Nuclear Engineering and Technology

Korean Nuclear Society (한국원자력학회)
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Applicability of nonlinear ultrasonic technique to evaluation of thermally aged CF8M cast stainless steel

  • Kim, Jongbeom (Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute) ;
  • Kim, Jin-Gyum (Korea Institute of Nuclear Safety) ;
  • Kong, Byeongseo (Department of Nuclear and Quantum Engineering, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology) ;
  • Kim, Kyung-Mo (Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute) ;
  • Jang, Changheui (Department of Nuclear and Quantum Engineering, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology) ;
  • Kang, Sung-Sik (Korea Institute of Nuclear Safety) ;
  • Jhang, Kyung-Young (School of Mechanical Engineering, Hanyang University)
  • Received : 2019.07.10
  • Accepted : 2019.09.10
  • Published : 2020.03.25
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Abstract

Cast austenitic stainless steel (CASS) is used for fabricating different components of the primary reactor coolant system of pressurized water reactors. However, the thermal embrittlement of CASS resulting from long-term operation causes structural safety problems. Ultrasonic testing for flaw detection has been used to assess the thermal embrittlement of CASS; however, the high scattering and attenuation of the ultrasonic wave propagating through CASS make it difficult to accurately quantify the flaw size. In this paper, we present a different approach for evaluating the thermal embrittlement of CASS by assessing changes in the material properties of CASS using a nonlinear ultrasonic technique, which is a potential nondestructive method. For the evaluation, we prepared CF8M specimens that were thermally aged under four different heating conditions. Nonlinear ultrasonic measurements were performed using a contact piezoelectric method to obtain the relative ultrasonic nonlinearity parameter, and a mini-sized tensile test was performed to investigate the correlation of the parameter with material properties. Experimental results showed that the ultrasonic nonlinearity parameter had a correlation with tensile properties such as the tensile strength and elongation. Consequently, we could confirm the applicability of the nonlinear ultrasonic technique to the evaluation of the thermal embrittlement of CASS.

Keywords

References

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