Notable Events in Early Industrial NDT
- 1854 Hartford, Connecticut: a boiler at the Fales and Gray Car works explodes, killing 21 people and seriously injuring 50. Within a decade, the State of Connecticut passes a law requiring annual inspection (in this case visual) of boilers.
- 1880 - 1920 The "Oil and Whiting" method of crack detection is used in the railroad industry to find cracks in heavy steel parts. (A part is soaked in thinned oil, then painted with a white coating that dries to a powder. Oil seeping out from cracks turns the white powder brown, allowing the cracks to be detected.) This was the precursor to modern liquid penetrant tests.
- 1895 Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen discovers what are now known as X-rays. In his first paper he discusses the possibility of flaw detection.
- 1920 Dr. H. H. Lester begins development of industrial radiography for metals.
- 1924 — Lester uses radiography to examine castings to be installed in a Boston Edison Company steam pressure power plant .
- 1926 The first electromagnetic eddy current instrument is available to measure material thicknesses.
- 1927 - 1928 Magnetic induction system to detect flaws in railroad track developed by Dr. Elmer Sperry and H.C. Drake.
- 1929 Magnetic particle methods and equipment pioneered (A.V. DeForest and F.B. Doane.)
- 1930s Robert F. Mehl demonstrates radiographic imaging using gamma radiation from Radium, which can examine thicker components than the low-energy X-ray machines available at the time.
- 1935 - 1940 Liquid penetrant tests developed (Betz, Doane, and DeForest)
- 1935 - 1940s Eddy current instruments developed (H.C. Knerr, C. Farrow, Theo Zuschlag, and Fr. F. Foerster).
- 1940 - 1944 Ultrasonic test method developed in USA by Dr. Floyd Firestone.
- 1950 The Schmidt Hammer (also known as "Swiss Hammer") is invented. The instrument uses the world’s first patented non-destructive testing method for concrete.
- 1950 J. Kaiser introduces acoustic emission as an NDT method.
(Source: Hellier, 2001) Note the number of advancements made during the WWII era, a time when industrial quality control was growing in importance.
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