Meridional ray backscattering enhancements for empty truncated tilted cylindrical shells: measurements,ray model,and effects of a mode threshold

Narrow-band backscattering experiments are used to characterize a meridional ray enhancement on a tilted, finite empty cylindrical shell having a blunt truncation. The meridional ray of the lowest order flexural leaky Lamb wave is examined, which has previously been shown to lead to large backscattering enhancements for excitation frequencies near and above the shell's coincidence frequency. The measurements are used to validate a convolution formulation ray theory describing the far-field backscattered amplitudes. Comparisons are also made with an approximate partial wave series solution for the finite cylindrical shell. The amplitude of the meridional ray enhancement is dependent on the nature of the reflection of the leaky wave from the shell truncation. While the peak measured amplitude agrees with predictions at low frequencies, experiments indicate the enhancement is degraded at high frequencies and exhibits an abrupt drop near the frequency of the mode threshold (cutoff) for the next-highest flexural mode. The nature of the leaky wave end reflection is examined using an approximate calculation of the energy reflection coefficient for leaky waves on a semi-infinite free plate. Results suggest the observed degradation is the result of mode conversion effects.