• Proceedings of the KWS Conference
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• 2006.10a
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• pp.38-40
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• 2006

Nuclear power plants are urged to reduce operating and maintaining costs to remain competitive as well as to increase the safety preventing the radioactive material to the atmosphere. To reduce the cost and to increase the safety, the inspection of balance-of-plant heat exchanger becomes important. However, there are some problems for plugging the heat exchanger tubes since the criterion and its basis are not clearly described. The codes and standards related to show the tube plugging criteria may not exist currently. In this paper, a method to establish the tube plugging criteria of BOP heat exchangers is introduced and the tube plugging criteria for the non-regenerative heat exchanger in the steam generator blow-down system of nuclear power plant. This method relies on the similar method used to establish the plugging criteria for the steam generator tubes.

• Journal of Mechanical Science and Technology
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• v.20 no.11
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• pp.1934-1941
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• 2006

As the operating time of heat exchangers progresses, fouling caused by water-borne deposits and the number of plugged tubes increase and thermal performance decreases. Both fouling and tube plugging are known to interfere with normal flow characteristics and to reduce thermal efficiencies of heat exchangers. The heat exchangers of Korean nuclear power plants have been analyzed in terms of heat transfer rate and overall heat transfer coefficient as a means of heat exchanger management. Except for fouling resulting from the operation of heat exchangers, all the tubes of heat exchangers have been replaced when the number of plugged tubes exceeded the plugging criteria based on design performance sheet. This paper describes a plugging margin evaluation method taking into account the fouling of shell-and-tube heat exchangers. The method can evaluate thermal performance, estimate future fouling variation, and consider current fouling level in the calculation of plugging margin. To identify the effectiveness of the developed method, fouling and plugging margin evaluations were performed at a component cooling heat exchanger in a Korean nuclear power plant.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.28 no.11
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• pp.1384-1389
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• 2004

As operating time of heat exchangers progresses, fouling generated by water-borne deposits and the number of plugged tubes increase and thermal performance decreases. Both fouling and tube plugging are known to interfere with normal flow characteristics and to reduce thermal efficiencies of heat exchangers. The heat exchangers of domestic nuclear power plants have been analyzed in terms of the heat flux and heat transfer coefficient at test conditions as a means of heat exchanger management. Except for the fouling level generated in operation of heat exchangers, also, all of the tubes of heat exchangers have been replaced when the number of plugged tubes exceeds the plugging criteria based on design performance sheet. This paper describes the plugging margin evaluation mettled reflected the fouling of shell-and-tube heat exchangers, which can evaluate the thermal performance for heat exchangers, estimate the future fouling variations, and reflect the current fouling level. To identify the effectiveness of the developed method, the fouling and plugging margin evaluations were performed for a component cooling heat exchanger in a nuclear power plant.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.23 no.7 s.166
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• pp.1094-1103
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• 1999

Ice-plugging of tube in nuclear power plant has been widely used for the purpose of preventing flow of the tube temporarily like a valve. Most common plugging method employs Liquid Nitrogen Gas of $-196^{\circ}C$. According to the change of tube materials and its dimension, the thermal stress caused from the application of the frozen gas can be varied. In this research, a series of experiments have been carried out to inspect the effect of tube geometry on thermal stresses induced due to ice-plugging. Two typical dimension of stainless and mild steels of 3 and 6 inch diameters were used for the experiments. Each critical spots were checked using strain rosette gages. Another inspection was made on the pressure and temperature of the fluid. It is shown that significant thermal stress level which can cause plastic deformation of failure has not been noticed in this series of experiments.

• Explosives and Blasting
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• v.17 no.4
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• pp.18-31
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• 1999

The explosive forming has been used for many year to expand tubes into tubesheets. this process has demonstrated ability to direct carefully the energy of an explosive to expand tubes into tubesheet holes without damaging the tubesheet and without causing the excessive cold work at the tube I.D. that is normally associated with mechanical expansion. The success of explosive tube expansion provided the background for the development of the explosive tube plug. The main results are as follows : (1) The optimum explosives and explosive qualities are PETN, RDX, HMS and about 18~31gr/ft of explosive plugging in nuclear steam generator. (2) Explosive plugging's thickness is 0.9~1.8mm. If groove of 0.4 mm formed in plug outside, For the hydraulic leakage is go up, explosive plugging of formed groove are applicate tube and tubrplate. (3) Sheath is designed on the polyethylene of low density, In thermal impact test of the $430^\circ{C}$, hydraulic leakage is $300kg/cm^2$. (4) About 10~60mm oxide inclusions are existed on the space of explosive plug and tube protect to the leakage.

• Geotechnical Engineering
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• v.12 no.2
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• pp.85-94
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• 1996

Model pile tests, using a calibration chamber in which the stress state and the relative density can be controlled, were performed in order to study the effects of pile diameter on the plugging rate and bearing capacity of open-ended pile. The model piles used in the test series were devised so that the bearing capacity of an open-ended pile could be measured out into three components. The test results showed that fully plugging depth of an open -ended pile increased with increase in pile diameter and soil density. Moreover, it was found that unit plug capacity decreased with increase in pile diameter, though the penetration ratio or plugging rate of piles was constant. However, the existing formulae for estimation of plug capacity give plug capacity which is constant or increased with increase in pile diameter, when penetration ratio or plugging rate of piles is equal. Thus, it is proposed that the effect of pile diameter as well as plugging rate on bearing capacity of pile must be considered in plug capacity estimation.

• Geotechnical Engineering
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.25-36
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• 1995

A specially designed model open -ended pile, which was composed of inner tube and outer tube, wry driven in the pressure chamber by two diffenent intallation methods, that is, impact -driving and vibratory driving, and static compression loading test was done for that pile. Through the measurement of bearing capacities in the separated resisting parts of open -ended pile, bearing mechanism of open-ended pile and soil plugging behaviors for different installation methods were studied. It appears that 20% out of soil plugging force of impact -driven pile was developed during driving, while the rest was developed during static compression loading and t.he magnitude of confining pressure applied to the chamber did not affect soil plugging behavior. Also. it appears that, soil plugging force of vibratory pile was not developed during driving, while it was developed weakly as about 0.5~0.7 times as that of impact pile during static compression loading. and the confining pressure of pressure rhamber had an effect on the soil plugging. In the ultimate loading condition unit soil plugging force did not approach to the failure condition.

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.175-181
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• 1987

Plugging effect of open-ended pipe piles is known to have a close relationship with the ratio of an embedment depth to a pile diameter, i.e., the relative embedment ratio. To evaluate this relationship in the concrete, load tests are performed on the open and the close ended model piles varying the relative embedment ratio as well as the relative density of the model test ground. Cross-shaped hollow plates are attached at the open pile ends to reduce the effective pile diameters, on which load tests are also performed. As a result, it is confirmed that higher plugging effect may be obtained in the denser ground at lower relative embedment. However, 100% plugging effect can be obtained at the relative embedment ratio of 25 or bigger regardless of the density of the ground. Increment of the plugging effect by introducing the cross-shaped attachment can hardly be achieved.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2003.11a
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• pp.55-60
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• 2003

As operating time of heat exchangers progresses, fouling generated by water-borne deposits increases and thermal performance decreases. The fouling is known to interfere with normal flow characteristics and reduce thermal efficiencies of heat exchangers. The heat exchangers of nuclear power plants have been analyzed in terms of the heat flux and heat transfer coefficient at test conditions based on the ASME OM-S/G-Part 2 as a means of heat exchanger management. It is hard to estimate the heat performance trend and to establish the future management plan. This paper describes the fouling evaluation method which can evaluate the thermal performance for heat exchangers and estimate the future fouling variations and the plugging margin evaluation method which can reflect the current fouling level developed in this study. To develop the fouling and plugging margin evaluation methods for heat exchangers, fouling factor was introduced based on the ASME O&M codes and TEMA standards. For the purpose of verifying the two evaluation methods, the fouling and plugging margin evaluations were performed for a component cooling heat exchanger in a nuclear power plant.

• Transactions of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering
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• v.13 no.6
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• pp.452-459
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• 2003

The characteristics of fluid-elastic instability and effects of turbulent excitations for the KSNP steam generator tubes were investigated numerically. The information for the thermal-hydraulic data of the steam generator has been obtained by using the ATHOS3-MOD1 code and the flow-induced vibration(FIV) analysis has been conducted by using the PIAT(program for Integrity assessment of SG tube) code. The KSNP steam generator has the concentrated plugging zone at the vicinity of the stay cylinder inside the SG. To investigate the cause of the concentrated tube plugging zone, the FIV analysis has been performed for various column and row number of the steam generator tubes. From the results of FIV analysis the stability ratio due to the fluid-elastic instability and vibrational amplitude due to the turbulent excitation in the concentrated plugged zone have a trend of larger values than those of the outer concentrated tube Plugging zone.