BOOK REVIEWS

Ultrasound in industrial processing and control edited by V. F. Nozdreva. Translated from the Russian. Consultants Bureau Inc. (1964) 202 pp. $22.50.

This collection of papers was published in Moscow in 1959 and presumably, therefore, delivered about 1958. The translation is dated 1964.

The papers are obviously intended as an introduction to the basic principles of ultrasonic technology for technicians and production workers. As such they are clear, well written and satisfactorily thorough. The credentials of the con- tributors are impeccable.

In considering the English translation we must ask what purpose has been served. The extreme obsolescence of the information and the purposes for which it was originally published make this book of no interest to scientific workers. Production managers and other indus- trial personnel might benefit from read- ing this but the chances of persuading them to do so are essentially nil. Finally, we may ask, does the publica- tion give us a picture of the industrial applications of sonics in the U.S.S.R. Unfortunately the answer must be no. Sonics in the United States and possibly to a lesser extent in England can best be characterized by the title of a recent movie “The sky above, the mud below.” Although sonics is filled with potentially useful, ingenious and powerful tech- niques, somehow, we all seem to keep slogging along in the mud of cleaning, gross flaw detection and a few specialized techniques such as drilling and welding. Judging by the lack of references to specific, fully developed, continuously employed, broadly applied industrial applications in this volume one is inclined to suspect that our Russian colleagues are subjected to the same frustrations.

Brekhovskikh, Krasilnikov and Rozenberg provide an interesting and, considering its brevity, complete intro- duction, discussing all too briefly their fine work in high power generation.

Kudryavtsev’s paper on applications, while well written, is largely a delinea- tion of hopes.

D’yachenko et al mention a technique for cutting diamonds which may be of interest. Lyamin describes an ingenious method of cutting tough materials by a combination of ultrasonic drilling and electrolytic forming of a continuously replenished oxide layer under the cutting tool so that it is in essence working on a hard brittle surface rather than the tough base material. This is said to speed up the drilling process considerably.

The article by Pisarevskii and Klenov

is of the type that is invariably spurned by scientific publications. Nevertheless, unless our scientists get out in the shop and solve some of these practical problems, the gap between theory and production will never be closed. For this reason this type of paper is to be encouraged.

Two papers which follow concern the control of crystallization processes. Teumin in particular is to be commended for attacking the difficult problem of sonic irradiation of solidifying melts. Nevertheless the question must be asked; when are we going to leave the laboratory and develop high power sources and coupling means for the treatment of full size ingots of many tons weight?

In discussing ultrasonic inspection Shraiber emphasizes the important point that the manufacturing process must be adjusted if necessary to fit the charac- teristics of the testing apparatus and that a complete knowledge of the material to be tested must be acquired by metallurgical study and sectioning before the test results can be interpreted meaningfully.

Several papers discuss the manu- facture of ceramic, magnetic and ferrite transducers.

A number of articles describe specific ultrasonic equipments in use in the U.S.S.R. It must be emphasized that although these pieces of apparatus are typical of the majority in use throughout the world, they are nevertheless com- pletely obsolete.

Solid state circuitry including high power transistor pulsed oscillation generators, delay sweeps, time variable sensitivity, log detection and so on have negated these simplified circuits and vacuum tube components.

In discussing the quality control of generator forgings by Grekov we must note the work of C. D. Moriarty whose development of guide lines placed the acceptance or rejection of generator forgings on a rational basis. The employment of improved alloys and vacuum pour for these large forgings has made the usual ultrasonic inspection a necessary but usually uninformative test since it will frequently be found that there are no indications over 10 per cent. Consequently we must seek for improved methods of inspection such as attenua- tion maps which give a good picture of variations in heat treatment and which reveal concentrations of porosity or inclusions.

Space prevents the review of several interesting articles such as that of Semennikov.

Despite the reservations mentioned at the beginning of this review, this

collection of papers can be recommended to those who wish to keep abreast of every possible sonic technique in inter- national industry.

R. G. GOLDMAN

Recommendations for ultrasonic testing of butt welds. Institute of Welding, London (1965) 38 pp. 6s. 6d.

As is stated in the introduction, these recommendations have been compiled by the Ultrasonics Working Group of the Institute and incorporate the most up-to-date knowledge and experience of some of our leading authorities in the field of ultrasonic weld testing. In general, the various procedures are concisely detailed and the subject matter is adequately supplemented by line diagrams.

Section 1 details the minimum per- formance requirements for the ultrasonic units so that any user can obtain apparatus which is suitable for the examination of butt welds in steel.

The need for careful calibration of probes and equipment is sufficiently stressed in Section 2, and details of the newly devised I.O.W. Beam Calibration Block are included. This block is simple to manufacture and enables an operator to determine quickly the spread of the beam emanating from a probe.

Section 3 contains a wealth of information on the practice of flaw location. Each necessary step in the chain of events leading to the precise location of a defect within a weld is simply and concisely detailed.

After reading Section 4, it becomes apparent that flaw identification and size estimation are readily achieved, without complex mathematics, by care- ful observation of the behaviour of a defect echo during a series of controlled movements of the probe. All the necessary information for this, the most important part of weld testing, is well detailed so that an ultrasonic operator following these principles should soon be able to say “where it is, what it is, and how big it is.” It has often been stated that ultrasonic testing can never replace the radiography of welds, since the former method produces no permanent record. A system by which the operator can record the results of ultrasonic testing is constructively outlined in Section 5, where examples of schematic report forms are included.

Bearing in mind the fact that the subject matter of this article has already been appraised, prior to printing, by 40 of the leading ultrasonic specialists in the country, it is difficult to be critical,

ULTRASONICS/.fanuar_v 1966 51

but J found the sections detailed on pages 21 and 26 to be rather irksome to read and felt that such important material would benefit by the use of larger type in any future revised edition.

Surprisingly, no mention is made in Section 1 of a method of overcoming parallex between the graticule and trace, which often leads to inaccuracy when using short beam path lengths. Also, whilst Section 2 details the calibration of probes, no mention is made of the overall efficiency of the flaw detector which can be checked quite simply with a standard probe, enabling the efficiency of valves and other components to be monitored during the working life of the unit.

Section 3 contains a misprint in Paragraph 3(h), which is not too obvious at first sight, and perhaps it should be recorded here that, in fact, beam spread decreases with increase in crystal size.

The publication under review is not for the theorist, but is recommended as an essential addition to the personal library of all those engaged in practical ultrasonic testing of welds.

B. LAMBERT

Les techniques Ultra-Sonores by P. HPmardinyuer, Editions Chiron Paris (1964). In French. 256 pp. 135 illus- trations.

An acknowledged authority in France on radio theory and practice, Monsieur HCmardinquer follows up his initial publication on ultrasonic generators with a further attempt to enlighten technicians and practitioners in a more specific treatment.

Stating that complete and detailed publications do not exist in sufficient quantity on the newer industrial applica- tions the author, in his first chapter of 37 pages, deals in a general way with magnetostrictive and electrostrictive generators. Unfortunately it is largely descriptive and lacking in the precision which ironically he calls desirable in the introduction.

The second chapter emphasizes the difficulty of classifying the many uses of ultrasonics in industry, which howevel he does admirably. Most interesting is his discussion of CERAPIUS, an organization created by the French National Fuel Industry. This is ;I

research and study group staffed b) acoustical engineers to effect a per- manent liaison with industrial members seeking technical solutions by ultrasonic processes. The scope of their research and activity is listed in three categories and should not be ignored by anyone familiar with the costs of ultrasonic research and subsequent equipment construction.

The third chapter on quality control is a disappointment to those readers who have heard of French successes with pulse-echo inventiveness. This would include Langevin in the first World War in underwater sounding experiments to the present day efforts of Dory and his half-cycle pulse technique in thickness measurements. The author obviously has had no practical experience in non- destructive techniques. This chapter might possibly suit a non-professional reader admirably, but a technician will require a strong constitution to accept his statements about which is practical and in fact not utilized. Moreover the conclusions are misleading and apparently projections of outdated theoretical studies. Also, his emphasis on French acceptance of through trans- mission methods in contact work in effect dates the method because it is rarely practised today. There is little in the way of detailed and practical information on applications. Citing the use of Firestone’s model SRO of some 200 Ib, mounted on rubber tyres (Reflectoscope 1943) as a contemporary instrument to measure thickness is regrettable. Electronic techniques such as sweep delay are not mentioned. Also one must consider the frequency of ultrasonic propagation with any attempt to describe attenuation, regardless of the method. However, the redeeming feature of this chaper is that the scope of problems presented for solution by flaw detectors is excellent.

The fourth chapter on marine and airborne detection of obstacles is perhaps the most interesting and here his information shows the acknowledgement of and improvement on the work done by Chilowsky and Langevin. The text is fairly up-to-date for the most part, but too general to be used except by the layman. The last subject in this chapter “Measuring the speed of ships,” would have been a good springboard for some mention of ultrasonic flowmeters which seems to ha\e been forgotten in spite of its use in France. The fifth chapter deals with ultrasonic cleaning and is nicely incorporated with a well balanced perspective. The reader wjill readily progress from general background infor- mation on to technical advantages, types of solvent, frequency and powel requirements. The illustrations are good, the photographs poor, while some of the electronic schematics have errors and outdated components.

Chapter six covers soldering, tinning and machining. The treatment of these subjects uses little mathematical support, but is explained well and in agreement with available English texts. Again the photographs are poor but offset by better drawings and some rathet interesting tables and graphs on penetra- tion and machining parameters. The last subject. ultrasonic grinding, leaves

one wishing the author had carried his research further into the effects and uses on lathes and milling processes.

Finally, in chapter seven, the author describes the metallurgical and chemical effects of ultrasound. Drawing on texts, laboratory reports and patents he shows some specific application in ;I short review of each source.

Summing up, this is a good book for the layman. and one of the all-too-feh French texts on ultrasonics and more up-to-date than man). Apart from ;I

touch of chauvinism (a French word) and the lack of an index the reviewer recommends this book for the labour ot compilation as a standard French text.

I<. MARBOIS

SIDUO--Symposium internationale de diagnostica ultrasonica in ophthalmo- logica. Hunrholdt iJnivcr~sity, Brrlitl DDR (1965)

This is an excellent and exhaustive presentation of the present status ot diagnostic and therapeutic applications using ultrasound. The range of papers extends from a discussion of basic physics and the ultrasonographic anatomy of the eye to the production of cerebral lesions and the diagnosis of midline shift of the brain. Many new and exciting methods for instrumenta- tion improvements are presented, i.c. the design of transducers which combine simultaneous optical and ultrasono- graphic visualization and transducers composed of a multiple array of elements to eliminate the need for mechanical scanning. Allied fields such as ultrasonic stereotaxic surgery, arterial pulse

measurements, ultrasonic imagery. ;I new light coagulator. and the use 01 ultrasound for the control of light coagulation of intraocular tumors arc presented. The knowledge of the activities in these allied Gelds is of help to those engaged in ultrasonic research.

The one paper that I find I must take issue with is that of Kossoff. We definitely have been able to display differences in resolution between 10 MC/S and 15 MC/S. The higher frequency is essential for visualization of the minute structures of the eye. Perhaps Kossof’s failure to detect resolution differences at higher frequencies is due to his use of a storage tube for his readout system. or the shorter pulse width of out

equipment. A storage tube is an unsatisfactory readout system because it lacks the resolution and dynamic range required to adequately display the small structures and dynamic range of the ocular tissues. Although compound scanning of the eye reduces resolution. its use may be essential for the detection of orbital lesions lying lateral to the eye.

52 ULTRASoNlcS/JanuUrv f Y66