10-June-2003

ISIS: Latest Happenings
Demonstration of New Field Monitoring Unit

On Friday, May 30, 2003 the first demonstration of a fibre Bragg grating (FBG) sensor interrogation unit being jointly developed by ISIS and IDERS Engineering Inc. took place at the Taylor Bridge in Headingley, Manitoba. The large crowd in attendance included representatives from IDERS, Earth Tech Canada Inc., the Province of Manitoba, the University of Manitoba (Drs. Aftab Mufti and Douglas Thomson), Dalhousie University (Dr. John Newhook) and the University of Alberta (Dr. Roger Cheng). The demonstration was carried out using a three axle truck with a total weight of 85,000 lbs. (11,000, 37,000 and 37,000 lbs.). The truck made multiple passes over the bridge at 40 km/h and at a crawl of 5 km/h. Two midspan FBG sensors were used for the demonstration in combination with several metal foil strain gauges for validation. One of these sensors was originally installed in 1996 and one was bonded onto the outside of the beam for this demonstration. The interrogation unit sampled the sensors at 100 samples per second and had a resolution limited by noise of approximately 1 microstrain. Readings taken from the metal foil strain gauges and a National Instruments system validated the readings taken by the fibre Bragg interrogation unit, including the ability to resolve strain from two of the axels at 40 km/h. Overall, ISIS representatives were very pleased with the results of the demonstration and look forward to receiving delivery of the units.

For more information go to:
http://www.isiscanada.com/latest/main.htm?latest.htm

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