• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Tribologists and Lubrication Engineers Conference
• /
• 2001.11a
• /
• pp.245-251
• /
• 2001

A fretting wear tester is developed for experimental study on the fuel fretting problem of light water reactor. The feature of the developed tester is it can simulate the existence of gap between spring and fuel rod as well as different contacting force including the just-contact condition (0 N on the contact). Used are a servo-motor, an eccentric cylinder and lever mechanism for driving system. A spacer grid cell is constituted with four strap segments (each segment has a spring). This fretting wear tester can also be used as a fatigue tester of a spacer grid spring with the frequency of more than 10 Hz. It is required to simulate the frequency of the vibrating fuel rod due to flow-induced vibration in a reactor. In fretting wear test, up to two span-length of a fuel cladding tube can be accommodated. A specimen of cladding tube of one span-length is specially designed, which can be extended for two-span test. For .fatigue test, a device for clamping the spring fixture is installed additionally, Presently, the tester is designed for the condition of air environment and room temperature. The variation of the reciprocal distance is measured to check the stability of input force, which will be exerted to the cladding (for fretting wear. test) and the spring (for fatigue test) specimen.

• Tribology and Lubricants
• /
• v.24 no.5
• /
• pp.250-254
• /
• 2008

The steam generator of nuclear power plant is composed with the bundles of long tubes. It is exposed fluid flow and weak in the vibration. The tubes are supported by anti-vibration bars. Due to vibration the wear damage is called as the fretting wear. It should be minimized for the safety of the plants. The hard coatings are very effective to reduce the amount of wear. The coatings of TiN and CrN are introduced in this study to protect the fretting surfaces. The tube-on-flat type tester was used for fretting wear tests. The results show that the wear amounts of the coated tubes were decreased depending on coating thickness. CrN was very effective to reduce the wear. In case of TiN the wear amounts were dependent on the coating thickness. Thick coating of TiN was very effective for wear resistance.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Tribologists and Lubrication Engineers Conference
• /
• 2002.10b
• /
• pp.195-196
• /
• 2002

Studied is fretting wear behaviour of transversely vibrating tube which is supported by springs and dimples. This simulates the fuel rod fretting due to flow-induced vibration in a nuclear reactor. The contact between spacer grid springs and fuel cladding tubes arc brought into focus in this paper. From the mechanical viewpoint, a concave contact shape of spring is considered to perform a wider distribution of the contact stress. Sliding/impacting experiments are conducted in air at room temperature with the conditions of positive contact force and gap existence to accommodate the mechanical condition between the fuel rod and the grid spring during reactor operation. It is found that wear region is separated and wear volume becomes larger as the supporting condition becomes poorer. Spring and dimple cause similar wear.

• Journal of Mechanical Science and Technology
• /
• v.15 no.9
• /
• pp.1274-1280
• /
• 2001

The fretting wear behavior of the contact between Zircaloy-4 tube and Inconel 600, which are used as the fuel rod cladding and grid, respectively, in PWR nuclear power plants was investigated in air. In the study, number of cycles, slip amplitude and normal load were selected as the main factors of fretting wear. The results indicated that wear increased with load, slip amplitude and number of cycles but was affected mainly by the slip amplitude. SEM micrographs revealed the characteristics of fretting wear features on the surface of the specimens such as stick, partial slip and gross slip which depended on the slip amplitude. It was found that fretting wear was caused by the crack generation along the stick-slip boundaries due to the accumulation of plastic flow at small slip amplitudes and by abrasive wear in the entire contact area at high slip amplitudes.

• Tribology and Lubricants
• /
• v.21 no.1
• /
• pp.33-38
• /
• 2005

Fretting is the oscillatory motion with very small amplitudes, which usually occurs between two solid surfaces in contact. Fretting wear is the removal of material from contacting surfaces through fretting action. Fretting wear of steam generator tubes in nuclear power plant becomes a serious problem in recent years. The materials for the tubes usually are Inconel 690 (I-690) and Inconel 600 (I-600). In this paper, fretting wear tests for I-690 and I-600 were performed under various applied loads in water at room temperature. Results showed that the fretting wear loss of I-690 and I-600 tubes was largely influenced by stick-slip. The fretting wear mechanisms were the abrasive wear in slip regime and the delamination wear in stick regime. Also, I-690 had somewhat better wear resistance than I-600.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
• /
• v.35 no.5
• /
• pp.442-453
• /
• 2003

This study investigates the safety assessment of the potential for fretting-wear damages on steam generator (SG) U-tubes caused by foreign object in operating nuclear power plants. The operating SG shell-side flow field conditions are obtained from three-dimensional SG flow calculation using the ATHOS3 code. Modal analyses are performed for the finite element modelings of U-tubes to get the natural frequency, corresponding mode shape and participation factor. The wear rate of U-tube caused by foreign object is calculated using the Archard formula and the remaining life of the tube is predicted. Also, discussed in this study is the effect of the flow velocity and vibration of the tube on the remaining life of the tube.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
• /
• 2004.11a
• /
• pp.67-72
• /
• 2004

Fundamentally, slip displacement should be known to solve the problem related to the fretting wear. For this, methods for measuring the slip displacement range in the contact surface of the tube and the supports were introduced and analyzed in this study. Also the increment of the slip displacement during a cycle was calculated using the revised formulas. As a result, the slip displacement newly evaluated was much higher ($7{\sim}50$ times) than that previously evaluated especially in the case of the gap existence. This enables to explain the severe wear found when there was a gap between the tube and the supports.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Tribologists and Lubrication Engineers Conference
• /
• 2001.11a
• /
• pp.59-62
• /
• 2001

Flow induced vibration in steam generators has caused dynamic interactions between tubes and contacting materials resulting in fretting wear . Series of experiments have been performed to examine the wear properties of Inconel 690 steam generator tubes in various environmental conditions. For the present study, the test rig was designed to examine the fretting wear and rolling wear properties in high temperature(room temperature - 290。C) water. The test was performed at constant applied load and sliding distance to investigate the effect of test temperature on wear properties of the steam generator tube materials. To investigate the wear mechanism of material, the worn was observed using scanning electron microscopy. The weight loss increase at higher test temperature was caused by the decrease of water viscosity and the mechanical property change of tube material. The mechanical property changes of steam generator tube material, such as decrease of hardness or yield stress in the high temperature tests. From the SEM observation of worn surfaces, the severe wear scars were observed in specimens tested at the higher temperature.

• KSTLE International Journal
• /
• v.3 no.1
• /
• pp.68-73
• /
• 2002

A fretting wear experiment in roam temperature air was performed to evaluate the wear mechanism of fuel rod using a fretting wear tester, which has been developed for experimental study, The main focus was to compare the wear behaviors of fuel rod against support springs with different contact contours (i.e. concave and convex). Wear volume, degree or surface hardening and adhesion tendency of wear particle were examined by the surface roughness tester. The result indicated that with a change of contact condition from contact force of 5 N to 0.1 mm gap, the wear volume of tube increased in the condition of concave spring, but slowly decreased in convex spring. From the results of SEM observation, wear mechanism of each test condition was also dependent on the spring shapes. The wear mechanism of each test condition in room temperature air is discussed.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Tribologists and Lubrication Engineers Conference
• /
• 1999.11a
• /
• pp.78-83
• /
• 1999

Fretting Wear Behavior and Characteristics were investigated with Inconel 690 tube which is used in Nuclear Power Plant. Fretting Wear Tester has been engaged in the study of characteristics on tube fretted induced to various factors, i.e. vibration amplitude, contact type, material properties load support geometry, environmental effect Test has been performed in air and at room temperature. Wear volume rate has been approximately estimated as a function of normal load.