Harmonic generation measurement is recognized as a promising tool for inspecting material state or micro-damage and is an ongoing research topic. Second harmonic generation is most frequently employed and provides the quadratic nonlinearity parameter (β) that is calculated by the measurement of fundamental and second harmonic amplitudes. The cubic nonlinearity parameter (β2), which dominates the third harmonic amplitude and is obtained by third harmonic generation, is often used as a more sensitive parameter in many applications. This paper presents a detailed procedure for determining the correct β2 of ductile polycrystalline metal samples such as aluminum alloys when there exists source nonlinearity. The procedure includes receiver calibration, diffraction, and attenuation correction and, more importantly, source nonlinearity correction for third harmonic amplitudes. The effect of these corrections on the measurement of β2 is presented for aluminum specimens of various thicknesses at various input power levels. By correcting the source nonlinearity of the third harmonic and further verifying the approximate relationship between the cubic nonlinearity parameter and the square of the quadratic nonlinearity parameter (β∗β), β2≈β∗β, the cubic nonlinearity parameters could be accurately determined even with thinner samples and lower input voltages.
Keywords: cubic nonlinearity; higher harmonic generation; nonlinear ultrasound; quadratic nonlinearity; source nonlinearity.