Abstract

Electromechanical impedance (EMI) technique is amongst the important technique in structural health monitoring field. Incipient level of damage can easily be detected through this technique as compared to other. Various PZT sensor configurations were proposed by the researcher for the EMI technique, which have their own advantages and disadvantages. In this paper surface bonded PZT sensor (SBPS) and surface mounted PZT sensor (SMPS) are used in steel I-section beam. Damages are induced in the beam and damage quantification is done using statistical tool. On comparing it was found that SMPS has more sensing region than SBPS. It is due to absence of shear lag effect in SMPS, which is not in the case of SBPS. The shear lag affects the strain transfer mechanism between the PZT sensor and host structure. The sensing region of SMPS is upto 3.5 m whereas the sensing region of SBPS is less than 2.0 m in the case of steel beam.