Multi-Harmonic Nonlinear Ultrasonic Fusion with Deep Learning for Subtle Parameter Identification of Micro-Crack Groups

Fatigue crack defects in metallic materials significantly reduce the remaining useful life (RUL) of parts. However, much of the existing research has focused on identifying single-millimeter-scale cracks using individual nonlinear ultrasonic responses. The identification of subtle parameters from complex ultrasonic responses of micro-crack groups remains a significant challenge in the field of nondestructive testing. We propose a novel multi-harmonic nonlinear response fusion identification method integrated with a deep learning (DL) model to identify the subtle parameters of micro-crack groups. First, we trained a one-dimensional convolutional neural network (1D CNN) with various time-domain signals obtained from finite element method (FEM) models and analyzed the sensitivity of different harmonic nonlinear responses to various subtle parameters of micro-crack groups. Then, high harmonics were fused to perform a decoupled identification of multiple subtle parameters. We enhanced the Dempster-Shafer (DS) evidence theory used in decision fusion by accounting for different sensitivities, achieving an identification accuracy of 93.73%. Building on this, we assigned sensor weights based on our proposed new conflict measurement method and further conducted decision fusion on the decision results from multiple ultrasonic sensors. Our proposed method achieves an identification accuracy of 95.68%.