• Journal of Energy Engineering
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.148-155
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• 2013

The steam generators of OPR-1000 plants have Alloy 600 and Alloy 690 as the tube material and its tube expansion method is the explosive expansion method. According to the experience of these plants, circumferential cracks were largely occurred in steam generator tubes expanded by the explosive expansion method and their locations were the outer surface of tube expansion transition region surrounding with piled-up sludge. But even though tubes have the same conditions, tubes with the hydraulic expansion method shows the prevail trend of axial cracks compared to circumferential cracks. Therefore in this study, in order to identify the difference of such phenomena as above, configurations of tube and tubesheet were modeled and at operating conditions, stress values applied in the tube expansion transition area in accordance with tube expansion methods were calculated by using computational program and the direction and the predominance of cracks were evaluated.

• Journal of Energy Engineering
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.149-157
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• 2014

The steam generator tubes of nuclear power plants have various types of corrosion failures during the plant operation. The stress corrosion cracking which occurs on the outer surface of tube is called the secondary side stress corrosion cracking and mainly occurs in the expansion-transition area of tube. The causes are the concentration of impurities by the sludge pile-up related to the geometry of its region and the residual stress by tube expansion in the process of steam generator manufacturing. Especially the directionality and sizes of residual stresses are differed according to the tube expansion methods and the direction and the frequency of tube cracks depend on their characteristics. In bases on the plant experiences, it is notified that circumferential cracks of tubes expanded with explosive expansion method are dominantly occurred compared to those of tubes done with hydraulic expansion one. Therefore in this study, according to tube expansion methods frequencies and sizes of tube cracks with specific direction are compared by means of accelerated immersion test and also the crack morphology and the specific chemicals from water-chemistry environment are observed through the fracture surface examination.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.27 no.5
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• pp.442-448
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• 2007

The ultrasonic inspection system for the expansion/transition area of steam generator tube was successfully developed. Variety of artificial flaw and real track specimen was tested using the UT system to verify the performance of the system. All artificial flaws of which through-wall depth larger than 10% was clearly detected by UT system. Measurement results of through-wall depth of flaws larger than 20% had good linearity and reproducibility with 3.27 of standard deviation. Results of real crack specimen test suggested that the detection limit of real crack strongly depends on the track morphology. A potential for measurement of PRL(percentage of remaining ligament) was recognized by the real crack specimen test.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.20 no.9
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• pp.2894-2900
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• 1996

The stream generator tubes represent an integral part of a major barrier against the fission product release to the environment. So, the rupture of these tubes could permit flow of reactor coolant into the secondary system and injure the safety of reactor coolant system. Therefore, if the crack was detected during In-Service Inspection of tubes the cracked tube should be evaluated by the pulgging criteria and plugged or not. In this study, the fracture mechanics evaluation is carried out on the thru-wall axial crack due to Primary Water Stress Corrosion Cracking in the roll transition aone of steam generator tube to help the assurence the integrity of tubes and estabilish the plugging criteria. Due to the Inconel which is used as tube material is more ductile than others, the plastic instability repture theory was used to calculate the critical and allowable crack length. Based on Leak Before Break concept the leak rate for the critical crack length and the allowable leak rate are compared and the safety of tubes was given.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.184-190
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• 2008

Various ECT techniques have been applied basically to assess the integrity of steam generator tithing in nuclear power plant. Among these techniques, the bobbin probe technique is applied generally to examine the volumetric flaws such as a crack-like defect and wear which is generally occurred on steam generator tubing, and additionally MRPC probe is used to examine closely tile top of tubesheet and bending regions due to the high possibility of cracking. Dent and bulge also may be formed on tube during installation process and operation of steam generator, but the dent and bulge indications greater than specific size criteria are recorded on examination report because these indications are not considered as flaw. These indications can be easily detected with bobbin probe and approximately sized with profile bobbin probe, but the size and shape can not be accurately verified. Accordingly, in this study, the $8{\times}1$ multi-array EC probe was designed to increase the measurement accuracy of the sectional profiling EC testing of tube. As a result, we would like to propose the application of $8{\times}1$ multi-array EC probe for the measurement of size and shape of profile change on steam generator tube in OPR-1000 nuclear power plant.