• Corrosion Science and Technology
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• v.3 no.5
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• pp.216-221
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• 2004

The operating experience showed that the fatigue is one of the major piping failure mechanisms in nuclear power plants (NPPs). The pressure and/or temperature loading transients, the vibration, and the mechanical cyclic loading during the plant operation may induce the fatigue failure in the nuclear piping. Recently, many fatigue piping failure occurred at the socket weld area have been widely reported. Many failure cases showed that the gap requirement between the pipe and fitting in the socket weld was not satisfied though the ASME Code Sec. III requires 1/16 inch gap in the socket weld. The ASME Code OM also limits the vibration level of the piping system, but some failure cases showed the limitation was not satisfied during the plant operation. In this paper, the fatigue behavior of the socket weld in the nuclear piping was estimated by using the three dimensional finite element method. The results are as follows. (1) The socket weld is susceptible to the vibration if the vibration levels exceed the requirement in the ASME Code OM. (2) The effect of the pressure or temperature transient load on the socket weld in NPPs is not significant because of the very low frequency of the transient during the plant lifetime operation. (3) 'No gap' is very risky to the socket weld integrity for the specific systems having the vibration condition to exceed the requirement in the ASME OM Code and/or the transient loading condition. (4) The reduction of the weld leg size from $1.09*t_1$ to $0.75*t_1$ can affect severely on the socket weld integrity.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2003.11a
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• pp.1092-1097
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• 2003

S-N fatigue tests were conducted to investigate the fatigue strength of small diameter socket and butt welded joints made of carbon steels. Experimental parameters were pipe diameter, throat depth, shape of socket welds and welding procedure. Filler metals used in SMAW and GTAW procedure were E9016-G with diameter of 4.0 mm and ER70S-G with diameter of 2.4 mm. API 5L Gr.B pipes were adopted as a small diameter branch pipes. All socket fittings were machined from ASTM A105 carbon steel. Tensile strength was not affected by the welding procedure. Fatigue strength in socket weld joints increased with increasing pipe diameter, area of weld metal and weld leg length of pipe side.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.50-55
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• 2004

S-N fatigue tests were conducted to investigate the fatigue strength of small diameter socket and butt welded joints made of carbon steels. Experimental parameters were pipe diameter, throat depth, shape of socket welds and welding procedure. Filler metals used in SMAW and GTAW procedure were E9016-G with diameter of 4.0 m and ER70S-G with diameter of 2.4 m. API 5L Gr.B pipes were adopted as a small diameter branch pipes. All socket fittings were machined from ASTM A105 carbon steel. Tensile strength was not affected by the welding procedure. Fatigue strength in socket weld joints increased with increasing pipe diameter, area of weld metal and weld leg length of pipe side.

• Proceedings of the KWS Conference
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• 2003.11a
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• pp.191-193
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• 2003

S-N fatigue tests were conducted to investigate the fatigue strength of the small diameter socket and butt welded joints of carbon steels. Experimental parameters were pipe diameter, throat depth, shape of socket welds and welding procedure. Filler metals used in SMAW and GTAW procedure were E9016-G with diameter of 4.0 mm and ER70S-G with diameter of 2.4 m. API 5L Gr.B pipes were adopted as a small diameter branch pipes. All socket fittings were machined from ASTM A105 carbon steel. Fatigue strength in socket weld joints increased with increasing pipe diameter, area of weld metal and weld leg length of pipe side.

• Corrosion Science and Technology
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.224-230
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• 2020

Stainless steel has excellent corrosion resistance. The drawback is that pitting occurs easily due to the concentration of chloride. In addition, corrosion of socket weld, which is structurally and chemically weaker than the other components of the pipe, occurs rapidly. Since these two phenomena overlap, pinhole leakage occurs frequently in the seawater pipe socket welds made of stainless steel at the power plants. To analyze this specific corrosion, a metallurgical analysis of the stainless steel socket welds, where the actual corrosion occurred during the power plant operation, was performed. The micro-structure and chemical composition of each socket weld were analyzed. In addition, selective corrosion of the specific micro-structure in a mixed dendrite structure comprising γ-austenite (gamma-phase iron) and δ-ferrite (iron at high temperature) was investigated based on the characteristic micro-morphology and chemical composition of the corroded area. Finally, the different corrosion stages and characteristics of socket weld corrosion are summarized.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.53 no.11
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• pp.3837-3851
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• 2021

To investigate how the fabrication and repair of socket welded joints could be used to enhance fatigue resistance under vibration condition, experimental test data of installation conditions that potentially influence fatigue strength were analyzed with the S-N curve. It was found that the decreasing fatigue strength of stainless steel socket welded joints was attributed to the effect of high heat input of welding process. The effect of welding method, slip-on gap and radial-gap conditions on fatigue strength was insignificant. The test data of repair technique application, 2 × 1 leg length and of socket weld overlay, clearly showed higher fatigue strength but there was a limitation for higher stress region because of the weld toe crack.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2003.04a
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• pp.617-621
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• 2003

The purpose of this paper is to analyze piping failure trend of safety pipings In domestic nuclear power plants. First, database for the piping failure was constructed with 105 data fields. The database includes plant population data, event data, and service history data. 7 kinds of piping failures in domestic NPPs were investigated. Among the 7 cases, detailed root causes were investigated for 3 cases. The first one is pipe wall thinning in main feedwater pipings of Westinghouse 3 loop type plants. The root cause of the wall thinning was flow accelerated corrosion near welding area. The next one is leak event in chemical and volume control system(CVCS) due to vibration. Some cracks occurred in socket welding area. The events showed that the integrity or socket weld is very vulnerable to vibration. The last one is also a leak event in primary sampling line in Korean standard reactor due to thermal fatigue. Although the structural integrity was not maintained by the events, there was no effect on nuclear safety in the above 3 piping failure eases.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.33 no.4
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• pp.368-375
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• 2013

Failure of small bore piping welds is a recurring problem at nuclear power plants. And the socket weld cracking in small bore piping has caused unplanned plant shutdowns for repair and high economic impact on the plants. Consequently, early crack detection, including the detection of manufacturing defects, is of the utmost importance. Until now, the surface inspection methods has been applied according to ASME Section XI requirements. But the ultrasonic inspection as a volumetric method is also applying to enforce the inspection requirement. However, the conventional manual ultrasonic inspection techniques are used to detect service induced fatigue cracks. And there was uncertainty on manual ultrasonic inspection because of limited access to the welds and difficulties with contact between the ultrasonic probe and the OD(outer diameter) surface of small bore piping. In this study, phased array ultrasonic inspection technique is applied to increase inspection speed and reliability. To achieve this object, the 3.5 MHz phased array ultrasonic transducer are designed and fabricated. The manually encoded scanner was also developed to enhance contact conditions and maintain constant signal quality. Additionally inspection system is configured and inspection procedure is developed.