• Transactions of the Korean Society of Pressure Vessels and Piping
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.21-25
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• 2011

Although many defects in PZR heater sleeve have been reported continually from operating experiences in oversea nuclear power plant, utilities get into difficulties in finding appropriate methods for diagnostics of the components due to the limited access or high radiation problems. Recently, as an alternative, diagnostics using Guided Wave Testing(GWT) are proposed and the attention of the methods has been growing gradually because of their long range inspection capability. This study is to investigate the effectiveness of GWT to detect PWSCC in welding points of PZR heater sleeve. Moreover, mode sensitivity analysis of GWT and optimal frequency for the diagnostics of PWSCC are presented by testing the mock-ups specimens that contain artificial flaws.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.295-301
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• 2010

Flow accelerated corrosion(FAC) of carbon steel pipes in nuclear power plants has been known as one of the major degradation mechanisms. It could have bad influence on the plant reliability and safety. Also detection of FAC is a significant cost to the nuclear power plant because of the need to remove and replace insulation. Recently, the interest of the guided wave testing(GWT) has grown because it allows long range inspection without removing insulation of the pipe except at the probe position. If GWT can be applied to detection of FAC damages, it will can significantly reduce the cost for the inspection of the pipes. The objective of this study was to determine the capability of GWT to identify location of FAC damages. In this paper, three kinds of techniques were used to measure the amplitude ratio between the first and the second welds at the elbow area of mock-ups that contain real FAC damages. As a result, optimal inspection technique and minimum detectability to detect FAC damages drew a conclusion.