Study on Applicability of Passive Infrared Thermography Analysis for Blistering Detection of Stone Cultural Heritage

Abstract

This study focused on analysis condition and application method of the passive infrared thermography according to the direction and time to nondestructively detect the blistering zone of stone cultural heritage. As a result, the passive thermographic images showed different temperature characteristics by time because it sensitively reacts to air temperature, insolation and sunshine direction. In particular, the insolation and sunshine direction, which are periodically changed from 6:00 to 17:00, irregularly made surface temperature. In addition, surface temperature differences were brought on fresh zones and blistering zones except specific time since blistering causes erratic thermal transfer. As a result of examining the detection characteristics of blistering by time, the blistering was well detected between 9:00 and 10:00 when there was rapid increase in air temperature and insolation in all direction except the north. However, this study isn't considered effects of four seasons because it is carried out in autumn, and the passive thermography has difficulty to analyze the quantitative area of blistering zone. Therefore, an additional study for synthetic consideration of the passive thermography analysis about four seasons and quantitative modeling of blistering zone using the active thermography are needed.