• Journal of Power System Engineering
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.38-44
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• 2006

Failure assessment of steam generator tube are very important for the integrity of energy plants. In pipes of energy plants, sometimes, the local wall thinning may result from severe erosion-corrosion damage. Recently, the effects of local wall thinning on fracture strength and fracture behavior of piping system have been well studied. In this paper, the elasto-plastic analysis is performed by FE code ANSIS on steam generator tube with wall thinning. We evaluated the failure mode, fracture strength and fracture behavior from FE analysis. It was possible to predict the crack initiation point by estimating true fracture ductility under multi-axial stress conditions at the center of the thinned area.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2007.05a
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• pp.1702-1707
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• 2007

The reduction of pipe-thickness induced by flow accelerated corrosion (FAC) is one of the most serious problems on the maintenance of piping system in nuclear power plants (NNP). If the thickness of a pipe component is reduced below the critical level, it cannot sustain pressure and consequently results in leakage or rupture. For this reason, wall thinning by FAC has been inspected in secondary side piping systems in NPPs. In this research Round Robin Test (RRT) was conducted to verify confidence of wall thinning measurement system in NPP. 12 inspectors from 3 companies participated and 23 specimens were used according to standard practice in RRT. The gage R&R analysis was introduced in regard to repeatability and reproducibility that are affected to measurement system errors. Confidence intervals of thickness measurement system were obtained.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2007.05a
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• pp.1813-1817
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• 2007

The present work presents plastic limit load solutions for piping branch junctions with local wall-thinning, based on detailed three-dimensional (3-D) and small strain FE limit analyses using elastic-perfectly plastic materials. Three types of loading are considered; internal pressure, in-plane bending on the branch pipe and in-plane bending on the run pipe. The wall-tinning located on variable area of the piping branch junction is considered. A wide range of piping branch junction and wall-thinning geometries are considered. Comparison of the proposed solutions with FE results shows good agreement

• Transactions of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering
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• v.16 no.12 s.117
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• pp.1224-1230
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• 2006

Pipe thinning is one of the major issues for the structural fracture of pipes of nuclear power plants. Therefore a method to inspect a large area of piping systems quickly and accurately is needed. In this paper, we proposed the method for monitoring pipe thinning. Our basic idea come from that a group velocity of impact wave is different as wall thickness. If the group velocity is measured, wall thickness can be estimated. To obtain the group velocity, time -frequency analysis is used. This is because an arrival time difference can be measured easily in time-frequency domain rather than time domain. To test the performance of this technique, experiments have been performed for a plate and U type pipe. Results show that the proposed technique is quite powerful in the monitoring pipe thinning.

• Journal of ILASS-Korea
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• v.13 no.4
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• pp.173-179
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• 2008

The current machinery and tools of secondary channel of the nuclear power plants were produced in the carbon-steel and low-alloy steel. What produced with the carbon-steel occurs wall thinning effect from flow accelerated corrosion by the fluid flow at high temperature, high pressure. Several nuclear power plants in Korea have experienced wall thinning damage in the area around the impingement baffle-installed. Wall thinning by flow accelerated corrosion occurs piping system, the heat exchanger, steam condenser and feedwater heaters etc,. Feedwater heaters of many nuclear power plants have recently experienced sever wall thinning damage, which will increase as operating time progress. This study describes the comparisons between the numerical results using the FLUENT code and experimental data of down scale model.

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.66-72
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• 2002

Fracture behaviors of pipes with local wall thinning are very important for the integrity of nuclear power plant. However, effects of local wall thinning on strength and fracture behaviors of piping system were not well studied. Acoustic emission(AE) has been widely used in various fields because of its extreme sensitivity, dynamic detection ability and location of growing defects. In this study, we investigated failure modes of locally wall thinned pipes and AE signals by bending test. From test results, we could be divided four types of failure modes of ovalization, crack initiation after ovalization, local buckling and crack initiation after local buckling. And fracture behaviors such as elastic region, yielding region, plastic deformation region and crack progress region could be evaluated by AE counts, accumulative counts and time-frequency analysis during bending test. The result of the frequency range is expected to be basic data that can inspect plants in real-time.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.29 no.4 s.235
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• pp.606-613
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• 2005

Effects of circumferentially local wall thinning on the fracture behavior of pipes were investigated by monotonic four-point bending. Local wall thinning was machined on the pipes in order to simulate erosion/corrosion metal loss. The configurations of the eroded area included an eroded ratio of d/t= 0.2, 0.5, 0.6, and 0.8, and an eroded length of ${\ell}\;=10mm,$ 25mm, and 120mm. Fracture type could be classified into ovalization, local buckling, and crack initiation depending on the eroded length and eroded ratio. Three-dimensional elasto-plastic analyses were also carried out using the finite element method, which is able to accurately simulate fracture behaviors excepting failure due to cracking. It was possible to predict the crack initiation point by estimating true fracture ductility under multi-axial stress conditions at the center of the thinned area.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2001.11a
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• pp.61-66
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• 2001

Fracture behaviors of pipes with local wall thinning is very important for the integrity of nuclear power plant. In pipes of energy plants, sometimes, the local wall thinning may result from severe drosion-corrosion damage. However, effect of local wall thinning on strength and fracture behaviors of piping system were not well studied. In this paper, the monotonic bending tests were performed of full-scale carbon steel pipes with local wall thinning. A monotonic bending load was applied to straight pipe specimens by four-point loading at ambient temperature without internal pressure. From the tests, fracture behaviors and fracture strength of locally thinned pipe were manifested systematically. The observed failure modes were divided into four types; ovalization, ovalization+cracking, local buckling and local buckling+cracking. Also, maximum load was successfully evaluated.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2003.04a
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• pp.90-95
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• 2003

Fracture behaviors of pipes with local wall thinning are very important for the integrity of nuclear power plant. In pipes of energy plants, sometimes, the local wall thinning may result from severe erosion-corrosion (E/C) damage. However, the effects of local wall thinning on strength and fracture behaviors of piping system were not well studied. In this paper, the monotonic bending tests were performed of full-scale welded and unwelded carbon steel pipes with local wall thinning. A monotonic bending load was applied to straight pipe specimens by four-point loading at ambient temperature without internal pressure. The observed failure modes were divided into four types; ovalization, crack initiation/growth after ovalization, local buckling and crack initiation/growth after local buckling. Also, the strengths of welded and unwelded piping system with local wall thinning were evaluated.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2003.04a
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• pp.622-628
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• 2003

The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effect of local wall thinning on the collapse of elbow subjected to internal pressure and bending moment. Thus, the nonlinear 3D finite element analyses were performed to obtained collapse moment of elbow containing various wall thinning defects under two loading; modes (closing and opening modes) and defect locations (intrados and extrados). From the results of analyses, the influence of wall thinning defect on the global moment-rotation behavior of elbow was discussed, and the dependance of collapse moment of elbow on wall thinning depth, length, and circumferential angle was investigated under different loading mode and defect location.