extra-ordinary development of structural materials, such as composite
materials, and structural configurations necessitated establishing robust
and continuous structural health monitoring (SHM) systems. The aim of
the present work is to establish an integrated SHM algorithm to remotely
detect damage starting from the insipient level for structures made of
composite materials. It depends on the electromechanical impedance
(EMI) technique using Piezoelectric Waver Active Sensor (PWAS). The
algorithm procedure includes several subroutines developed to ensure
the identification of real damage and relatively define its location and
severity precisely. The performance and the reliability of the proposed
algorithm are verified through numerical simulations carried out through
finite element modeling of the monitored structure using ANSYS
software, since it is available to do multi-physics modeling to simulate
coupling characteristics of piezoelectricity. MATLAB codes are
developed to prepare and process the obtained numerical data in order
to implement the algorithm subroutines. Several numerical simulation
studies are carried out to verify the proposed algorithm procedure and
measure its performance. Carbon woven fiber composite plates equipped
with a matrix of PWASs are assigned as test articles. Numerically, the
algorithm was shown to be beneficial to detect two different-location of
insipient damages and two different-location of insipient and moderate
damages, as well as to locate these damages with accuracy more than
80%. Reliability of data obtained from physical operating system was
guaranteed using sensors diagnostic check in advance to SHM process.