FIFTH CANADIAN CONFERENCE ON NONDESTRUCTIVE ... - IAEA

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Nondestructive testing Is a subject that one might say was born of necessity,
nurtured and kept alive by dedicated and experienced practitioners and has
developed empirically, often through panic and expediency, to satisfy
specific needs as they arise in industry.
In recent years the subject has developed in a much more structured way, by
encouraging formal training and operator certification, by the setting up of
societies and conferences both nationally and internationally and, perhaps
most significantly, by attracting the interest and participation of
scientific research groups in many countries.
One great advantage of this input of 'fresh blood' into the subject has been
that NDT has developed much firmer foundations; the conventional techniques
are, themselves, much more clearly understood and the basis for forward
development is rapidly reverting to one of 'fact' and 'scientific reasoning'
rather than 'hunch' and 'lets have a go'. The disadvantage, which should
certainly not be underestimated, is that we now have a very dichotomous
situation with, on the one hand, those practised and experienced in
conventional practices and in the needs of industry, who have not amassed
detailed knowledge or understanding of recent scientific developments or of
research practices associated with signal and data processing; and, on the
other hand, the 'scientific recruits' to the subject who have virtually no
feel for the applications side of practical field NDT, scant allegiance to
the technological society framework and little concern for the empirical
'footslogging' of those who built the 'string and sealing wax' launch pad
which they, the scientists, have used to get themselves into orbit.
So if we look first into the near future one of the major needs is to bridge
this "gulf before it becomes an unbrldgable chasm. One solution is to build
up combined teams in which practical experience and scientific erudition can
be brought together, hopefully to the mutual benefit of both disciplines. We
have tried to tackle it this way in the UK with the national NDT Centre,
which was set up at Harwell as long ago as 1967 with this as one of its main
objectives. Both NDT applications work and research programmes are combined
in the Centre's work programme and there is the added stimulus that need (as
measured fairly quantitatively by contract income) can be used as the arbiter
to decide the balance and range of activity.
Our experience is that the type of organisation we have set up in the UK can
be made to cater for both the short-term 'fire—bridgade ' type of NDT problem
that tends to arise unexpectedly but, seemingly, with amazing regularity in
manufacturing industry; and for the longer term R&D needs of larger
organisations (such as the power generation, nuclear construction, oil and
gas distribution and aerospace industries) who are perhaps more likely to
anticipate and plan for the NDT needs associated with new manufacturing
designs or new constructional materials and hence support underlying
research.