Guidance for assessing the Damage Detection Capability of Structural Health Monitoring Systems
ARP6821
The nature of SHM data differs from that seen in traditional NDE applications in that the position of SHM sensors is fixed and that SHM data will be available much more frequently (if not continuously) over time.
Rationale: The goal of this document is to provide guidance for establishing the damage detection capability of Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) systems to assist in the safe adoption of SHM solutions for assessing aircraft integrity.
The maturity of SHM systems has evolved to the point where some SHM systems have demonstrated sensitivities that meet or exceed current damage detection requirements and are being considered for on-aircraft use.
As a result, there is a growing need for well-defined methods to statistically quantify the SHM system capability .
However, while there are many agreed-upon procedures for quantifying the performance of NDI techniques, there are limited guidelines for assessing SHM systems. While the intended function of the SHM and NDI systems may be very similar, there are distinct differences in the parameters that affect their capability and differences in their implementation that require special consideration.
