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NDT has been in existence for several decades. The industry gained importance after the second world war, mainly technological advancement, the
efforts by defense establishments stimulated swift development in instrumentation. NDT was then mainly used for detecting defects. Safe life were the
code words buzzing around the industry, it was mainly intended to check macroscopic defects on structures during its life, in the event of such
defects being noticed, that particular component would be removed from service. To meet this growing demand, researchers were developing a variety of
sophisticated techniques using ultrasonics, eddy currents, x-rays, dye penetrants, magnetic particles and other forms of interrogating energy emerged.
This report deals with the technological development and growth opportunities.
D246 Technical Insights report separates the good news from the mundane by providing the following:
- A detailed overview of technological advances in development laboratories
- Identification of key companies and developers and estimates of timelines for commercializing technology
- Definitions of key markets and applications
- Techniques and application
- Reporting on technology drivers as well as obstacles in the way of commercial success
- A detailed list of key contacts in the field, including names, titles, addresses, phone numbers, e-mail addresses, and URLs.
"In the past industries such as defense and nuclear played an important role in Nondestructive testing (NDT). Currently, there is a growing
need across industries that demands such testing techniques and NDT is an extremely important technique for manufacturers," says Technical
Insight Analyst Anand. "A series of advancements related to computers, electronics, material science, and other interdisciplinary fields made
major impact on all or many of the NDT (nondestructive testing) methods."
Accepting the reality that no single method can provide all the necessary NDT information, efforts are being made to integrate several methods. The
complimenting capabilities offer greater detectability and the overlapping ones enhance the reliability. Data fusion techniques are being developed to
enable effective data-acquisition and processing as well as provide a sound interpretation of the test parameters in relation to the material
integrity. Instruments are now commercially available that can be used to perform ultrasonic and eddy current tests using a core hardware and
interchangeable transducers and modules.
The search for smarter methods that can rapidly and inexpensively detect very small flaws in complex materials and structures at very high
probability and repeatability will continue to be a challenge for NDT. Efforts will be made to further reduce the complexity associated with
inspection procedures, where redundant tasks will be performed by computers leaving the role of the human operator to critical decision making. While
it is difficult to predict when, global standards will eventually be accepted worldwide and will cover all the NDT standards, inspection procedures
and personnel training/qualifications.
Developers of NDT products are highly dependent on the end-user industries that purchase NDT equipment. Experts believe that in the event of an
economic recession, NDT is one of the first items cut as it is seen as an extra cost in many applications. While the defense sector has gradually cut
the purchase of NDT equipment, other sectors such as civilian aerospace, automotive, and plant maintenance have increased their purchases of NDT
equipment and services. It is likely that chemical and petrochemical industries will show greater demand for NDT equipment. | 
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