The use of infrared thermography for nondestructive evaluation of joints

A junction between two similar, or dissimilar, materials represents generally a weak structural point and so it requires accurate choice of the most adequate joining technique and nondestructive evaluation of joined parts whatever the joining technique. The attention of the present paper is focused on the aid provided by infrared thermography for nondestructive evaluation of three types of joints: aluminum adhesively bonded joints, stainless steel laser welded joints and Glare mechanical fastened joints. Both techniques, pulse and modulated thermography with optical stimulation, are used. The attention is particularly focused on the second method because phase images are practically not affected by local nonuniform heating and/or local variation of the emissivity coefficient as thermal images.