• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.17 no.2
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• pp.121-129
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• 2000

The robotic automation in NonDestructive Testing(NDT) is a promising field of research and it helps to expand the applications of NDT enormously. Especially, in the case of pipelines which are widely used in various industrial facilities, it is required to secure adequate ways of inspection in the usual maintenance activitites. In this paper, we present a robot system for inpipe inspection of underground urban gas pipelines. The robot is configured as an articulated structure like a snake with a tether cable. Two active driving vehicles are located in front and rear of the system, respectively and passive modules such as a NonDestructive Testing module and a control module are chained between the active vehicles. The proposed system has outstanding mobility by employing a new steering mechanism called Double Active Universal Joint, which makes it possible to cope with complicated configurations of underground pipelines. Characteristic features of the system are described and the construction of the system is briefly outlined.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.8-13
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• 2008

The stray current interference problem could induce the corrosion of near-by structure and rail itself. Many efforts has been concentrated on the reduction of the interference. In this work the influences of separation distance, soil resistivity, pipe coating resistance, leak resistance of rail were studied using the numerical analysis methods. These analysis could be used to estimate the sensitivity of each variables in the study of the mitigation method and their numerical analysis.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Machine Tool Engineers Conference
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• 2003.04a
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• pp.68-72
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• 2003

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2011.04a
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• pp.128-129
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• 2011

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Machine Tool Engineers Conference
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• 2002.10a
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• pp.11-17
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• 2002

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.261-266
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• 2002

Up to now a wide variety of researches on inpipe robots for inspection have been introduced, but it still seems to be difficult to construct a robot providing mobility sufficient to navigate inside the complicated configuration of underground pipelines. The robot for the inspection of pipelines should freely move along the basic configuration of pipelines such as along horizontal or vertical pipelines. Moreover it should be able to travel along reducers and elbows, and especially the capability for steering in branches is essential to it. In this report, citical points and technologies in the development of the inpipe inspection robots are introduced and inpipe robots developed for last several years are introduced.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.34 no.4
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• pp.413-421
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• 2010

In this study, residual-stress distributions in welds with different strength used in natural gas pipelines are calculated by using finite-element analysis and simulating a realistic welding process. The temperature and residual-stress analysis results are compared with the real fusion profile and the application results of the Fitness-For-Service assessment code, API 579 in order to validate the finite-element analysis model and procedure. Parametric study is performed to assess the effect of welding and material variables such as mechanical strength mismatch, the strength of weld metal, reinforcement, and heat input on the residual stress distributions. Finally, on the basis of the parametric study results, the effects of these variables on residual stress distributions are investigated. In particular, the strength mismatch between base metals has an insignificant effect on residual-stress distributions.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.39 no.1
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• pp.11-17
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• 2015

High-density polyethylene (HDPE) piping, which has recently been applied to safety class III piping in nuclear power plants, can be butt-joined through the thermal fusion process, which heats two fused surfaces and then subject to axial pressure. The thermal fusion process generates bead shapes on the butt fusion. The stress concentrations caused by the bead shapes may reduce the fatigue lifetime. Thus, investigating the effect of the thermal butt fusion beads on fatigue behavior is necessary. This study examined the fatigue behavior of thermal butt fusion via a tensile fatigue test under stress-controlled conditions using finite element elastic stress analysis. Based on the results, the presence of thermal butt fusion beads was confirmed to reduce the fatigue lifetime in the low-cycle fatigue region while having a negligible effect in the medium- and high-cycle fatigue regions.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.44-52
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• 2014

Leakage is an important factor to be considered for the management of underground water supply pipelines in a smart water grid system, especially if the pipelines are aged and buried under the pavement or various structures of a highly populated city. Because the exact detection of the location of such leaks in pipelines is essential for their efficient operation, a new methodology for leak location detection based on frequency band variation, windowing filters, and probability is proposed in this paper. Because the exact detection of the leak location depends on the precision of estimation of time delay between sensor signals due to leak noise, some window functions that offer weightings at significant frequencies are applied for calculating the improved cross-correlation function. Experimental results obtained by applying this methodology to an actual buried water supply pipeline, ~ 253.9 m long and made of cast iron, revealed that the approach of frequency band variation with those windows and probability offers better performance for leak location detection.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.31 no.9
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• pp.53-68
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• 2015

Longitudinal strain is an important component of seismic design for buried pipelines. A design procedure which determines the wavelength from site natural period and shear wave velocity of the soil layer and closed-form solutions of pipelines under a harmonic motion is typically used in design. However, the applicability of the procedure has not yet been thoroughly investigated. In this paper, displacement-time histories extracted from 1D site response analyses are used in 3D shell-spring model to accurately predict the response of pipelines. The results are closely compared to those from the design procedure. The area of interest is East Siberia. Performing a site response analysis to determine site specific displacement time history is highlighted. The site natural period may be used to predict the predominant period of the acceleration time history, but cannot be used to estimate the predominant period of the displacement time history. If an accurate estimate of the predominant period of the displacement time history is provided, it is demonstrated that the design equation can be successfully used to predict the response of pipelines.