• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.153-161
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• 2009

After several PWSCCs were found in Bugey(France), Ringhals(Sweden), Tihange(Belgium), Oconee, Arkansas, Crystal Fever, Davis-Basse, VC Summer(U.S.A.), Thuruga(Japan), USNRC and PNNL started the research on PWSCC, that is, PINC project. The aim of this project is to fabricate and obtain representative NDE mock-ups with flaws to simulate tight PWSCC cracks, to identify and quantitatively assess NDE methods for accurately detecting, sizing and characterizing tight cracks such as PWSCC, to document the range of locations and crack morphologies associated with PWSCC and observed responses and to incorporate findings from other ongoing PWSCC research programs, as appropriate. By participating in PINC project, Korean morphology technique about PWSCC and NDE technique have improved and become similar lever with other advanced country. Therefore, the evaluation technique of integrity for nickel alloy component has been improved by cooperation with university, research institute and industries.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.263-272
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• 2008

Many technical methods are used for nondestructive testing field for solid materials. Among those, ultrasonic inspection methods are widely used and one of the popular methods involves the extraction of an appropriate set of features followed by the use of a neural network for the classification of the signals in the feature space. This paper describes an approach which uses LMS method to determine the coordinates of the ultrasonic probe followed by the use of SAFT with centroid technique to estimate the location of the ultrasonic reflector. The method is employed for classifying UT-NDE signals from the steam generator tubes in a nuclear power plant. The classification results are presented for the ultrasonic signals from cracks and deposits within steam generator tubes.

• Journal of Welding and Joining
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.68-75
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• 2000

The incomplete penetration(IP) discontinuity in butt joint weld, which is detected during safety analysis of the steel bridge by nondestructive evaluation(NDE) method, is classified as unacceptable defect according to the NDE codes and standards. In fact, there are a little allowance in butt joint weld in the view point of design criterion, and also detected IP discontinuity should be classified and evaluated for the fatigue strength and residual life estimation. In this study, we performed fatigue test to evaluate the fatigue strength of high strength steel(SWS490A) containing IP discontinuities in various size, the results compared and classified according to the bridge construction standard specification which published by korea administration of construction and traffic. Experimental results could be used to evaluate and estimate the IP discontinuities considering different stress range in butt joint bridge weld during periodic safety inspection.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2001.06a
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• pp.541-546
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• 2001

Application of bonding by adhesives can be found in many industries, particularly in advanced technological domains such as the aeronautical and space industries, automobile manufacture, and electronics. Periodic inspection with conventional ultrasonic NDE techniques is capable of indicating the presence and possible location of crack. Continuous ultrasonic attenuation monitoring has potential to supply information. This study used adhesive-bonded single-lap joints specimen to evaluate such possibility by ultrasonic signal processing method.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.5 no.4
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• pp.469-482
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• 2009

The emerging sensor-based structural health monitoring (SHM) technology has a potential for cost-effective maintenance of aging civil infrastructure systems. The author proposes to integrate continuous and global monitoring using on-structure sensors with targeted local non-destructive evaluation (NDE). Significant technical challenges arise, however, from the lack of cost-effective sensors for monitoring spatially large structures, as well as reliable methods for interpreting sensor data into structural health conditions. This paper reviews recent efforts and advances made in addressing these challenges, with example sensor hardware and health monitoring software developed in the author's research center. The hardware includes a novel fiber optic accelerometer, a vision-based displacement sensor, a distributed strain sensor, and a microwave imaging NDE device. The health monitoring software includes a number of system identification methods such as the neural networks, extended Kalman filter, and nonlinear damping identificaiton based on structural dynamic response measurement. These methods have been experimentally validated through seismic shaking table tests of a realistic bridge model and tested in a number of instrumented bridges and buildings.

• Proceedings of the KWS Conference
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• 2002.10a
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• pp.127-132
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• 2002

Recent deepwater offshore structures in Gulf of Mexico utilize butt welded tubular joints. Application of welded tubular joint includes tendons, production risers, and steel catenary risers. Fatigue life assessment of these joints becomes more critical because the structures to which they are attached are allowed to undergo cyclic and sometimes large displacements around an anchored position. Estimating the fatigue behavior of these tubular members in the design stage is generally conducted by using S-N curves specified in the codes and standards. Applying the stress concentration factor of the welded structure to S-N approach often results in very conservative assessment because the stress field acting on the tubular has a non-uniform distribution through the thickness. Fracture mechanics and fitness for service (FFS) technology have been applied in the design of the catenary risers. This technology enables the engineer to establish proper requirements on weld quality and inspection acceptance criteria to assure satisfactory structural integrity during its design life. It also provides guidance on proper design curves to be used and a methodology for accounting for the effects of non-uniform stress distribution through the wall thickness. An attempt was made to develop set of S-N curves based on fracture mechanics approach by considering non-uniform stress distribution and a threshold stress intensity factor. Series of S-N curves generated from this approach were compared to the existing S-N curves. For flat plate butt joint, the S-N curve generated from fracture mechanics matches with the IIW class 100 curve when initial crack depth was 0.5 mm (0.02"). Similar comparison with API X′ was made for tubular joint.. These initial crack depths are larger than the limits of inspection by current Non-destructive examination (NDE) means, such as Automatic Ultrasonic Inspection (AUT). Thus a safe approach can be taken by specifying acceptance criteria that are close to limits of sizing capability of the selected NDE method. The comparison illustrates conservatism built into the S-N design curve.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.15 no.5
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• pp.328-333
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• 2006

Magnetic Flux Leakage (MFL) methods are widely employed for the nondestructive evaluation (NDE) of gas pipelines. In the application of MFL pipeline inspection technology, corrosion anomalies are detected and identified via their leakage filed due to changes in wall thickness. The gas industry is keenly interested in automating the interpretation process, because a large amount of data to be analyzed is generated for in-line inspection. This paper presents a novel approach to the tasks of data segmentation, feature extraction and depth estimation from gas pipelines. Also, we will show that the proposed method successfully identifying artificial defects.

• Proceedings of the KSR Conference
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• 2009.05a
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• pp.673-679
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• 2009

Nondestructive inspection(NDI) is a testing procedure used to easily inspect an object for internal defects, abnormalities, shape, and structure, etc. without destroying it. Typical candidates for NDI include buildings, railways, aircraft, bridges, underground pipelines and various types of factory equipment. Recent advances in nondestructive evaluation(NDE) technologies have led to improved methods for quality control and in-service inspection, and the development of new options for material diagnostics. This paper introduces the methods of a survey and assessment on NDI applications in Electric Multiple Units(EMU). The main objective of this paper was to obtain information on various applications of NDI technology in EMU.

• Smart Structures and Systems
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• v.13 no.6
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• pp.1041-1063
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• 2014

This work introduces a two-module robotic pipe inspection system with ultrasonic NDE device to evaluate the integrity of pipe structures. The proposed robotic platform has high mobility. The two module mobile robot platform overcomes pipe obstacle structures such as elbow, or T-branch joints by cooperative maneuvers. Also, it can climb up the straight pipeline at a fast speed due to the wheel driven mechanism. For inspection of pipe structure, SH-waves generated by EMAT are applied with additional signal processing methods. A wavelet transform is implemented to extract a meaningful and specific signal from the superposed SH-wave signals. Intensity ratio which is normalized the defect signals intensity by the maximum intensity of directly transmitted signals in the wavelet transforms spectrum is applied to evaluate defects quantitatively. It is experimentally verified that the robotic ultrasonic inspection system with EMAT is capable of non-destructive inspection and evaluation of defects in pipe structure successfully by applying signal processing method based on wavelet transform.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.24 no.6
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• pp.590-596
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• 2004

Neural network-based signal classification systems are increasingly used in the analysis of large volumes of data obtained in NDE applications. Ultrasonic inspection methods on the other hand are commonly used in the nondestructive evaluation of welds to detect flaws. An important characteristic of ultrasonic inspection is the ability to identify the type of discontinuity that gives rise to a peculiar signal. Standard techniques rely on differences in individual A-scans to classify the signals. This paper proposes an ultrasonic signal classification technique based on the information tying in the neighboring signals. The approach is based on a 2-dimensional Fourier transform and the principal component analysis to generate a reduced dimensional feature vector for classification. Results of applying the technique to data obtained from the inspection of actual steel welds are presented.