Scott A Herbster

US Patent:

7506546, Mar 24, 2009

Filed:

Apr 17, 2008

Appl. No.:

12/104871

Inventors:

John Michael Cuffe - Reedsville PA, US
Klaus Peter Busch - Rodenbach, DE
Scott Allen Herbster - Middleburg PA, US

Assignee:

GE Inspection Technologies, LP - Lewistown PA

International Classification:

G01N 29/06
G01N 29/44
A61B 8/08
A61B 8/00

US Classification:

73602, 600437, 600443

Abstract:

The invention provides an ultrasonic object inspection system for measuring the physical properties of a test object which includes a pulse generator for sending an electrical pulse signal to a transducer. The transducer then applies an ultrasonic signal to the test object and receives an ultrasonic echo signal from the test object which is then converted by the transducer to an electrical echo signal for sending to a signal processing circuit. The signal processing circuit includes a plurality of signal processing paths with each path scaling the electrical echo signal to a different degree and including a respective analog to digital converter for converting the electrical echo signal to a digital electrical echo signal. The signal processing circuit further includes a logic circuit for selecting the output of the respective analog to digital converter that provides the digital echo signal having the greatest amplitude without exceeding a predetermined saturation threshold.

US Patent:

D636282, Apr 19, 2011

Filed:

Oct 9, 2009

Appl. No.:

29/345132

Inventors:

Yong Yin - Shanghai, CN
Scott Allen Herbster - Middleburg PA, US
Tounine Mayer - Lewistown PA, US
Hongfang Wang - Shanghai, CN

Assignee:

General Electric Company - Schenectady NY

International Classification:

1004

US Classification:

D10 70, D10 78

US Patent:

20070101816, May 10, 2007

Filed:

Nov 4, 2005

Appl. No.:

11/266854

Inventors:

John Cuffe - Reedsville PA, US
Klaus-Peter Busch - Rodenbach, DE
Scott Herbster - Middleburg PA, US

Assignee:

GE Inspection Technologies, LP - Lewistown PA

International Classification:

G01N 29/00

US Classification:

073649000

Abstract:

The apparatus and method of the present invention provides a plurality of linear amplifiers simultaneously processing an ultrasonic signal. Each amplifier of the plurality of linear amplifiers has a predetermined gain level suitable for achieving the desired output signal level for input to an analog to digital (A/D) converter for processing. The output of each amplifier is sampled by each respective A/D converter at a very high frequency to convert the analog signal output of each of the linear amplifiers to a digital signal. Logic circuits simultaneously monitor all of the output digital signals from the A/D converters. The logic circuits determine which output of the A/D converters has the greatest linear output and stores the selected output in a memory storage device. The saved output waveforms are subsequently combined into a continuous linear digital output that has a dynamic response range that is approximately the sum of the individual dynamic response ranges of the individual amplifiers and A/D converters. The combined continuous linear digital output waveform may be input to a logarithmic conversion to produce a waveform having a wide dynamic range.