Westinghouse Electric Corporation

Paul G Kennedy

Robert C Miller

James W Justice

Michael J Hurwitz

Miklos Sarkozi

Nicholas Yaroshuk

The work is scanned by acoustic energy from a focused-arc transducer and from an acoustic-lens transducer. An echo-ranging subassembly energizes the focused-arc transducer and processes the echo trains relfected from the lines or pencils in the work along which the acoustic energy is focused. A holographic echo-processing subassembly is connected to energize the acoustic-lens transducer and to process the echoes reflected from the work where the energy from the acoustic lens impinges. The echo-ranging subassembly and the holographic echo-processing subassembly are enabled alternately and the acoustic energy from the focused-arc transducer and from the acoustic-lens transducer impinge on, and is reflected by, each of a succession of elemental areas of the work. The outputs of the echo-ranging subassembly and of the holographic echo-processing subassembly are supplied to an elastic store which may include one or more shift registers. The elastic store stores a set of magnitudes corresponding to the components of each echo train resulting from the impingement on each elemental area of acoustic energy from the focused-arc transducer and to the echo or echoes resulting from the impingement at a predetermined depth in the work of acoustic energy from the acoustic-lens transducer. The content of the elastic store is transferred to a video disc, the intelligence for each strip or each line of the work which is scanned is recorded on a track of the disc. A cathode-ray tube display is produced from the intelligences stored in the disc for the trains of echo components reflected from each strip of the work and a hologram is produced of the intelligences stored in the disc for the trains of echo components reflected from each strip of the work and a hologram is produced of the intelligences stored on the disc for the echoes resulting from the acoustic energy derived from the acoustic-lens transducer.

Detection, characterization, and study of flaws in work with acoustic

A digital circuit for detecting changes in the gray scale of scanned images is disclosed. Each line of video information produced by scanning the image is digitized. Each digital sample is compared to digital samples delayed a predetermined amount to generate a difference signal which is indicative of a change in the gray scale having a component perpendicular to the direction of scan. The digitized samples of the video signal are also stored in a memory having a capacity sufficient to store data representing a plurality of scan lines with a typical memory having a capacity for storing digital information representing eight scan lines. Selected digital samples from the stored data are compared to samples of the line being scanned to detect changes in the gray scale having a component parallel to the direction of scan. These changes in the gray scale are combined to generate a signal indicative of the central portion of the change in the gray scale of the image being scanned to drive a printer to generate a line drawing with the position of the lines corresponding to the central portion of the changes in gray scale of the scanned image.

Digital circuit for accurately detecting changes in the gray scale of a

This invention is a system of automatically classifying defects both for sorting defective products (metallic surfaces, especially tube surfaces) as to the reworking operation required for correcting the defect, and for classifying the defect as to the preceding manufacturing operation which is the most probable cause of that defect and sending a signal to that operation to provide for adjustments to minimize future defects. The system uses a source of electromagnetic radiation (typically a laser beam which is scanned across the surface) and at least two sensors (adjusted such that the radiation is reflected from a defect-free surface principally received by one of the sensors but that there is a measured amount of radiation in the other sensor). An average signal of the principal sensor is developed as a function of scan position. Threshold circuitry detects when the ratio of sensor signal to average signal varies by a predetermined amount. Special circuitry is used to detect the essentially simultaneous occurrence of at least two different preselected combinations of signal variations to identify the type of defect.

Processing system for detection and the classification of flaws on

A method and apparatus for lowering the contrast range between a welding arc and its surroundings for remote viewing of an arc welding process. A monochromatic light source (10) is used to illuminate the area surrounding the welding arc (18) and a narrow band interference filter (22) tuned to the wavelength of the monochromatic light (10), is placed in front of a viewing camera (24). The monochromatic light enhances the arc background while the filter (22) attenuates the arc illumination that reaches the camera for a more desirable contrast ratio so that the arc, weld puddle and surrounding area can be visible with a high degree of definition on the monitor.

Method and apparatus for monitoring arc welding

A standard television picture is transmitted over conventional phone lines by sampling and storing one picture element per TV line, and transmitting the information of the stored samples over the phone line as a reduced bandwidth television signal. At the receiver end the transmitted signal is placed into storage and extracted at standard TV rates and written as a TV line onto a rotating video disc. The process is repeated until the final picture to be displayed is assembled on a line-by-line basis on the disc.

Scan conversion apparatus

A reference signal reflecting distortion characteristics caused by surrounding interference conditions is applied to transmitted television video or quasi-video information to effectively cancel the distortion characteristics of the incoming transmitted video information. In the event the signal distortion results from randomly occurring interference such as 'airplane flutter' the reference signal may be updated periodically such as during the vertical blanking of each and every incoming television frame. This regular and periodic updating of the reference signal will serve to compensate continuously for varying interference conditions as well as compensating for fixed interference patterns. In the event the interference causing signal distortion is the result of a fixed condition, it may not be necessary to update continuously the reference signal and thus a random or manually initiated update may be acceptable.

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Monroeville, PA, United States of America

Paul G Kennedy