• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.28 no.7
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• pp.1006-1013
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• 2004

Operating experience of steam generators shows that the tubes are degraded by stress corrosion cracking, fretting wear and so on. These defected tubes could stay in service if it is proved that the tubes have sufficient structural margin to preclude the risk of tube bursting. This paper provides detailed plastic limit pressure solutions for through-wall cracks in the steam generator tubes. These are developed based on three dimensional(3D) finite element analyses assuming elastic-perfectly plastic material behavior. Both axial and circumferential through-wall cracks in free span and in u-bend regions are considered. The resulting limit pressure solutions are given in a polynomial form, and thus can be simply used in practical integrity assessment of the steam generator tubes.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2000.11a
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• pp.849-855
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• 2000

This study evaluated the effect of restraint of pressure induced bending(PIB) on crack mouth opening displacement(CMOD) for circumferential through-wall crack in pipe by using both elastic and elastic-plastic finite element analyses. The analyses results showed the restraint of PIB was decreased crack opening for a given crack length and tensile stress, and the effect was considerable for large crack and short restraint length. Also, the restraint effect on CMOD was independent on the variation in pipe diameter and decreased with increasing pipe thickness, and it depended on not total restraint length but short restraint length for non-symmetrically restrained. Additionally, the effect of restraint of PIB was more significant in the elastic-plastic analysis results compared with in the elastic analysis results.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.548-553
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• 2001

A new method to estimate the elastic-plastic J-integral and the crack tip opening displacement (COD) for circumferential through-wall cracked pipes under tension and under bending is proposed for Leak-Before-Break (LBB) analysis. Being based on the reference stress method with further modifications, the proposed method is simple to use and easy to be generalised in practice. Comparison of the CODs, predicted using the proposed method with published pipe test data show overall excellent agreement.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Pressure Vessels and Piping
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• v.15 no.2
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• pp.40-49
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• 2019

In this paper, failure probabilities of the OPR1000 reactor vessel under pressurized thermal shock (PTS) were estimated using the probabilistic fracture mechanics code, R-PIE. Input variables of initial crack distribution, crack size, copper contents, and upper shelf toughness were selected for the sensitivity analyses. A wide range of the input data were considered. Through-wall cracking frequencies determined by the product of the vessel failure probability and the corresponding occurrence frequency of the transient were also compared to the acceptance criterion. The results showed that transient history had the most significant impact on the vessel failure probability. Moreover, conservative assumptions resulted in extremely high through-wall cracking frequencies.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.53 no.3
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• pp.974-987
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• 2021

This paper presents ductile fracture simulation of full-scale cracked pipe for nuclear piping materials using the cohesive zone model (CZM). The main objective of this study is to investigate the applicability of CZM to predict ductile fracture of cracked pipes with various crack shapes and under quasi-static/dynamic loadings. The transferability of the traction-separation (T-S) curve from a small-scale specimen to a full-scale pipe is demonstrated by simulating small- and full-scale tests. T-S curves are calibrated by comparing experimental data of compact tension specimens with finite element analysis results. The calibrated T-S curves are utilized to predict the fracture behavior of cracked pipes. Three types of full-scale pipe tests are considered: pipe with circumferential through-wall crack under quasistatic/dynamic loadings, and with 360° internal surface crack under quasi-static loading. Computational results using the calibrated T-S curves show a good agreement with experimental data, demonstrating the transferability of the T-S curves from small-scale specimen.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.38 no.11
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• pp.1257-1264
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• 2014

Efforts are presently underway for developing an optimal design methodology for GEN-IV nuclear reactors based on target failure probabilities. A typical example is the system-based code, in which the results are represented in the form of partial safety factors (PSFs). Thus, a PSF is one of the crucial elements in either component design or integrity assessment based on target failure probabilities during the operation period. In the present study, a procedure for calculating the PSF of a circumferential through-wall cracked pipe based on the elastic-plastic crack initiation criterion is established, in which the importance of each input variable is assessed. Elastic-plastic J-integrals are calculated using the GE/EPRI and reference stress methods, and the PSF values are calculated using both first- and second-order reliability methods. Moreover, the effect of statistical distributions of assessment variables on the PSF is also evaluated.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.16 no.6
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• pp.727-741
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• 2019

A reinforced concrete water tank is a typical functional liquid storage structure and cracks are the greatest threat to the liquid storage structure. Tanks are readily cracked due to seismic activity, thereby leading to the leakage of the stored liquid and a loss of function. In order to study the effect of cracks on liquid storage tanks, self-healing and leakage tests for bending cracks and through cracks in the walls of a reinforced concrete water tank were conducted. Material performance tests were also performed. The self-healing performance of bending cracks in a lentic environment and through cracks in a lotic environment were tested, thereby the self-healing width of bending micro-cracks in the lentic environment in the short term were determined. The through cracks had the capacity for self-healing in the lotic environment was found. The leakage characteristics of the bending cracks and through cracks were tested with the actual water head on the crack. The effects on liquid leakage of the width of bending cracks, the depth of the compression zone, and the acting head were determined. The relationships between the leakage rate and time with the height of the water head were analyzed. Based on the tests, the relationships between the crack characteristics and self-healing as well as the leakage were obtained. Thereby the references for water tank structure design and grading earthquake damage were provided.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.29 no.10 s.241
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• pp.1361-1368
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• 2005

The structural and leakage integrity of steam generator tubes should be sustained all postulated loads with appropriate margin even if a crack is present. During the past three decades, for effective integrity evaluation, several limit load solutions have been used world-widely. However, to predict accurately load carrying capacities of specific components under different conditions, the solutions have to be modified by using lots of experimental data. The purpose of this paper is to propose a new burst pressure estimation scheme based on fracture mechanics analyses for steam generator tube with an axial or circumferential through-wall crack. A series of three dimensional elastic-plastic finite element analyses were carried out and, then, closed-form estimation equations with respect to both J-integral and crack opening displacement were derived through reference stress method. The developed engineering equations were utilized for structural integrity evaluation and the resulting data were compared to the corresponding ones fiom experiments as well as limit load solutions. Thereafter, since the effectiveness was proven by promising results, it is believed that the proposed estimation scheme can be used as an efficient tool for integrity evaluation of cracked steam generator tubes.

• Proceedings of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute Conference
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• 2004.04a
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• pp.309-316
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• 2004

A probabilistic structural integrity assessment is performed for a reactor pressure vessel under PTS(Pressurized Thermal Shock). A semi-elliptical finite axial crack is assumed to he in the beltline region(either base metal or weld meta)1 of the reactor vessel inside surface. The selected random variables are initial crack depth, neutron fluence on the vessel inside surface, copper, nickel, and phosphorus content of the vessel material, and RT/sub NDT/. The probabilities of crack initiation or vessel failure where the crack is propagated through vessel wall are calculated. The probabilities obtained with random crack size are compared to these obtained with deterministic us. Since the failure function cannot to explicitly by selected by selected random variables, Monte Carlo Simulation is applied to perform probabilistic analysis The influence of the amount of neutron fluence is also examined to assess the structural reliability for vessel life time.

• The Journal of the Convergence on Culture Technology
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• v.5 no.3
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• pp.345-349
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• 2019

In Korea, the mountainous area occupies more than 70% of the whole country, cutting of earth slope that cuts a part of the ground surface is widely used when building infrastructures such as road, railroad, and industrial complex construction. In recent years, regulations on environmental damage have become more strict, and various methods have been developed and applied. Among them, Concrete-Panel Retaining Wall technique is actively applied. Concrete-Panel Retaining Wall is a method to resist horizontal earth pressure by forming a wall by attaching a precast retaining wall to the front of the support material and increasing the shear strength of the disk through reinforcement of the support material. Soil nailing, earth bolt, and ground anchor are used as support material. Among them, ground anchor is a more aggressive reinforcement type that introduces tensile load in advance to the steel wire, and a large concentrated load acts on the front panel. This concentrated load is a factor that creates cracks in the concrete panel and reduces the durability of the retaining wall itself. In this study, steel pipe sleeves and reinforcements were purchased at the anchorage of the panel to prevent cracks, and by applying bumpy shear keys to the end of the panel, the weakness of the individual behavior of the existing grout anchors was improved. The problem of degraded landscape by exposure to front concrete of retaining wall and protrusion of anchorage was solved by the production of natural stone patterns and the construction of sections that do not protrude the anchorage. In order to verify the effectiveness of anti-crack sleeves and reinforcements used in the null, indoor testing and three-dimensional numerical analysis have been performed, and the use of steel pipe sleeves and reinforcements has demonstrated the overall strength increase and crack suppression effect of panels.