• Transactions of the Korean Society of Pressure Vessels and Piping
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.61-66
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• 2011

The integrity of the SG(Steam Generator) tubes has been challenged by numerous factors such as flaws, operation, atmosphere, inherently degraded materials, loose parts and even human errors. Of the factors, loose parts(or foreign materials) on the secondary side of the tubes can bring about volumetric defects and even leakage from the primary to the secondary side in a short period of time. More serious concerns about the loose parts are their unknown influx path and rapid growth rate of the defects affected by the loose parts. Therefore it is imperative to detect and characterize the foreign materials and the defects. As a part of the measures for loose part detection, TTS(Top of Tubesheet) MRPC(Motorized Rotating Pancake Coils) ECT has been carried out especially to the restricted high probability area of the loose part. However, in the presence of loose parts in the other areas, wide range loose part detection techniques are required. In this study, loose part standard tube was presented as a way to accurately detect and characterize loose part signals. And the SG tube ECT bobbin coil and MRPC ISI(In-service Inspection) data of domestic OPR-1000 and Westinghouse Model F(W_F) were reviewed and consequently, comprehensive loose part detection technique is derived especially by applying bobbin coil signals

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.53 no.4
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• pp.1199-1209
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• 2021

The detection of unexpected loose parts in the primary coolant system in a nuclear power plant remains an extremely important issue. It is essential to develop a methodology for the localization and mass estimation of loose parts owing to the high prediction error of conventional methods. An effective approach is presented for the localization and mass estimation of a loose part using machine-learning and deep-learning algorithms. First, a methodology was developed to estimate both the impact location and the mass of a loose part at the same times in a real structure in which geometric changes exist. Second, an impact database was constructed through a series of impact finite-element analyses (FEAs). Then, impact parameter prediction modes were generated for localization and mass estimation of a simulated metallic loose part using machine-learning algorithms (artificial neural network, Gaussian process, and support vector machine) and a deep-learning algorithm (convolutional neural network). The usefulness of the methodology was validated through blind tests, and the noise effect of the training data was also investigated. The high performance obtained in this study shows that the proposed methodology using an FEA-based database and deep learning is useful for localization and mass estimation of loose parts on site.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2000.06a
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• pp.670-678
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• 2000

Loose parts monitoring system(LPMS) is one of the important monitoring systems for the safe and efficient operation of the nuclear reactor, since it is LPMS that can early detect loose parts which may cause a significant damage in facilities or components of the plant. Nuclear power plants in Korea have recently experienced several loose part alarms due to the metallic impact and it is expected that the frequency of the loose part will be increased along the aging of the plants. In this paper, the status of loose parts monitoring technologies and facilities in Korean nuclear power plants is presented for the establishment of LPMS installation plan in some nuclear reactors which are not yet equipped with LPMS. Sensor specification, location and mounting method for loose parts monitoring were reviewed. As a result, the location and the mounting method of the properly chosen sensor was recommended. Data acquisition algorithms and discriminating rules of loose part impact signals were also reviewed. Actual alarm cases occurred by true impact signal and false impact signal were stated here.

• Transactions of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.469-474
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• 2016

Abnormal sound was heard from a heat exchanger of condensate water system in a nuclear power plant, which was identified as impact sound of a loose part later. Nuclear power plants are normally equipped with loose part monitoring system for primary water system, but not for secondary water system. The abnormal sound was analyzed by using the impact signal-processing methodology based on the Hertz theory. The predicted results for impact location and size of the loose part showed good agreement with those of the actual loose part found during the overhaul period in the plant. So, this analysis methodology for the impact signal will be widely utilized for the primary and secondary side of the nuclear power plant.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2003.11a
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• pp.361-364
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• 2003

The safe operation and reliable maintenance of nuclear power plants is one of the most fundamental and important tasks. It is known that a loose part such as a disengaged and drifting metal inside of reactor coolant systems might lead to a serious damage because of their impact on the components of the coolant system. In order to estimate the impact position of a loose par, three accelerometers attached to the wall of the coolant system have been used. These accelerometers measure the vibration of the coolant system induced by loose part impact. In the conventional analysis system, the low pass filtered version of the vibration data was used for the estimation of the position of a loose part. It is often difficult to identify the initial point of the impact signal by using just a low passed time signal because the impact wave is dispersed during propagation into the sensor. In this paper, the impact signal is analysed by use of various time frequency methods including the short time Fourier transform(STFT), the wavelet transform, and the Wigner-Vill distribution for finding a convenient way to identify the starting point of a impact signal and their advantages and limits are discussed.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.52 no.4
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• pp.846-855
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• 2020

A loose part monitoring system is used to detect unexpected loose parts in a reactor coolant system in a nuclear power plant. It is still necessary to develop a new methodology for the localization and mass estimation of loose parts owing to the high estimation error of conventional methods. In addition, model-based diagnostics recently emphasized the importance of a model describing the behavior of a mechanical system or component. The purpose of this study is to propose a new localization and mass-estimation method based on finite element analysis (FEA) and optimization technique. First, an FEA model to simulate the propagation behavior of the bending wave generated by a metal sphere impact is validated by performing an impact test and a corresponding FEA and optimization for a downsized steam-generator structure. Second, a novel methodology based on FEA and optimization technique was proposed to estimate the impact location and mass of a loose part at the same time. The usefulness of the methodology was then validated through a series of FEAs and some blind tests. A new feature vector, the cross-correlation function, was also proposed to predict the impact location and mass of a loose part, and its usefulness was then validated. It is expected that the proposed methodology can be utilized in model-based diagnostics for the estimation of impact parameters such as the mass, velocity, and impact location of a loose part. In addition, the FEA-based model can be used to optimize the sensor position to improve the collected data quality in the site of nuclear power plants.

• 제어로봇시스템학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2000.10a
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• pp.522-522
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• 2000

In this paper, two pre-filtering techniques are presented for accurately estimating the impact location of a loose part. The reason why a pre-filterng technique Is necessary in a Loose Part Monitoring System is that the effects of background noise on the signal to noise ratio (SNR) can be reduced considerably resulting in improved estimation accuracy. The first method is to take d moving average operation in the time domain. The second one is to adopt band-pass filters designed in the frequency domain such as a Butterworth filter, Chebyshev filter I & II and an Elliptic Filter. To show the effectiveness, the impact test data (signals) from the YGN3 power plant are first preprocessed and then used to estimate the loose pan impact position. Resultantly. we observed that SNR is much improved and the average estimation error is below 7.5%.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2006.05a
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• pp.1306-1311
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• 2006

The root cause of abnormal sound from a heat exchanger of condensate water system in a nuclear power plant is investigated by using the impact signal-processing methodology based on the Hertz theory. The predicted results for the location of impact force and the loose part size meet good agreement with the identified materials during the overhaul period in the plant. Nuclear power plants have experienced several loose parts and the frequency of the loose part will be increased along the aging of the plants. So, this analysis methodology for the impact signal will be widely utilized for the primary and secondary side of the nuclear power plant.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.49 no.7
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• pp.1555-1562
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• 2017

A loose part monitoring system is used to identify unexpected loose parts in a nuclear reactor vessel or steam generator. It is still necessary for the mass estimation of loose parts, one function of a loose part monitoring system, to develop a new method due to the high estimation error of conventional methods such as Hertz's impact theory and the frequency ratio method. The purpose of this study is to propose a mass estimation method using a Markov decision process and compare its performance with a method using an artificial neural network model proposed in a previous study. First, how to extract feature vectors using discrete cosine transform was explained. Second, Markov chains were designed with codebooks obtained from the feature vector. A 1/8-scaled mockup of the reactor vessel for OPR1000 was employed, and all used signals were obtained by impacting its surface with several solid spherical masses. Next, the performance of mass estimation by the proposed Markov model was compared with that of the artificial neural network model. Finally, it was investigated that the proposed Markov model had matching error below 20% in mass estimation. That was a similar performance to the method using an artificial neural network model and considerably improved in comparison with the conventional methods.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2008.11a
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• pp.687-692
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• 2008

In a nuclear power plant, loose part monitoring and its diagnostic technique is one of the major issues for ensuring the structural integrity of the reactor system. Typically, accelerometers are mounted on the surface of a reactor vessel to localize impact location caused by the impact of metallic substances on the reactor system. However, in some cases, the number of the accelerometers is not enough to estimate the impact location precisely. In such a case, one of alternative plan is to utilize another type sensors that can measure the vibration of the reactor structure even though the measuring frequency ranges are different from each others. The AE sensors installed on the reactor structure can be utilized as additional sensors for loose part monitoring. In this paper, we proposed a new method to estimate impact location by using both accelerometer signal and AE signal, simultaneously. The feasibility of the proposed method is verified by an experiment. The experimental results demonstrate that we can enhance the reliability and precision of the loose part monitoring.