A vibration-based Machine Learning type Structural Health Monitoring methodology for populations of composite aerostructures under uncertainty

A robust to uncertainty Machine Learning (ML) based Structural Health Monitoring methodology for populations of composite aerostructures is postulated. The methodology is founded upon a number of unsupervised ML algorithms for damage detection and a supervised counterpart for damage characterization. Damage detection is specifically based on two types of Healthy Subspace representations: A Multiple Model (MM) and a varying radii Hyper-Sphere (HS) type. Both are built upon response-only vibration acceleration and/or strain signals at properly selected sensor locations. Based on them, Multiple Input Single Output (MISO) Transmittance Function AutoRegressive with eXogenous (TF-ARX) excitation data driven models representing the partial structural dynamics are obtained. Decision making is then based on the model parameter vector that may be transformed and reduced via Principal Component Analysis (PCA). Damage detection is achieved via multi-level information fusion using acceleration and/or strain sensors. Damage characterization, referring to damage type, location, and level determination, is achieved via a hierarchical cosine similarity based algorithm. The methodology is successfully assessed via hundreds of experiments using a population of small-scale composite coupons for the detection and characterization of Delamination and Impact damage under material/manufacturing, temperature, excitation, and experimental uncertainty.