• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.38 no.7
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• pp.639-656
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• 2006

In order to apply the leak before break (LBB) concept to nuclear piping systems, the dynamic strain aging effect of low carbon steel materials has to be taken into account, in compliance with the requirements of the Korean Standard Review Guide (KSRG) 3.6.3-1. For this goal, J-R tests are needed for a range of various temperatures and loading rates, including dynamic loading conditions. In the dynamic loading J-R test, the unloading compliance method can not be applied to measure the crack growth and direct current potential drop (DCPD) method; this method also has a problem defining the crack initiation point. The normalization method is known as a very useful method to determine the J-R curve under dynamic loading because it does not need additional equipment or complicated loading sequences such as electric current or unloading. This method was accepted by the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) as a standard test method E1820 A15 in 2001. However, it has not yet been clearly verified yet if the normalization method is sufficiently reliable to be applied to LBB. In this study, the basic background of the J-integral, LBB and dynamic loading J-R test are explained, and the current status for dynamic loading J-R test methods are reviewed from the view point of LBB for nuclear piping. In particular, the theoretical and historical background of the normalization method which has received attention recently, is summarized. Recent studies for this method are introduced and future works are suggested that may improve the reliability of LBB for nuclear piping.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2004.11a
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• pp.262-267
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• 2004

The unloading compliance method is the most commonly used method to evaluate the fracture resistance characteristics of a material. In dynamic loading condition, the direct current potential drop(DCPD) method has been used because the unloading compliance method can not be applied due to the discontinuity of loading. However, even in the dynamic test using DCPD method, there is a problem that the voltage drops sharply on the initiation of crack. For the reason metioned above, the normalization method was suggested on ASTM E 1820 which is revised recently, as a new method to evaluate the dynamic fracture resistance characteristic. The nomalization method can be used to obtain a fracture resistance curve directly from a load-load line displacement. In this study, we obtained two fracture resistance curves from static test of welding part of nuclear piping both by unloading compliance and nomalization method. The two curves were almost same each other, so the adaptability of the nomalization method has been proved. We conducted a dynamic fracture resistance test for the same material. The fracture resistance curve from the dynamic test was obtained by normalization method and compared to that of the static test result.