Detection of back-side pit on a ferrous plate by magnetic flux leakage method with analyzing magnetic field vector

We have developed a magnetic flux leakage (MFL) system using magnetic resistive (MR) sensors for detecting two dimensional magnetic field components, and an induction coil that generates low magnetic field strengths and extremely low frequencies. The signal at each scanned measurement point (i) was divided by the signal strength M_mes,i and phase α_i by a lock-in amplifier. Using the strength M_mes,i and phase α_i, we calculated the imaginary part of the signal using the common phase β. By optimization of the common phase β to the imaginary part, the analyzed scanning data curve was shown to be effective in estimating the size (depth and diameter) of back-side pits on a ferrous plate. Comparing the two dimensional magnetic field components of leakage, the imaginary part of the y-component parallel to the induced magnetic field was found to be suitable for detecting the back-side pits.