Ultrasonic Weld Joint Quality Testing Using Vibration Signals

The patent implements continuous real-time monitoring during the ultrasonic welding process by detecting vibration signals throughout the entire welding cycle. The evaluation unit continuously analyzes vibration characteristics and compares them against reference values, enabling uninterrupted quality assessment without pausing production. This ensures that every welded joint is monitored from start to finish, maintaining both productivity and reliability.

The patent replaces destructive mechanical testing methods with non-contact vibration analysis. Instead of physically testing welded joints after production, the system uses vibration sensors to detect and evaluate welding quality in real-time during the welding process itself. This substitution eliminates the need for separate testing steps, maintaining production speed while ensuring quality determination.

The patent segments the continuous vibration signal into discrete evaluation intervals that correspond to specific welding process phases. The evaluation unit processes vibration data in manageable segments rather than attempting to analyze the entire continuous signal at once. This segmentation approach enables real-time monitoring coverage without overwhelming the processing system, balancing reliability with manageable computational load.

The patent implements evaluation at multiple prescribed intervals throughout the welding process, performing more analyses than the minimum single-point evaluation. By evaluating vibration characteristics at several key moments during welding (such as at the start, middle, and end of the welding cycle), the system achieves comprehensive real-time monitoring coverage. This partial multiple-evaluation approach ensures gap-free monitoring while distributing processing load across time intervals.

The patent implements a feedback-based quality determination system where vibration signals are continuously monitored and compared against reference values derived from known good welds. The evaluation unit analyzes the feedback from vibration characteristics and provides real-time quality assessment. This feedback mechanism enables comprehensive quality determination without requiring complex tolerance-based cancellation systems, as the reference value comparison naturally identifies defective welds.

The patent creates reference copies of vibration signals from properly executed welds and stores them for comparison. Instead of implementing complex real-time tolerance calculations, the system copies ideal vibration patterns and uses these as benchmarks for quality assessment. This copying approach simplifies the evaluation system while enabling accurate quality determination, as actual weld vibrations are directly compared against the reference copies.

The patent performs preliminary action by pre-establishing reference vibration values from known good welds before production begins. These reference values are stored in the evaluation unit and ready for immediate comparison during welding operations. By preparing the reference standards in advance, the system eliminates the need for complex real-time calculations, achieving both high measurement precision through accurate reference comparison and fast processing speed by avoiding computationally intensive operations during production.

The patent transforms the complex vibration signal data into simplified characteristic parameters that can be quickly compared against reference values. By converting raw vibration signals into key characteristic parameters (such as frequency components, amplitude ratios, or spectral features), the system achieves accurate quality determination through parameter comparison rather than full signal analysis. This parameter transformation maintains measurement precision while significantly reducing processing time.