The Prediction of Leather Mechanical Properties from Airborne Ultrasonic Testing of Hides

Abstract

High quality, clean, and well-preserved hides are paramount forcompetitiveness in both domestic and export markets. Currently,hides are visually inspected and ranked for quality and saleprice, which is not reliable when hair is present on the hides.Advanced technologies are needed to nondestructively andaccurately characterize the quality of hides and enable one topredict the mechanical properties of leather. Research wascarried out to develop airborne ultrasonic (AU) methods tonondestructively characterize the quality of hides that are usefulfor predicting the mechanical properties of leather. The developednondestructive method is based on measuring the AU wavestransmitted through the hide samples. We performed a systematicstudy and used a statistical experimental design to establish therelationship between key test parameters and responding AUquantities, thereby establishing proper AU testing methods forhides. Moreover, observations showed AU parameters derivedfrom the distributions of Time of Flight (TOFd) and the amplitudeof transmitted waves (AMPd) have a strong correlation with themechanical properties of leather. This study demonstrated thatthe tensile strength, stiffness, elongation, and toughness of leathercould be nondestructively predicted by the physical quantitiesobtained from AU testing of hides.