case of pipe corrosion, decrease in
thickness will be localized, leading to
scattering of incident wave (in addition
to reflection and mode conversion).
The mode-converted waves tend to

LONG RANGE UT
APPLICATION

DEFECTS DETECTED

In-service inspection of
pipelines. In refinery, it is
carried out for over head
lines of columns, buried
lines and in lines where full
de-lagging is not possible.

CUI
General wall thickness reduction
Perforation

LONG RANGE UT
ADVANTAGES

LIMITATIONS

In-service inspection of
degradation and metal loss
for very large length of
pipe is possible.
100% coverage of pipe
wall.
Detection of internal as
well as external metal
loss.
Leaks
can
be
detected.
Reduction in cost of
gaining
access
and
minimal requirement of
insulation removal.

Difficult to detect small

pitting. Although large
area
pitting
can
be
detected.
As it uses UT technique,
it can not be used for
high temperature lines.
Not effective in detecting
near
areas
close
to
accessories.
Interpretation of data is
highly operator dependent.

REFERENCES

www.ndt.net/article/ecndt02/251/251.htm
https://www.nde-ed.org
www.tuv.com
www.inspecta.com
www.inspectionengineer.com

Thank You!