Numerical and Experimental Investigations of Flaws Detection in Multilayer HTS Tapes by Magnetothermal Technique

This article presents a numerical and experimental studies on the non-destructive testing of high temperature superconducting (HTS) multilayer tapes at room temperature, by eddy current thermography (ECT). An experimental setup is developed in which a rotating magnet wheel inductor is used instead of electromagnetic inductors to avoid the inherent thermal disturbance. A 3-D magnetothermal modelling approach is developed for the verification of the experimental results and the simulation of situations that cannot be reproduced experimentally, in particular the verification of the detection limits as a function of the shape and location of the defects. Simulation and experimental results are in good agreement.