A review of field implementation of infrared thermography as a non-destructive evaluation technology

Abstract

The aging of highway infrastructure is a serious problem worldwide. As important constituents of this infrastructure, bridges have usually been inspected by visual inspection techniques and hammer sounding methods. In addition to these existing methods, different non-destructive evaluation technologies are also being developed and are expected to be utilized for effective management of highway structures. This study focuses on exploring and enhancing the usability of infrared thermography as a viable non-destructive evaluation technology. In this research, an experimental study was conducted to determine the most thriving time window to collect data from an object by using an infrared camera. The same setup was utilized to obtain data from existing structures. The results have shown that the night time was a better option to gather data from an object. It was also observed that infrared thermography could detect subsurface anomalies. © ASCE 2014.