Wave propagation in an anisotropic nickel-based superalloy

The effects of elastic anisotropy on ultrasound propagation in a nickel-based single crystal test component are studied using a 25 MHz focused probe in a water immersion system. Anisotropy gives rise to directionally dependent acoustic wavespeeds, beam steering, acoustic energy focusing and mode conversion for normal incidence. Transverse mode echoes are particularly strong in the vicinity of crystallographic directions in which the Gaussian curvature of the slowness surface is zero and divergence of the echo amplitude is predicted on the basis of the stationary phase approximation. There are other directions where the transverse mode echoes vanish for symmetry reasons. The longitudinal mode echo amplitude also shows significant variation with direction. Overall there is good agreement between the echo signal arrival times and amplitudes we measure and calculation. Progress in applying this technique to gas turbine blades is reported.