Ultrasonic Lamb Wave Propagation Characteristics in Hollow

Cylindrical Pipes
Je-Heon Hana)
Yong-Joe Kimb)
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Texas A&M University
3123 TAMU, College Station, TX 77843-3123, USA
For the purpose of nondestructively evaluating the structural health of a pipe system that is
used to transport a fluid or gas, it has gained significant interests to identify the
characteristics of ultrasonic Lamb waves that can propagate a long distance with a small
spatial decay rate, enabling to scan a long pipe section with a single array measurement.
Thus, it is here proposed to develop a hybrid analytical/two-dimensional finite element
method (2-D HAFEM) to analyze the Lamb wave propagation characteristics in composite
pipes with arbitrary cross-sectional shapes. In this method, a pipe is modeled by using a 2D finite element approximation in the cross-sectional directions while an analytical wave
solution is assumed in the axial direction. Thus, it makes possible to use a small number of
finite elements even for ultrasonic frequency analyses in a computationally efficient
manner. In order to validate the proposed method, the HAFEM-predicted dispersion
curves of a homogeneous, hollow cylindrical pipe are compared with analytical solutions.
It is shown that the 2-D HAFEM results agree well with the analytical solutions.
1

INTRODUCTION

Dispersion curves contain information on wave propagation characteristics in solid or fluid

media such as phase speed, wavelength, and wavenumber as a function of frequency. In
addition, the dispersive characteristics of wave modes in a waveguide can be determined from
the dispersion curves of the guided wave modes.
A guided ultrasonic wave in a pipe can propagate a long distance with a small spatial
dissipation rate so that it can be used for non-destructive evaluations (NDEs) for a large number
of circular pipe systems such as pipeline, cannon, and drill string. In this NDE application, a
guided wave is generated and then propagates in a circular pipe system. When there is a
a)
b)

email: jeep2000@tamu.edu
email: joekim@tamu.edu

structural defect in the system, a wave is then reflected from this defect. By measuring the
reflective wave, the structural defect location and shape can be identified. Since the guided wave
can propagate a long distance, the latter procedure can be used to scan a long pipe section with a
single measurement made by using a small number of transducers.
In order to use the guided waves for the NDE applications, it is important to properly excite
a circular pipe system to generate a specific guided wave of which wave propagation
characteristics are predetermined. Therefore, various numerical and analytical methods have
been developed to obtain the dispersion curves, of the guided wave, from which its propagation
characteristics such as wave speed and wavelength can be determined. Gazis1 first derived the
analytical dispersion curves in isotropic hollow circular cylinders. Silk and Bainton2 studied
experimentally ultrasonic guided waves propagating in a heat exchanger pipe. Rose suggested
comb transducers for inspecting a hollow cylinder3 and published a book on experimental and
theoretical dispersion curves4. Aalami5 obtained the dispersion curves of an arbitrarily shaped
cross-sectional bar by using a Rayleigh-Ritz energy method.
For the purpose of reducing computational costs, various hybrid approaches that combine
analytical approaches and finite element methods have been developed. Cheung6 described a
hybrid formulation that uses analytical mode shapes in the axial direction of a beam and 2-D
finite stripe elements in the cross-sectional directions. Taweel et al.7 applied the hybrid method
to obtain the dispersion curves of various cross-sectional beams. Kim et al.8 investigated the
vibration responses of a tire by modeling it using an analytical wave solution in the
circumferential direction and 2-D shell elements in the cross-sectional direction. In addition,
Kim et al.9-11 also studied the acoustic characteristics of sandwich composite panels by using a
Hybrid Analytical/One-Dimensional Finite Element Method (1-D HAFEM). Hayashi et al.12
named a 2-D hybrid approach as the Semi Analytical Finite Element Method (SAFEM) and used
the SAFEM to calculate the dispersion curves of an arbitrary cross-sectional rail. Experimental
data were then used to validate the numerically-predicted dispersion curves.
In this paper, dispersion curves of hollow cylindrical pipes are obtained by using a Hybrid
Analytical/Two-Dimensional Finite Element Method (2-D HAFEM) that employs an analytical
solution in the axial direction and a Finite Element (FE) approximation in the cross-sectional
directions. While the FE approximations in the previous hybrid approaches are based on linear
interpolation functions, the current FE approximation uses quadratic interpolation functions to
improve computational efficiency and accuracy. Additionally, a forced solution procedure for
pipe systems with simply-supported boundary conditions is presented. The proposed solution
approach is validated by comparing the numerically-predicted responses to the analytical
solutions of a simply-supported, hollow, cylindrical pipe. The proposed 2-D HAFEM procedure
is also validated by comparing the numerical and analytical dispersion curves of the cylindrical
pipe. As another validation case, the HAFEM-predicted dispersion curves are compared to those
of the Lamb waves and shear-horizontal (SH) waves in a plate by setting the radius of the pipe to
be infinite.
2

THEORY

2.1 2-D HAFEM Equation of Motion Based on Quadratic Interpolation Functions

A quadratic finite element with 9 nodes in the x-y coordinates can be mapped into the -
coordinates in the domain of = -1 to 1 and = -1 to 1. This mapping is defined as13
x( , ) N T ( , )x ,

(1a)

y ( , ) N T ( , )y ,

(1b)

x [ x1 x2 x3 x4 x5 x6 x7 x8 x9 ]T ,

(2a)

y [ y1 y2 y3 y4 y5 y6 y7 y8 y9 ]T ,

(2b)

N( , ) [ N1 N 2 N 3 N 4 N 5 N 6 N 7 N8 N 9 ]T ,

(2c)

where

1
1
1
N1 ( 1) ( 1), N 2 ( 1) ( 1), N 3 ( 1) ( 1) ,
4
4
4

(3a - 3c)

1
1
1
N 4 ( 1) ( 1), N5 (1 )( 1) ( 1), N 6 ( 1)(1 )( 1) ,
4
2
2

(3d - 3f)

1
1
N 7 (1 )( 1) ( 1), N8 ( 1)(1 )( 1), N9 (1 )( 1)(1 )( 1) .
2
2

(3g - 3i)

This coordinate transformation simplifies a spatial integral in the x-y domain dramatically by
mapping this integral to the - domain. In order to implement this coordinate transformation, a
chain rule is defined as
f

y f
f

x
J x ,
y f
f
y
y

(4)

where J is the Jacobian matrix. By substituting Eqns. (1a) and (1b) into Eqn. (4), the Jacobian
matrix and its determinant can be represented, respectively, as
x

J
x

y NT ( , )
x

y NT ( , )
x

NT ( , )
y
J J

11 12 ,

NT ( , ) J 21 J 22
y

(5)

and
NT ( , ) NT ( , )
NT ( , ) NT ( , )
y
y
x.
J det(J )
x

(6)

For an element, vibration displacements in the - coordinates are approximated by applying

quadratic interpolation functions to nodal displacements. In the z-direction, an analytical
solution is assumed: i.e., the nodal displacements are the functions of the time and z-location.
The displacement vector is then represented as

u ( , , z , t )
N1

( , , z , t ) v( , , z , t ) N u ( , )u( z , t ) 0
w( , , z , t )
0

N9

N1
0

0
N1

0
0

N9
0

u1
v
1
0 w1

0 .
N9 u9

v9
w
9

(7)

Then, a strain vector can be expressed by the partial derivatives of the displacements: i.e.,
u
e ( x, y , z , t )
x

v
y

w
z

v u

x y

w v

y z

w u
.

x z

(8)

The stress vector can be related to the strain vector by using matrix C: i.e.,
s = Ce .

(9)

For the case of orthotropic materials, the matrix C can be expressed as

C11 C12
C
12 C22
C
C23
C 13
0
0
0
0

0
0

C13
C23

0
0

0
0

C33
0
0

0
C44
0

0
0
C55

0
0
0
.
0
0

C66

(10)

In order to derive the 2-D HAFEM equation of motion (EOM) for the single element, the virtual
work principle is applied: i.e.,

(U T W ) 0 ,

(11)

where the potential energy, the kinetic energy, and the work are represented, respectively, as
1
e H Cedxdydt ,

2t xy

(12)

1
u H H u
Nu Nu

dxdydt ,
2 t x y t
t

(13)

1
u H fdxdydt .

2t xy

(14)

Finally, the equation of motion for the element can be obtained by substituting Eqns. (5), (7), (8),
and (12) (14) into Eqn. (11): i.e.,
K zz

2u
u
2u

K
u

M
fi fe,
( ) z

z 2
z
t 2

(15)

where
K zz

1 1

K ( ) z

(16)

(BH CB z B Hz CB ) J d d ,

B Hz CB z J d d ,

BH CB J d d dzdt ,

(17)
(18)

N uH N u J d d ,

(19)

B B( ),1 B( ),2 B( ),3 B( ),4 B( ),5 B( ),6 B( ),7 B( ),8 B( ),9 ,

(20a)

B z Bz ,1 Bz ,2 Bz ,3 Bz ,4 Bz ,5 Bz ,6 Bz ,7 Bz ,8 Bz ,9 ,

(20b)

B ( ),i

N i 1
N i 1
(J )11 (J )12

N i 1
N

(J ) 21 i (J 1 ) 22

N i 1
N i 1

(J ) 22
(J ) 21
0

0
0

N i 1
N
,
(J )11 i (J 1 )12
0

N i 1
N i 1
0
(J ) 21
(J ) 22

N i 1
N
0
(J )11 i (J 1 )12

0 0 Ni
B z ,i 0 0 0
0 0 0

0 0
0 Ni
0 0

(20c)

0
0 .
N i

(20d)

In Eq. (15), the superscripts, e and i on the force vector, f represent the external and
internal forces, respectively. The double integrals in Eqns. (16) (19) can be calculated by
using the Gauss-Legendre quadrature13. For a FE system with multiple elements, the global
HAFEM EOM is obtained by assembling all of the individual stiffness and mass matrices and
force vectors. During this global assembly process, the internal forces are cancelled out. For

convenience, the same notation for the nodal displacement vector is used although the upper bar
in the local stiffness and mass matrices in Eqns. (15) (19) are dropped for the global matrices:
i.e.,
2u
u
2u
(21)
K zz 2 K ( ) z
K u M 2 f .
z
z
t
2.2 Forced Responses

When a system is excited at a single angular frequency of , the global HAFEM EOM can
be rewritten from Eq. (21) as
L(1 i )u 2 Mu f (x) ,

(22)

where is the structural loss factor and L is the linear operator defined as
L K zz

K ( ) z K .
2
z
z

(23)

For finite-size structures, the modal displacement vector can be written as

u m ( z , t ) U m exp(imt ) ,

(24)

U m ( z , t ) m m ( z ) m ,

(25)

where m is the modal amplitude vector. In Eq. (25), the diagonal element of the diagonal
matrix, m for a circular pipe with the simply-supported boundary condition is written as14
sin( m z / L), for x-direction nodal displacement

m ( z ) sin(m z / L), for y -direction nodal displacement ,

cos(m z / L), for z -direction nodal displacement

(26)

where L is the length of the pipe in the z-direction. In Eqn. (24), m is the mode normalization
factor with respect to the mass matrix, M: i.e.,

m2 mH mH ( z )M m ( z ) m dz 1 .

(27)

Equation (24) satisfies Eqn. (22) for an undamped, free-vibration case (i.e., f = 0 and = 0). In
this case, by substituting Eqn. (24) into Eqn. (22), an eigenvalue problem for calculating the
modal amplitude vector can be represented as
L m ( z ) m m2 M m ( z ) m 0 .

(28)

The cosine and sine components of Eqn. (28) are cancelled out because each row has only one
cosine or sine. Therefore, Eqn. (28) can be rewritten as

S m m m2 M m 0 .

(29)

For a harmonic excitation at an angular frequency of , the forced solution is then expressed as a
superposition of the modes: i.e.,
u( z , t ) Cm m m ( z ) m exp(it ) ,
m

(30)

where Cm is the modal contribution coefficient for the m-th mode. By substituting Eqn. (30) into
Eqn. (22) and applying the orthogonality of UnH(z), the modal contribution coefficient can be
obtained as
fm
Cm
,
(31)
(1 i )m2 2
where fm is the modal force represented as
L

f m m mH mH ( z )f dz .
0

(32)

2.3 Dispersion Relation

When it is assumed that there is no reflection wave (e.g., infinite length in the z-direction),
a wave solution can be set as

u u 0 expi ( kz t ) .

(33)

By substituting Eqn. (33) into Eqn. (21) for the free vibration case12, an eigenvalue problem is
derived as

K 2 M
0
K 2 M
0 U

0 .
K 2 M
K
K
0
i

kU
z
zz

(
)

(34)

The dispersion relation between the wavenumber, k and the angular frequency, can be
obtained by solving the eigenvalue problem in Eqn. (34). Although a numerous number of FE
nodes in the z-direction are required for a full 3-D FE model, the proposed HAFEM procedure
for calculating the dispersion relation makes it possible to use a small number of finite elements
in a computationally efficient manner by considering an analytical wave solution in the zdirection as in Eq. (33).
3

VALIDATIONS

3.1 Forced Responses of Simply-Supported Pipe

In this section, the forced, flexural vibration responses of a simply-supported, hollow,
circular pipe obtained from 2-D HAFEM models at low frequencies are compared to the

analytical vibration responses calculated by using the Euler-Bernoulli beam theory15. Figure 1
shows an example of a 2-D HAFEM model for analyzing a hollow, circular pipe system. As
shown in Fig. 1, the cross-section of the pipe is modeled by using the finite elements while an
analytical solution is assumed in the z-direction.
An aluminum pipe, with a thickness of 1 mm, simply-supported at the both ends of the pipe
is used for validating the proposed 2-D HAFEM procedure. The material properties and
geometry information of this pipe are shown as Case I in Table 1. Regarding the cross-sectional
FE mesh, it consists of 9 nodes in the r-direction and 24 nodes in the -direction. Therefore, the
cross-section is discretized by using 48 elements with 216 nodes (216 = 9 24). For a harmonic,
point excitation in the y-direction with the excitation frequencies of 100 Hz and 200 Hz at z = 0.3
m, the resulting natural frequencies and displacements obtained by using both of the 2-D
HAFEM and analytical methods are shown in Table 2 and Fig. 2, respectively. From Table 2
and Fig. 2, it is shown that the flexural vibration displacements and natural frequencies obtained
by both of the approaches are almost identical except for the very low natural frequencies (i.e.,
from 0.106 Hz to 0.405 Hz) that are predicted from the HAFEM model. These low natural
frequencies are associated with rigid body motions. Since the FE model contains the natural
frequencies in the x- and y-directions and the cross-section of the pipe is symmetry with respect
to the x- and y-axes, the duplicated natural frequencies are calculated from the HAFEM model as
shown in Table 2.
3.2 Dispersion Relations at Low Frequencies
There are a large number of modes to satisfy Eqn. (34) in an ultrasonic frequency range,
which makes it difficult to validate dispersion curves predicted by using the proposed HAFEM
approach against analytical dispersion curves in this frequency range. However, at lower
frequencies, only three wave modes (i.e., torsional, longitudinal, and flexural wave modes) are
dominant in a hollow, circular pipe. The wave speeds of these wave modes can be accurately
calculated by using analytical approaches15. The analytical dispersion curves of these wave
modes are represented as
cL E / ,
(35)
cT G / ,

cf

EI 2
,
A(1 v 2 )

(36)

(37)

where cL, cT, and cf are the longitudinal, torsional, and flexural wave speeds, respectively. The
longitudinal and torsional waves are non-dispersive (see Eqns. (35) and (36)) while the flexural
wave is dispersive (see Eq. (37)). For Case II in Table 1, the dispersion relations obtained by
solving the eigenvalue problem in Eqn. (34) and the analytical dispersion curves in Eqns. (35) (37) are plotted in Fig. 3. As shown in Fig. 3, the HAFEM-predicted dispersion relations are
well matched with the analytical ones.

DISPERSION RELATIONS IN ULTRASONIC FREQUENCY RANGE

Figure 4(a) shows the dispersion relations of axisymmetric longitudinal and torsional modes
up to 1.5 MHz for Case II in Table 1. In order to obtain the axisymmetric modes, it is assumed
that ultrasonic wave responses have no spatial variation in the circumferential direction. In order
to realize this condition in the HAFEM model, all displacements in the -direction set to be equal
and the dimension of the stiffness and mass matrices in Eq. (34) is then reduced from 648 648
(648 = 9243) to 27 27 (27 = 93). The dispersion curves are then calculated from Eq. (34)
with the reduced stiffness and mass matrices. As shown in Fig. 4(a), the dispersion relations
obtained by using the HAFEM agree well with the analytical dispersion relations for the circular
pipe1,4.
As another validation, by setting the radius of the cylindrical pipe to be extremely large (e.g.,
r = 1 km), the wave modes predicted by using the proposed HAFEM become the Lamb wave
modes or SH modes of the equivalent flat aluminum plate (i.e., r = ) with the same thickness of
3 mm. The analytical dispersion relations for the Lamb wave modes are obtained from the
following equations4.
tan(qh)
4k 2 pq
2
for symmetric modes ,
tan( ph)
(q k 2 ) 2

(40)

tan(qh)
(q 2 k 2 )2
for antisymmetric modes ,

tan( ph)
4k 2 pq

(41)

where

2G 2 G


thickness
2Gv
2
p k 2 , q 2 k 2 , cL
, cT , h
.
, and

2
1 2v
cL
cT
2

(42)

For the SH modes, the analytical dispersion equation is represented as4

sin(qh) cos(qh) 0 .

(43)

As shown in Fig. 4(b), the HAFEM-predicted dispersion relations are well in line with the
analytical dispersion relations.
5

CONCLUSIONS

In this paper, the ultrasonic wave propagation characteristics, of two hollow, cylindrical
pipes, that can be used for non-destructive evaluations (NDEs) are investigated. It is proposed
that the wave propagation characteristics are identified by modeling the two pipes using the
Hybrid Analytical/Two-Dimensional Finite Element Method (2-D HAFEM) that uses the twodimensional FE approximation in the cross-sectional directions based on the quadratic
interpolation functions and an analytical wave solution in the axial direction. Since the crosssectional area is only modeled by using the finite elements, compared to full 3-D FE models, the
proposed 2-D HAFEM approach can be used to analyze pipe systems in a computationally
efficient manner even in an ultrasonic frequency range where extremely small element size is

required due to short wavelength. The proposed 2-D HAFEM approach is validated through the
comparison of the HAFEM results to the analytical solutions. It is also shown that by setting the
radius of the pipe to be infinite, the dispersion relations predicted by using the HAFEM
procedure are well matched with the analytical dispersion curves. In the near future, the current
2-D HAFEM modeling procedure will be applied to analyze ultrasonic wave propagation
characteristics of multi-layered, composite pipe systems with arbitrary cross-sectional shapes. It
is also planned to develop a 2-D hybrid fluidic finite element so that the effects of fluid loading
inside or outside of a pipe can be analyzed.
6

REFERENCES

1. D.C. Gazis, Three-Dimensional Investigation of the Propagation of Waves in Hollow

Circular Cylinders. I. Analytical Foundation, the Journal of the Acoustical Society of
America, 31, 568-572, (1959)
2. M.G. Silk and K.F. Bainton, The propagation in metal tubing of ultrasonic wave modes
equivalent to Lamb waves, Ultrasonics, 17, 11-19, (1979)
3. J.L. Rose, A Baseline and Vision of Ultrasonic Guided Wave Inspection Potential,
Transactions of the ASME Journal of Pressure Vessel Technology, 124, 273-282, (2002)
4. J.L. Rose, Ultrasonic Waves in Solid Media, Cambridge University Press, 103-107, 159-162,
241-244, 425-427, (1999)
5. B. Aalami, Waves in Prismatic Guides of Arbitrary Cross Section, Transactions of the
ASME Journal of Applied Mechanics, 40, 1067-1072, (1973)
6. Y. K. Cheung. Finite Strip Method in Structural Analysis, Pergamon Press, (1976)
7. H. Taweel, S.B. Dong, and M. Kazic, Wave reflection from the free end of a cylinder with
an arbitrary cross-section, International Journal of Solids and Structures, 37, 1701-1726,
(2000)
8. Y.-J. Kim and J. S. Bolton, Analysis of tire vibration by using a hybrid two-dimensional
finite element based on composite shell theory, Proceedings of Inter-Noise 2003, (2003)
9. Y.-J. Kim, Identification of sound transmission characteristics of honeycomb sandwich
panels using hybrid analytical/one-dimensional finite element method, Proceedings of InterNoise 2006, Honolulu, USA, (2006)
10. Y.-J. Kim, Acoustical characteristics of honeycomb sandwich composite panels, the 161st
Meeting of the Acoustical Society of America, Seattle, Washington, (2011)
11. Y.-J. Kim and J.H. Han, Identification of Acoustic Characteristics of Honeycomb Sandwich
Composite Panels Using Hybrid Analytical/Finite Element Method, Journal of Vibration
and Acoustics Transactions of the ASME, in review, (2012)

12. T. Hayashi, W.-J. Song, and J.L. Rose, Guided wave dispersion curves for a bar with an
arbitrary cross-section, a rod and rail example, Ultrasonics, 41, 175-183, (2003)
13. J. N. Reddy, Introduction to the Finite Element Method, McGraw Hill, (1993)
14. Werner Soedel, Vibrations of Shells and Plates, Marcel Dekker, Inc., (1993)
15. K. F. Graff, Wave Motion in Elastic Solids, Dover Publications, (1991)
8

TABLES

Table 1 Material properties and geometry information of hollow, circular pipe.

Case I
Case II
Material
Aluminum
Youngs modulus [Pa]
7.1E10
Density [kg/m3]
2700
Poissons Ratio
0.33
Structural damping coefficient
0.01
Outer diameter [mm]
6
40
Thickness [mm]
1
3
Length [m]
1
N/A
Table 2 Natural frequencies of simply-supported pipe (Case I in Table 1).
Method
Natural frequencies [Hz]
14.52
58.07
Analytical
130.7
232.3
0.106 0.197 0.299 0.405 14.52 14.52 58.07 58.07
HAFEM
130.6 130.6 232.0 232.0
9

FIGURES

Fig. 1 Illustration of 2-D HAFEM model for analyzing hollow, cylindrical pipes: (a) FE
approximation on cross-section and (b) Analytical solution in axial direction.

Fig. 2 Displacement amplitudes in the y-direction for Case I in Table 1 when excited by ydirection, harmonic, point excitation at z = 0.3m: (a) 100 Hz and (b)200 Hz.

Fig. 3 Dispersion relations at low frequencies for Case II in Table 1: (a) Phase speed/frequency
relations and (b) Wavenumber/frequency relations.

Fig. 4 Dispersion relations up to 1.5 MHz for Case II in Table 1: (a) Outer diameter of 40
mm and (b) Outer diameter of 1 km.