University of Waterloo

Purpose

The focus of this Project will be to develop a set of ultrasound‐based monitoring and artificial intelligence (AI) processing systems for each of resistance spot welding (RSW) and laser brazing (LB) technologies. These systems will rely on real‐time automated ultrasonic inspection, which requires the design and development of new single‐element or phased array probes for monitoring each joining technology. An AI system will automatically interpret the ultrasonic non‐destructive evaluation (NDE) data in real time, thus high‐speed high‐performance inference models using cutting‐edge deep learning techniques will be developed. These real‐time process monitoring systems represent major steps towards zero‐defect manufacturing, NDE 4.0, and Industry 4.0 – all of which bring forth considerable economical and societal benefits.