• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.9 no.4
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• pp.60-68
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• 1991

The weld quality of end cap welds in Pressurized Heavy Water Reactor (PHWR) Fuel is extremely important for the fuel performance in the nuclear reactor. The quality of resistance upset welds is currently evaluated mainly by the metallographic examination although it reveals only two weld cross-sections in a circumference welds. This investigation was, firstly, carried out to determine whether the ultrasonic examination would be applied to detect weld defects in the end cap welds and, secondly, to measure the mechanical strength of upset butt welds as a function of phase shift percentage. The major results obtained in this study are as follows: 1. The weld current and amount of upset shrinkage linearly increased with increasing the phase shift percentage. 2. Above the phase shift 55%, the defects in the welds were completely eliminated with increasing the phase of sound weld was over the thickness of cladding tube. 3. The ultrasonic testing well detected such defects in the end cap welds as upset external crack, upset split, corner crack and irregular weld flash comparing with the results of metallography. 4. The micro-fissure in the corner of the end cap welds was reliably detected by ultrasonic testing. 5. The mechanical strength in the welds increased with increasing phase shift percentage but the fracture did't occur in the welds above 55%.

• Proceedings of the KWS Conference
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• 2010.05a
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• pp.43-46
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• 2010

As the nuclear power plant has been constructed continuously for several decades in Korea, the welding technology for components manufacturing and installation has been improved largely. Standardization for weld test and qualification was also established systematically according to the concerned code. The welding for the main components requires the high reliability to keep the constant quality level, which means the repeatability of weld quality. Therefore the weld process qualified by thorough test and evaluation is able to be applied for manufacturing. Narrow gap SAW and GTAW process are usually applied for girth seam welding of pressure vessel like Reactor vessel, steam generator, and etc. For the surface cladding with stainless steel and Inconel material, strip welding process is mainly used. Inside cladding of nozzles is additionally applied with Hot wire GTAW and semi-auto welding process. Especially the weld joint having elliptical weld line on curved surface needs a specialized weld system which is automatically rotating with adjusting position of the head torch. The small sized pipe, tube, and internal parts of reactor vessel requests precise weld processes like an automatic GTAW and electron beam welding. Welding of dissimilar materials including Inconel690 material has high possibility of weld defects like a lack of fusion, various types of crack. To avoid these kinds of problem, optimum weld parameters and sequence should be set up through the many tests. As the life extension of nuclear power plant is general trend, weld technologies having higher reliability is required gradually. More development of specialized welding systems, weld part analysis and evaluation, and life prediction for main components should be taken into a consideration extensively.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.429-436
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• 2001

The effect of welding condition on the microstructures of the weld metal in A7N01 welded by $CO_2$ laser was investigated. The number of ripples was increased with decreasing power and increasing welding speed. In the bead without ripple lines, the subgrain microstructures distribution from the fusion line toward the center of the bead were in the order of cellular, dendritic and equiaxed dendrite. However, in the bead with ripple lines, cellular and dendritic were formed between the fusion boundary and the ripple line. Inaddition, those structures were also observed between the ripple line. Equiaxed dendrites were formed only at the center line region. Cellular and dendritics formed near the ripple line were larger than those formed near the fusion boundary. The cooling rates estimated by the dendrite arm spacing were in the range of 200 to 1150oC/s. Cooling rate was increased with decreasing the power and increasing the welding speed. Mg and Zn segregated at the boundaries of cellulars and dendritics, Mg was segregated more than Zn. The segregation of Mg and Zn decreased with increasing cooling rate. Hardness of the weld metal was lower than that of the base metal in all welding conditions and increased as the cooling rate increased.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.119-133
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• 1998

To implement full automation in pipe welding, it si most important to develop special sensors and their related systems which act like human operator when detecting irregular groove conditions. In this study, an automatic pipe Gas Metal Arc Welding (GMAW) system was proposed to full control pipe welding procedure with intelligent sensor systems. A five-axes manipulator was proposed for welding torch to automatically access to exact welding position when pipe size and welding angle were given. Pool status and torch position were measured by using a weld-pool image monitoring and processing technique in root-pass welding for weld seam tracking and weld pool control. To overcome the intensive arc light, pool image was captured at the instance of short circuit of welding power loop. Captured image was processed to determine weld pool shape. For weld seam tracking, the relative distance of a torch position from the pool center was calculated in the extracted pool shape to move torch just onto the groove center. To control penetration of root pas, gap was calculated in the extracted pool image, and then weld conditions were controlled for obtaining appropriate penetration. welding speed was determined with a fuzzy logic, and welding current and voltage were determined from a data base to correspond to the gap. For automatic fill-pass welding, the function of human operator of real time weld seam control can be substituted by a sensor system. In this study, an arc sensor system was proposed based on a fuzzy control logic. Using the proposed automatic system, root-pass welding of pipe which had gap variation was assured to be appropriately controlled in welding conditions and in torch position by showing sound welding result and good seam tracking capability. Fill-pass welding by the proposed system also showed very successful result by tracking along the offset welding line without any control of human operator.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.4-17
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• 1984

Overlaid weld metals of austenitic stainless steel in a pressure vessel of power reactor are usually post-weld heated for a long period of time after welding. The PWHT is considered as a kind of sensitizing and it is important to check the soundness of the weld metal after PWHT, especially about the precipitation of carbides. The purpose of this report is to obtain information on the relation between the change of microstructure and Post-Weld Heat Treatment in the overlaid weld metals. Metallurgical aspects of the problem on austenitic stainless steel heated at $625^{\circ}C$, $670^{\circ}C$, $720^{\circ}C$ and $760^{\circ}C$ for 3, 10, 30, 100 and 300 hours have been investigated by means of optical-micrography, micro-hardness measurement, scanning electron microscope and electron-probe micro analysis. From the results obtained, the following conclusions are drawn; 1) The PWHT above $625^{\circ}C$ for a long time causes a diffusion of carbon atoms from low alloy steel into stainless steel, and consequently carbon is highly concentrated at the boundary layer of stainless steel. 2) C in ferritic steel migrated to austenitic steel and carbides precipitated in austenitic steel along fusion line. At higher temperatures, the ferrite grains coarsened in the decarburized zone. 3) In the change of microstructure of stainless steel overlaid weld metal, the width of carbides precipitated zone and decarburized zone increased with increase of PWHT temperature and time. 4) At about $625^{\circ}C$ to $760^{\circ}C$, chromium carbides, mainly $M_{23} C_6$, precipitate very closely in the carburized layer with remarkable hardening. 5) Precipitation of delta ferrite from molten weld metal depends on solidification phenomenon. There was a small of ferrite near the bond in which the local solidification time was short, comparing with after parts of weld metal. Shape and amount of ferrite were not changed by Post-Weld Heat Treatment after solidification.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.29-36
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• 2014

Recently, in order to enhance the function and usefulness of products, cladding of dissimilar materials that maximizes the performance of the material is being widely used in all areas of industry as an important process. Clad steel plate, produced by cladding stainless steel plate, an anticorrosive material, on carbon steel plate, is being used to produce pressure vessels. Stainless steel plate has good corrosion resistance, and carbon steel plate has good rigidity and strength; clad steel can satisfy all of these qualities at once. This study aims to find the ${\delta}$-ferrite behavior, mechanical properties, structure change, integrity and reliability of clad steel weld on hot rolled steel plates. For this purpose, multi-layer welding, repair welding and post weld heat treatment were implemented according to welding procedure specifications (WPS). In order to observe the mechanical properties and toughness of clad steel weld zone, post weld heat treatment was carried out according to ASME Sec. VIII Div.1 UW-40 procedure for post weld heat treatment. With heat treatment at $625^{\circ}C$, the hold time was used as the process variable, increased by intervals that were doubled each time, from 80 to 1,280 min. The structure of weld part was typical cast structure; localized primary austenite areas appeared near central vermicular ferrite and fusion line. The heat affected zone showed rough austenite structure created by the weld heat input. Due to annealing effects of heat treatment, the mechanical properties (tensile strength, hardness, impact value) of the heat affected area tended to decrease. From the results of this study, it is possible to conclude the integrity of clad steel welds is not affected much in field welding, repair welding, multi-layer welding, post weld heat treatment, etc.

• Proceedings of the KWS Conference
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• 2002.10a
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• pp.408-411
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• 2002

Effect of in-situ vibration on the properties of A-grade steel SMA weldment has been investigated. Welding was performed on the steel fixed at the experimental jig under the mechanical vibration of a given frequency. The applied frequency varied from 39 to 43.5 Hz (harmonic frequency). For weldments formed under the vibration with a sub-harmonic frequency, both the columnar width of the weld metal and the prior austenite grain size of the HAZ near the fusion line clearly decreased. This indicates that the vibration increase the cooling rate after welding. Vibration effect was also found at the weld metal formed at the center region of the weldment. The weld metal showed liner microstructure both in columnar zone and in equiaxed zone with thinner grain boundary ferrite. However mechanical properties of the weld metal did not exactly follow the microstructural changes developed under the vibration. The weld metal formed under the vibration revealed higher yield and tensile strength but lower ductility and impact toughness, compared with the conventional weld metal.

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.67-73
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• 2010

A simplified finite element analysis has been used to predict the weld-induced deformation to bead-on-plate welding of steel plates having curvatures in the welding direction. In this study, the equivalent loading method based on inherent strain was used to investigate the effect of longitudinal curvature on the weld-induced deformation of curved plates. Equivalent loads were derived from the inherent strain distribution around the weld line, and the loads were used for linear finite element analyses. These kinds of numerical simulations can, of course, be performed by using the rigorous thermalelastic-plastic analysis method. This approach is not, however, practical for use in weld-induced deformation analysis of large and complex structures, such as ship structures, in view of computing time and cost. The present equivalent load approach has been applied to several plate models having curvatures in the welding direction, and the results are compared with those obtained by thermal-elastic-plastic analysis and also with those obtained by the other simplified method found in reference. As far as the present results are concerned, the weld-induced deformation of curved plates can be accurately predicted by the method presented in this paper.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.66-74
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• 2005

API(American Petroleum Institute) steel, as a line pipe material, requires the enhanced mechanical and chemical properties with the environmental severity. Especially, the weld part(weld metal and heat affected zone) is an important region for the safety. However, the study for the behavior of microstructure and toughness in multi-pass welding is seldom. In this study, the relationship between the microstructure and toughness of welds with several welding, bending and heat-treatment conditions was examined. In particular, HIC property in the weld metal was evaluated. The microstructure and toughness in multi-passed HAZ seemed to be determined by the final welding thermal cycle and the low toughness was attributed to the MA constituents formed in the intercritically reheated region. The weld metal showed very low toughness and it was not improved by the change in bending and heat treatment conditions. Additionally, the cracks are observed in the weld metal. from these results, it was found that the choice of welding wire/flux is very important.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.186-192
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• 2002

The fatigue crack propagation characteristics were investigated on dissimilar friction weld of two kind of heat-resisting steels (STR3 and STR35) commonly used in valve materials for vehicles. A small circular artificial defect was machined to induce fatigue crack at bonded line, heat affected zone and base metal of the weld on the surface of the specimens. From the results of the experiment, the fatigue limits of the materials STR3 and STR35 were obtained to be 429.0MPa and 409.4MPa respectably. The STR35 base metal and 1.0mm HAZ specimens showed 190% and 82% higher fatigue life than STR3 base metal. And the fatigue life of 1.0mm HAZ specimen was shown 99% on STR3 and 29% on STR35 higher than that of their base metal. But the fatigue life of weld interface specimen was shown 18% on STR3 and 72% on STR35 lower than that of their base metal because of the weld interface separation.