Wave propagation in cementitious material containing artificial distributed damage

The propagation of ultrasonic pulses through highly inhomogeneous mortar is discussed in this paper. The inhomogeneity is introduced by light plastic inclusions in different volume contents to simulate distributed damage. Wave propagation in such media becomes dispersive and therefore, although pulse velocity is influenced, other easily measured features are much more indicative of the inclusion content. These features can certainly improve characterization since they include information from the whole waveform and not only the leading edge.