Tone Burst Generators In Research

Tone burst generators are often used in high power ultrasonic applications. Modern computer controlled ultrasonic instrumentation, such as Ritec's RAM 10000, is a complete advanced measurement system designed to satisfy the needs of the acoustic researcher in materials science or advanced NDE. Its purpose is to transmit bursts of acoustic energy into a test piece, receive signals from the piece following this burst, then manipulate and analyze these received signals in various ways. Extreme versatility is achieved through a modular approach allowing an instrument to be configured for unique applications not previously encountered. Unwanted modules need not be purchased and in many cases special modules can be designed and constructed.

The high power radio frequency (RF) burst capability allows researchers to work with difficult, highly attenuative materials or inefficient transducers such as EMATs.

A computer interface makes it possible for the system to make high speed complex measurements, such as those involving multiple frequencies. Many of these measurements are very limited or impossible with manually controlled instruments. A Windows or DOS based personal computer controls and acquires data from the system. Software is supplied with each RAM-10000 suitable for a wide variety of applications including those involving EMATs, acoustic resonance, velocity, relative velocity, and attenuation measurements. In addition, the source code for this software is made available so that it may be modified to include new applications or changes in technique.

The unique automatic tracking superheterodyne receiver, quadrature phase sensitive detection circuits and gated integrators offer superb analog signal processing capability. Both the real and imaginary parts of the value of the Fourier transform at the driving frequency are obtained. This increases the dynamic range of the instrumentation and allows phase and amplitude information at the driving frequency to be extracted from noise and out-of-band spurious signals more efficiently than using Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) techniques.