Ultrasonic wave propagation provides a method for Nondestructive Characterisation of the clastic constants of materials. Goniometry based ultrasonic measurements were conducted in through transmission mode for isotropic and anisotropic materials using a conventional ultrasonic immersion transducer as a transmitter and a large aperture sensor made from Polyvinylidene Fluoride (PVDF) as receiver. The experimental results using this probe configuration were found to give improved transmission spectra that provides improved corroboration with the theoretical predictions based on Plane Wave Stiffness-Matrix based transmission factor model. Inversion of the clastic constants of materials, from the measured ultrasonic transmission spectra, was evaluated using two methods: (a) Genetic Algorithm and (b) Targeted Reconstruction. The inversions were carried out on transmission spectra obtained from both isotropic (Aluminum) and anisotropic materials (fiber reinforced graphite epoxy). The effectiveness of the large aperture receiver was also demonstrated from the results from inversion of the measured transmission spectra. © 2006 American Institute of Physics.