product focus
TM
the world’s most convenient diagnostic AE sensor
Wireless communications to your PC
Rapid attachment & removal (magnetic)
Dynamic envelope or statistical mode
Capture, display & export as standard
What is AE-Ultraspan ™?
AE – Ultraspan is a complete single channel
wireless Acoustic Emission (AE) system housed
within a compact sensor housing - there’s never
been anything quite like it. It incorporates specific
design features to provide extreme portability
and rapid installation
diagnostic investigation !
!
Industrial strength Bluetooth (Class 1)
Internal aerial & rechargeable battery
just got easier ! Magnetic front face for instant attachment
It’s so convenient to get results in the field.
Simply couple the sensor where you want to
monitor, activate the sensor and establish
communications with your laptop PC running
Ultraspan-Vu software. AE – Ultraspan will
continuously stream the log dynamic envelope of
the detected AE signal to your PC where you can
! display it (like an oscilloscope)
! capture, replay & export for detailed analysis
Monitor the waveform from one machine,
process or structure, move the sensor to another.
It couldn’t be easier or quicker - its compact and
there are no trailing wires.
What is Acoustic Emission (AE) ?
The term AE applies to both the physical effect
whereby high frequency elastic waves are
generated in materials by naturally occurring
processes in response to a lower frequency
stimulus and to the technology that is used to
detect and process such signals.
In general AE signals have a high signal to noise
ratio for the detection of energy loss processes
ideal for
Reciprocating machines
Intermittent actions
Partial rotation
Process cycles
Manufacturing operations
etc...
Internal battery or external supply
OK for a wide range of signal amplitudes
Single shot or continuous modes
FFT spectra & audio transformations
such as impacts, friction, crushing, turbulence
etc.. The detection of such signals has found
widespread use in machinery and process
monitoring. AE methods can also be used to
detect structural degradation (crack growth,
delamination, corrosion etc.) although this can be
complicated by lower signal to noise ratios and
single channel monitoring is not appropriate to
monitoring large structures.
About the log dynamic envelope signal
Like many Acoustic Emission (AE) sensors AE-
Ultraspan is based on a resonant transducer
design. This has the effect of improving
sensitivity due to the mechanical Q of the
piezoelectric transducer element, reducing
electronic noise and minimising sensitivity to
unwanted low frequency noise and vibration.
Unfortunately the signal is still at high frequency
which is not easy to handle. A field proven way
around this is to work with the dynamic envelope
of the oscillatory signal. Whilst a small amount of
information is lost in generating the dynamic
envelope, the majority of useful information is
retained despite it having only audio frequency
content (DC to 5 kHz).
To achieve this simplification AE-Ultraspan
incorporates a state of the art detection and
dynamic enveloping scheme which enables it to
faithfully respond to elastic waves over a 40,000
to 1 range of amplitudes (i.e. 92 dB) - so there’s
no need to change the operating range whether
signals are big or small. To make this signal even
easier to handle it is logarithmically (log)
compressed before being digitised. AE-Ultraspan
streams out these digitised values at the rate of
10,000 every second directly into your PC.
Ultraspan - Vu & Ultraspan Pro
Ultraspan-Vu (supplied with the SI/BV
interface) controls the operation of the AE-
Ultraspan sensor. You set-up how the signal
is captured (e.g. sample rate, continuous or
single shot mode, dynamic envelope or
statistical MEAN / MAX / MIN etc).The
software collects the data in your laptop
showing a ‘live’ graphical display or
tabulated data format.
When used in conjunction with Ultraspan
Pro software this forms the basis for a
powerful and easy to use AE based
diagnostic analysis package.
 How can I make use of a log dynamic envelope signal ?
008898E88777, Site A, Machine 2, Gearbox1, Output, W5000 [12/03/09 15:35:47]
Ultraspan-Vu software gives you access to the digitised log averaging period : 3000 samples

dynamic envelope values in tabulated form (in addition to its

oscilloscope like display). However at 10,000 samples per second
such digitised listings soon become too long to be handled by
standard spreadsheet programs. There are four possible ways time domain record of 1.65 million points
around this : (Ultraspan Pro software)

a) If you are only interested in capturing a transient event then

you can operate Ultraspan-Vu in single shot (rather than zoom into data
continuous) mode being triggered when the signal exceeds a user
defined threshold level. By defining an appropriate X-axis period
and using the pre-trigger facility the captured file will be much
shorter and easier to handle.

b) Ultraspan Pro analysis software will display a time domain

waveform of very many points. Large files are generated during
recordings of long periods of time (e.g. 10secs = 100,000
measurements). Ultraspan Pro gives you an overview of such
large waveforms and lets you zoom into the data to reveal more
detail.

c) Ultraspan Pro makes it easy to clip out part of a very large file
and display it either as a time domain waveform or as an FFT
frequency spectrum (cursor functions allow you interrogate these
displays further). One final feature of Ultraspan Pro is its ability to
take the entire digitised Ultraspan-Vu files and convert and play
1 Hz
them as audio as well as export them as .wav files.

d) A statistical mode in which the AE Ultraspan sensor repeatedly

10 Hz pre-characterises the dynamic envelope signal in terms of its
Max, Min and Mean values over a user defined number of signal
FFT spectra with resolution samples. In this way the rate at which data needs to be stored
below 0.0025Hz (and hence ultimate file size) can be very dramatically reduced.
(Ultraspan Pro software)
e) If you are lucky enough to have a suitably capable third party
data analysis package you can copy and paste the data table into
it to allow analysis and interpretation.

Acoustic Emission
Measurement
Sensor Resonant piezoelectric at ~ 100 kHz
Enveloper 100µs time constant
Dynamic range 0 to 92dB
Resolution digitised 0.5dB
specifications

Real time envelope 10,000 samples / sec

Characterisation a) log dynamic envelope
b) Max, Mean & Min calculated over 2 t o 16384 samples

Wireless Comms
Type Bluetooth - Class I (licence free – FCC ID : PI401B) top
Range 100 m (typ) free space not to scale
25 m (typ) through single w all (evaluate around oth er structures)
Extend range with external aerial to sensor (see below)

Other I/O
Aerial Built-in or factory fitted exter nal antenna option
58mm

Power check Pushbutton with LED indicator status

Internal battery 4.8V NiMH rechargeable
Recharger for External mains powered c harger (sold separately)
Internal battery
I/O port Recharger input for inter nal battery
External supply input of 5 VD C
80 mA when transmitting side
Physical
Dimensions 68(l) x 55(w) x 58(h) mm
Weight 260g
Operating temp. -20 to +85 deg C (internal battery temp limit)
25.4mm

55mm

Order Codes
395-00-05V-00000-07 AE-Ultraspan sensor (magneti c mount, internal aerial,
internal power, -20 to +85 degC)
395-00-05V-00000-08 AE-Ultraspan sensor (magneti c mount, internal aerial,
external power, -40 to +85 degC)
460-00-05V-00000-09 Mains charger for internal battery
460-00-15V-00300-08 External supply input lead (-40 to +85 deg C)
bottom
532-00-000-00000-01 Ultraspan - Vu & Ultraspan Pro softw are CD with SI/BV interface unit

68mm

www.holroyd-instruments.com +44 (0)1629 822060

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AE-Ultraspan , Ultraspan-Vu , Ultraspan Pro are trademarks of Holroyd Instruments Limited © 2009 Holroyd Instruments Limited
specifications subject to change without notice - products are not certified for use in hazardous / explosive environments