Extraction of the Polyurethane Layer in Textile Composites for Textronics Applications Using Optical Coherence Tomography

This article presents a new method for the extraction and measurement of the polyurethane layer of Cordura textile composites using optical coherence tomography. The knowledge of coating layer properties in these composites is very important, as it affects mechanical parameters such as stiffness and...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Jarosław Gocławski, Ewa Korzeniewska, Joanna Sekulska-Nalewajko, Dominik Sankowski, Ryszard Pawlak
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: MDPI AG 2018-04-01
Series:Polymers
Subjects:
Online Access:http://www.mdpi.com/2073-4360/10/5/469
Description
Summary:This article presents a new method for the extraction and measurement of the polyurethane layer of Cordura textile composites using optical coherence tomography. The knowledge of coating layer properties in these composites is very important, as it affects mechanical parameters such as stiffness and bending rigidity. Unlike microscopic measurements, which require cross-section samples of the material, the proposed approach is non-invasive. The method is based on detecting the top and bottom boundaries of the polyurethane layer in Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) images using image processing methods, namely edge enhancement filtering, thresholding and spline smoothing. The cover layer measurement results obtained from a three-dimensional OCT image of the composite fabric are presented as the thickness maps. The average values of the layer thicknesses measured with the OCT method for four types of Cordura showed a high correlation with the results obtained from microscopic measurements (Pearson correlation coefficient r = 0.9844 ), which confirms the accuracy of the OCT method.
ISSN:2073-4360