• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.36 no.6
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• pp.460-465
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• 2016

Long pipe structures are usually installed in fixtures located with regular intervals or laid underground. Therefore, deflection and deformation could easily occur due to their weight or ground activity. A shape monitoring technique can be used effectively to evaluate the integrity of the pipe structures. Fiber Bragg grating (FBG) sensors, which have an advantage of multiplexing could be used to measure strains at multiple-points of a long structure. In this study, to evaluate the integrity of a pipeline, a shape estimation technique based on strain information was proposed. Furthermore, different experiments were conducted to verify the performance of the proposed technique. Thus, the proposed shape estimation technique can represent the shape according to the deformation of the specimen using the FBGs. Moreover, calculated deflection of the pipeline using the estimation technique showed a good agreement with the actual deflection of the pipeline.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.10-17
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• 2020

The structural reliability assessment can be used to improve the reliability in the asset integrity management of the pipeline by using a geometric variation, mechanical characteristics, load change and operating condition as evaluation factors. When evaluating structural reliability, the failure probability of the natural gas pipe is evaluated by the relationship of the resistance of the pipe material to external loads. The failure probability of the natural gas pipe due to the combined stresses such as the internal pressure, thermal stress and bending stress was evaluated by using COMREL program. When evaluating the failure probability of the natural gas pipe, a buried depth of 1.5 to 30 m, a wheel load of 2.5 to 20 ton, a temperature difference of 45℃, an operating pressure of 6.86MPa, and a soil density of 1.8 kN/㎥ were used. The failure probabilities of the natural gas pipe were evaluated by the Von-Mises stress criterion as the maximum allowable stress criterion under the combined stresses.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Information and Communication Engineering
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• v.24 no.9
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• pp.1231-1240
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• 2020

Water pipes are laid on the ground, making it impossible to visually detect leaks due to aging of pipes, and technology to detect leaks in pipes is mainly used to detect leaks in pipes by detecting leaks. In this paper, two accelerometers were attached to both ends of the constant water piping to calculate the time difference between the acquired data to detect leakage points. The leak test of piping was performed by installing valves at 4.3m, 8.6m, and 12.9m points on piping 17.2m, and changing the development rate of valves to 30% and 70%. Leakage can be detected for pressure drop in piping, which is 30% and 70% open valve. It is very important to detect leakage in the early stage, and it is judged that detection of the initial leak point from the algorithm applied in this paper will be possible.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.4 no.4 s.12
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• pp.6-12
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• 2000

We have developed a new split tee which can be used to effectively branch into a main gas steel pipelines without losing any gas pressure or having to shut down a line. The split tee has been designed considering the locations of branch connection to the pipelines. Therefore, we could keep the depth of buried pipelines which used to be the problem of the conventional split tees. Test results of the developed split tee showed that the performance of the tightness, hydraulic strength, sealing, welding, bending, and compatibility were excellent. The application of the split tee can provide the advantage of eliminating cost and time, and easy field pipeline coatings.

• Journal of the Korean Geotechnical Society
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• v.38 no.11
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• pp.137-147
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• 2022

Various geophysical exploration methods are used to determine the exact location of underground utilities, and many studies have been performed to improve the accuracy. This study analyzed the feasibility of exploring underground utilities through a new exploration method using cosmic ray muon. A prototype of a portable muon detector was manufactured by combining a scintillator and a silicon photomultiplier. Further, a calibration operation was performed on the muon count rate. The ground thickness of the ground model was measured using the muon detector prototype, where the value could be estimated with an error of about 3%, close to the actual. In addition, the theoretical basis for tomography analysis technology was analyzed to utilize the muon detector for exploring underground utilities, and a zenith angle correction method was presented. This study revealed that the technology of exploration using muon can analyze density with high resolution and will be used for exploring underground utilities.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.41 no.11
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• pp.1021-1033
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• 2017

In this study, an optimum process to improve structural integrity was established by investigating effect of the process variables on fatigue lifetime of steel-sleeve repair welds in buried gas pipeline. Residual stresses in the repair welds were derived through sequentially-coupled temperature-stress analysis using ABAQUS, which is a commercial finite element analysis program. In addition, variations of operating stresses were derived by finite element linear elastic stress analysis. Fatigue lifetimes of the steel-sleeve repair welds were evaluated by substituting the derived weld residual stresses and operating stress variations into the structural stress/fracture mechanics approach as input. Parametric study using finite element analysis and fatigue assessment for various repair welding process variables were carried out to investigate the effects of the process variables on the fatigue lifetime. Finally, based on the effects of the process variables on the fatigue lifetime, an optimal process to minimize the welding time and economic costs and to improve the fatigue lifetimes was derived.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.72-79
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• 2017

The operating temperature range of the natural gas pipeline in Arctic environment would be controlled primarily to optimize gas throughput and to minimize the environmental impact resulting from operation of such pipelines. The temperature of the gas as it flows through the pipeline is a function of both the Joule-Thomson effect and the pipe to soil heat transfer. Therefore, the heat transfer and Joule-Thomson effect of the buried natural gas pipeline in this study were carefully considered. Soil temperatures and overall heat transfer coefficients were assumed to be $0{\sim}-20^{\circ}C$ and $0{\sim}5.5W/m^2K$, respectively. The gas temperature and pressure calculations along a pipeline were performed simultaneously at different soil temperatures and overall heat transfer coefficients. Also, this study predicted the phase change and hydrate formation for different soil temperatures and overall heat transfer coefficients using HYSYS simulation package.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2000.11a
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• pp.417-420
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• 2000

The theoretical analyses for stresses induced in axial direction in the buried pipelines are reviewed. The influences of the axially directed stresses on the surface elliptical crack are studied in detail and thus some engineering technical informations are provided to use reliability assessment of buried pipelines. The change in temperature, the effect of inner pressure and soil friction in the buried pipeline constrained in axial direction are included to determine the axial stresses in the buried pipeline. Furthermore, the stress induced by the pipeline bending are also considered. The stress intensity factors calculated by two models such as a simple plane crack and an elliptical surface crack for a circumferential surface elliptical crack are compared.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2001.06a
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• pp.573-578
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• 2001

For the corrosion protect ion of the natural gas transmission pipelines, two methods are used, cathodic protection and coating technique. In the case of cathodic protection, defects are embrittled by occurring hydrogen at the crack tip or material surface. It is however very important to evaluate whether cracks in the embrittled area can grow or not, especially in weld metal. In this work, on the basis of elastic plastic fracture mechanics, we performed CTOD test ing with varying test conditions, such as the potential and current density. The CTOD of the base steel and weld metal showed a strong dependence of the test conditions. The CTOD decreased with increasing cathodic potential and current density. The morphology of the fracture surface showed quasi-cleavage. Hydrogen introduced fractures, caused by cathodic overprotection.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.27 no.2
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• pp.1-6
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• 2023

PE piping, which has advantages in terms of construction convenience and economy, is widely used for underground burial in the domestic urban gas field. These PE pipes use squeeze-off in many sites to block gas flow during maintenance and repair work. Squeeze-off refers to a method of compressing a PE pipe to block fluid flow, and damage may occur due to the nature of construction in which the pipe is deformed by physical force. In order to prevent damage to PE pipes due to squeeze-off, the main points to be reflected in the squeeze-off operation procedures such as proper compression range, use pressure, and diameter were derived through damage assessment and confidential test according to the compression rate. The compression experiment for PE pipe damage assessment was conducted while changing the compression rate (20%~40%), the pressure of use (2.8 kPa, 25 kPa, 70 kPa), and the pipe diameters (63 mm, 90 mm, 110 mm). As a result of damage assessment according to the compression rate, damage occurred in pipes with compression rates of 45%(110mm) and 73%(63mm), which are for analyzing the effect of excessive compression. In addition, the leakage test was conducted using Ar(argon) during the squeeze-off, and as a result of the experiment, leakage occurred under the conditions of 70kPa and 110mm of pipe. As a result of this study, it was confirmed that squeeze-off for airtightness should be carried out in pipes within a range not exceeding 25 kPa and 90 mm pipes, and the appropriate compression rate to prevent damage to PE pipes is 30%.