• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.1156-1165
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• 2017

A high performance interleaved bridgeless boost power factor correction (PFC) rectifier operating under the critical current conduction mode (CrM) is proposed in this paper to improve the efficiency and system performance of various applications, such as nano-grid systems. By combining the interleaved technique with the bridgeless topology, the circuit contains two independent branches without rectifier diodes. The branches operate in interleaved mode for each respective half-line period. Moreover, when operating in CrM, all the power switches take on soft-switching, thereby reducing switching losses and raising system efficiency. In addition, the input current flows through a minimum amount of power devices. By employing a commercial PFC controller, an effective control scheme is used for the proposed circuit. The operating principle of the proposed circuit is presented, and the design considerations are also demonstrated. Simulations and experiments have been carried out to evaluate theoretical analysis and feasibility of the proposed circuit.

• The Transactions of The Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers
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• v.66 no.1
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• pp.27-32
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• 2017

In this paper, slot less type high-speed and compact motor was designed. it was selected through change of stator coil distribution for the optimal performance of the motor. In this paper, designed motor was expected to be very vulnerable to heat dissipation in a compact motor. Therefore, to ensure reliability in the design result, winding and permanent magnet damage caused by the losses of motor was analyzed by thermal analysis and demagnetization analysis. Using the result, whether motor burnout was confirmed by motor performance degradation and insulation breakdown.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.848-859
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• 2016

System failures in thermal power plants (TPPs) can lead to serious losses because the equipment is operated under very high pressure and temperature. Therefore, it is indispensable for alarm systems to inform field workers in advance of any abnormal operating conditions in the equipment. In this paper, we propose a clustering-based fault detection method for steam boiler tubes in TPPs. For data clustering, k-means algorithm is employed and the number of clusters are systematically determined by slope statistic. In the clustering-based method, it is assumed that normal data samples are close to the centers of clusters and those of abnormal are far from the centers. After partitioning training samples collected from normal target systems, fault scores (FSs) are assigned to unseen samples according to the distances between the samples and their closest cluster centroids. Alarm signals are generated if the FSs exceed predefined threshold values. The validity of exponentially weighted moving average to reduce false alarms is also investigated. To verify the performance, the proposed method is applied to failure cases due to boiler tube leakage. The experiment results show that the proposed method can detect the abnormal conditions of the target system successfully.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.54 no.1
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• pp.72-83
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• 2022

This paper presents a numerical investigation of two-phase natural circulation flows established when external reactor vessel cooling is applied to a severe accident of the APR1400 reactor for the in-vessel retention of the core melt. The coolability limit due to external reactor vessel cooling is associated with the natural circulation flow rate around the lower head of the reactor vessel. For an elaborate prediction of the natural circulation flow rate using a thermal-hydraulic system code, MARS-KS1.5, a three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation is conducted to estimate the flow rate and pressure distribution of a liquid-state coolant at the brink of significant void generation. The CFD calculation results are used to determine the loss coefficient at major flow junctions, where substantial pressure losses are expected, in the nodalization scheme of the MARS-KS code such that the single-phase flow rate is the same as that predicted via CFD simulations. Subsequently, the MARS-KS analysis is performed for the two-phase natural circulation regime, and the transient behavior of the main thermal-hydraulic variables is investigated.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers D
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• v.55 no.2
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• pp.68-71
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• 2006

Active thermography has been used for several years in the field of remote non-destructive testing. It provides thermal images for remote detection and imaging of damages. Also, it is based on propagation and reflection of thermal waves which are launched from the surface into the inspected component by absorption of modulated radiation. For energy deposition, it use external heat sources (e.g., halogen lamp or convective heating) or internal heat generation (e.g., microwaves, eddy current, or elastic wave). Among the external heat sources, the ultrasound is generally used for energy deposition because of defect selective heating up. The heat source generating a thermal wave is provided by the defect itself due to the attenuation of amplitude modulated ultrasound. A defect causes locally enhanced losses and consequently selective heating up. Therefore amplitude modulation of the injected ultrasonic wave turns a defect into a thermal wave transmitter whose signal is detected at the surface by thermal infrared camera. This way ultrasound thermography(UT) allows for selective defect detection which enhances the probability of defect detection in the presence of complicated intact structures. In this paper the applicability of UT for fast defect detection is described. Examples are presented showing the detection of defects in PCB material. Measurements are performed on various kinds of typical defects in PCB materials (both Cu metal and non-metal epoxy). The obtained thermal image reveals area of defect in row of thick epoxy material and PCB.

• Journal of the Korean Recycled Construction Resources Institute
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.165-170
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• 2015

Pipe-rack structures supporting high temperature and pressure are of great importance to ensure the safety of the operation of the plants. If some damage occurred in the pipe-rack structure, the facilities not only bring damage to the commercial property, but also result in economic losses. Specially, since pipe-rack structures are exposed to various environmental conditions, it is essential to evaluate the thermal behavior of the structure caused by environmental conditions for the appropriate design and maintenance of the pipe-rack structure. Thus, based on a selected, typical pipe-rack structure, a thermal-stress coupled analysis was conducted to evaluate the temperature distributions and thermal stresses of the structure. For this, this study accounted for the operating condition of the pipe and the effect of environmental conditions, Yeosu in South Korea and Saudi Arabia in the Middle East. The results of the study showed the need for accounting for a variance in the environmental factors to evaluate the thermal behavior of the pipe-rack structure along with the working condition of pipe.

• Journal of Biosystems Engineering
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• v.41 no.4
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• pp.328-336
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• 2016

Purpose: The heat culture areas of greenhouses have been continuously increasing. In the face of international oil price fluctuations, development of energy saving technologies is becoming essential. To save energy, auxiliary heat source and thermal insulation technologies are being developed, but they lack cost-efficiency. The present study was conducted to save energy by developing a conceptually new semi-basement type greenhouse. Methods: A semi-basement type greenhouse, was designed and constructed in the form of a three quarter greenhouse as a basic structure, which is an advantageous structure to inflow sunlight. To evaluate the performance of the developed greenhouse, a similar structured general greenhouse was installed as a control plot, and heating tests were conducted under the same crop growth conditions. Results: Although shadows appeared during the winter in the semi-basement type greenhouse due to the underground drop, the results of crop growth tests indicated that there were no differences in crop growth and development between the semi-basement type greenhouse and the control greenhouse, indicating that the shadows did not affect the crop up to the height of the crop growing point. The amount of fuel used for heating from January to March was almost the same between the two greenhouses for tests. The heating load coefficients of the experimental greenhouses were calculated as $3.1kcal/m^2{\cdot}^{\circ}C{\cdot}h$ for the semi-basement type greenhouse and $2.9kcal/m^2{\cdot}^{\circ}C{\cdot}h$ for the control greenhouse. Since the value is lower than the double layer PE (polyethylene) film greenhouse value of $3.5kcal/m^2{\cdot}^{\circ}C{\cdot}h$ from a previous study, Tthe semi-basement type greenhouse seemed to have energy saving effects. Conclusions: The semi-basement type greenhouse could be operated with the same fuel consumption as general greenhouses, even though its underground portion resulted in a larger volume, indicating positive effects on energy saving and space utilization. It was identified that the heat losses could be reduced by installing a thermal curtain of multi-layered materials for heat insulation inside the greenhouse for the cultivation of horticultural products by installing thermal curtain of multi-layered materials for heat insulation inside the greenhouse, it was identified that the heat losses could be reduced.

• Progress in Superconductivity and Cryogenics
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.30-34
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• 2016

An integral crank driven Stirling cryocooler is solidly based on concepts of direct IR detector mounting on the cryocooler's cold finger, and the integral construction of the cryocooler and Dewar envelope. Performance factors of the cryocooler depend on operating conditions of the cryocooler such as a cyclic mean pressure of the working fluid, a rotational speed of driving mechanism, a thermal environment, a targeted operation temperature and etc.. At given charging condition of helium gas, the cyclic mean pressure of helium gas in the cryocooler changes with temperatures of the cold end and the environment. In this study, effects of the cyclic mean pressure of helium gas on performances of the Stirling cryocooler were investigated by numerical analyses using the Sage software. The simulation model takes into account thermodynamic losses due to an inefficiency of regenerator, a pressure drop, a shuttle heat transfer and solid conductions. Simulations are performed for the performance variation according to the cyclic mean pressure induced by the temperature of the cold end and the environment. This paper presents P-V works in the compression and expansion space, cooling capacity, contribution of losses in the expansion space.

• Journal of the Korean Solar Energy Society
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.63-71
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• 2001

This work has been carried out to find the ideal operating conditions for solar vacuum tube collectors which are widely used at present. Various types of solar collectors including a flat plate one were experimentally tested and examined to determine their thermal efficiencies and operating characteristics. Generally, solar vacuum tubes can be classified into two groups according to their design features. Of these, one is characterized by the insertion of a metallic device(such as a finned heat pipe) in an evacuated glass tube for the collection and transportation of solar energy. The other utilizes double glass tubes where the smaller one is contained inside the bigger one and soldered to each other after the small gap between them is evacuated. Both of these solar collectors are designed to minimize convection heat losses by removing the air which is in direct contact with the absorber surface. The performance of the former type can be readily analyzed by applying the relevant correlations developed for flat plate solar collectors. This has been demonstrated in the present study for the case of a solar collector where a heat pipe is inserted in an evacuated tube.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and Technology
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• v.12 no.6
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• pp.2247-2255
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• 2017

Because the on-board charger (OBC) is installed in electric vehicles (EVs), high power density is regarded as a key technology. Among components of the OBC, inductors occupy more than 30% of the total volume. Thus, it is important to reduce the volume and the weight of inductors while maintaining thermal stability. Discontinuous conduction mode (DCM) can satisfy these requirements; however, only a few studies have adopted the DCM operation for OBCs because of the large inductor current ripple. In this paper, a design process is proposed for application of the DCM operation to OBCs. In order to analyze the inductor losses accurately, a numerical formula for the inductor current ripple is deduced based on a detailed analysis. Two inductors are fabricated using several ferrite cores and powder cores taking into consideration the inductor size, inductor losses, and temperature rise. In order to verify the analysis and design process, experimental results are presented that show that the designed inductors satisfy the requirements of the OBCs.