A reliable Non-Destructive Evaluation (NDE) approach is required for the inspection of different polyethylene (PE) pipe joints in various material grades and pipe sizes. In February 2010 a European (FP7) funded project on the development and validation of an automated NDE approach for testing welded joints in plastics pipes (TestPEP), involving 15 organisations from seven European countries, was started. In initial studies, the technical problem, industry needs and the proposed approach to the solution were defined. Several additional tasks need to be solved before approaching the final solution. The challenging material properties of PE pipes, low speed of sound and high frequency dependent attenuation, must be overcome. A flexible scanner with probe and wedge holder incorporated must be adaptable for the variety of pipe joint configurations. Furthermore, a rugged flaw detector instrument will be developed, capable of performing the advanced procedures required for these materials. In this paper the development progress of the inspection techniques for the different pipe joints and pipe sizes are presented. The different joints have specific appearances and several individual techniques need to be applied to fully cover the weld fusion zones. In a separate task, work on the insertion of artificial flaws is being undertaken, and these pipe samples will be inspected with the developed techniques. Initial evaluation of the capability of the inspection techniques are presented in this paper.
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