A model of the acoustic scattering of a plane wave incident obliquely upon an infinite elastic bi-layered cylindrical shell is developed based on normal mode expansion technique. The far field backscattering form function for the composite copper/stainless steel cylindrical shell is calculated for reduced frequency range of k⊥ a 1= 0–70 and for different values of incident angles α (k⊥= k 1 cos⁡ α, k 1 is the wave number in the fluid surrounding the shell and a 1 is the outer radius of the shell). Numerical calculations show the behaviour of the resonances of circumferential and helical guided waves as the angle of incidence increases. The obtained results are compared with those of copper and stainless steel one-layered cylindrical shells. The use of frequency-angle representation depicts the helical propagation of surface waves along the axis of the shell. This representation, along with the identification plan, enables to describe the evolution of acoustic scattering as a function of incidence angle and vibration mode n. Furthermore, a comparative analysis of the resonance trajectory evolution between mono-layered and composite cylindrical shells is performed. The evolution of the helical guided waves, the bifurcation of the A 0 wave into the A 0− and A 0+ waves, and a region with high backscattering are investigated. The presented results show that the extension of the region with high backscattering depends on the thickness and physical properties of the bi-layered cylindrical shell.