Estimation of Hysteretic Interfacial Stiffness of Contact Surfaces

This paper proposes an ultrasonic method for measurement of linear and hysteretic interfacial stiffness of contacting surfaces between two steel plates subjected to nominal compression pressure. Interfacial stiffness was evaluated by the reflection and transmission coefficients obtained from three consecutive reflection waves from solid-solid surface using the shear wave. A nonlinear hysteretic spring model was proposed and used to define the quantitative interfacial stiffness of interface with the reflection and transmission coefficients. Acoustic model for 1-D wave propagation across interfaces is developed to formulate the reflection and transmission waves and to determine the linear and nonlinear hysteretic interfacial stiffness. Two identical plates are put together to form a contacting surface and pressed by bolt-fastening to measure interfacial stiffness at different states of contact pressure. It is found from experiment that the linear and hysteretic interfacial stiffness are successfully determined by the reflection and transmission coefficient at the contact surfaces through ultrasonic pulse-echo measurement.