Elastic constant determination of hardwoods using ultrasonic insertion technique

Ultrasonic insertion technique (IT) is an ultrasonic technique which involves sample immersion in a solution to determine its acoustic properties. IT is normally used to determine the acoustic properties of a medical phantom. We proposed the use of IT as an alternative technique to the common contact ultrasonic technique: through-transmission technique (TT) for determining the elastic constant of hardwoods in longitudinal, tangential and radial directions. The elastic constant of twelve rectangular-shaped Malaysian hardwoods from three different categories; heavy, medium and light with the density ranging from 602 to 992kgm-3 were determined using IT and TT. Both techniques were carried out at 24.0°C surrounding temperature and utilized 2.25MHz ultrasonic transducers. Data from both techniques were compared to validate the use of the proposed technique. Findings indicated that IT offers consistent and accurate results for, tangential and radial elastic constants (TEC and REC) within 8.89% and 5.86% differences, respectively compared to TT for all tested hardwoods. IT offers an alternative technique for TEC and REC determinations of precious wood samples.