Research on cost-effective and efficient testing of Air Force equipment will continue with federal funds. The Center for Nondestructive Evaluation of Iowa State has been given $1 million to continue the research.

“The program has been under way for three years now and has focused on the development of equipment-testing techniques, so they may be used for longer periods time safely,” said Bruce Thompson, director of the Center.

Thompson explained all planes are designed with the same life span, but not all planes are going to fail at the same time.

The center’s goal is to find ways to remove the planes that fail first and keep the ones that remain operational safe.

“We have been working with the Air Force for several years now and work on applying technologies developed to the specific needs of the Air Force,” said Lisa Bracshe, associate director of the center.

“One of the research projects the center is working on focuses on the new problems that occur on aging equipment that old testing methods may not detect.”

Strengthening techniques such as shock pinging where the surface of the jet’s engines are bombarded with tiny particles to increase the compressive strength of the engine surface must undergo retesting to ensure safety, Thompson said.

“We are working to develop a measurement technique to make sure compressive strength is still present; this strongly influences if the engine can still be used,” he said.

The center is working on developing an X-ray machine that can see deeper into aircraft to find weaknesses in the compressive strength of the pinged material.

“We are dealing with a hardware problem in the X-ray machine. We need to get a very high amount of energy directed at certain angles to see beyond the surface of the plane,” Brasche said.

“Within a jet engine there are various turbine discs; these discs act as support for the blade that provides the thrust, if these disks fail the engine fails,” said Joseph Gray, adjunct associate professor at the center.

“This is what happened in the Sioux City air crash, and a single engine plane can be shattered. We are developing a method using X-ray machines to test the disks to make sure this does not happen,” Gray said.

Another technique developing at the center involves eddy current technology, Brasche said.

“Eddy currents work by measuring the conductivity of metal and structural differences such as a crack can be found when the differences in conductivity are detected,” Brasche said.

“The center, for the past several years, has led the way in computer simulation technology,” Thompson said.

Every time a new testing method is developed that method must be tested to ensure it will detect actual problems. These costs can be enormous, Thompson explained.

“If we have to run five tests and each of those tests costs $100,000, that is a huge amount to test a test,” he said.

“The Air Force spends a significant amount of money testing equipment, and operational costs go up each year with the aging of equipment,” Thompson said. “Our job is to keep those costs down and the planes flying.”