• Transactions of the Korean Society of Pressure Vessels and Piping
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.146-154
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• 2023

In nuclear power plants, ultrasonic test for pipe wall thickness measurement is used during periodic inspections to prevent pipe rupture due to pipe wall thinning. However, when measuring pipe wall thickness using ultrasonic test, a significant amount of measurement error occurs due to the on-site conditions of the nuclear power plant. If the maximum pipe wall thinning rate is decided by the measured pipe wall thickness containing a significant error, the pipe wall thinning rate data have significant uncertainty and systematic overestimation. This study proposes preprocessing of pipe wall thinning measurement data using support vector machine regression algorithm. By using support vector machine, pipe wall thinning measurement data can be smoothened and accordingly uncertainty and systematic overestimation of the estimated pipe wall thinning rate data can be reduced.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.25 no.1
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• pp.81-88
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• 2001

This study proposed an analytical method to evaluate a local allowable wall thickness (LAWT) for locally thinned pipe subjected to internal pressure and bending moment. In this method, the stresses in the thinned region were calculated by finite element analysis and plastic collapse was applied as a failure criterion of thinned pipe. Using this method, LAWT for a simplified thinned pipe was evaluated with variation in axial extent of thinned area, and it was compared with allowable wall thickness provided by previous pipe wall thickness criteria. The results showed that the LAWT was lower, about 50%, than that calculated by construction code or ASME Code N-597, and it was higher, about 2 times, than that estimated by evaluation model based on pipe experiments. In addition, LAWT was decreased with increasing axial extent of thinned area and saturated with further increase in axial extent. And, the variation in LAWT with axial extent of thinned area depended on type of load, especially a magnitude of bending moment, considering in the evaluation.

• Plant Journal
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.65-73
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• 2011

This research has suggested a method to select pipe wall thickness by application of the value engineering to reduce the cost and quantity that are major part of construction materials. This research shows that the application of value engineering reduces the cost of piping materials by optimizing pipe wall thickness while maintaining process flow date of design pressure and design temperature. Based on this knowledge, the application of the value engineering will lead to the cost reduction and quantity reduction by effective selection of pipe wall thickness. The application of the value engineering will help the EPC companies to win a contract in the overseas plant market.

• Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering
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• v.19 no.11
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• pp.782-788
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• 2007

In this paper, the freezing process of the water supply pipe in the exterior wall of an apartment house was analyzed by numerical method. The thickness of the pipe insulation and the percentage of insulation damage were considered as parameters in this paper. In the cases of the 0%, 8% and 20% damaged of the 5mm thickness insulation, the freezing was completed after 13 hours, 10 hours and 7 hours respectively. And in cases of the 10mm thickness insulation, the freezing was completed after 18 hours, 10.5 hours and 8 hours respectively. As a result, it is predicted that the water freezing would occurred when the water supply pipe with 8% or 20% damaged insulation are installed in the exterior wall. However, the water freezing would not occurred when the water supply pipe with 10mm thickness insulation of 0% damage is installed in the exterior wall.

• Corrosion Science and Technology
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.182-188
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• 2016

Significant piping wall thinning caused by Flow-Accelerated Corrosion (FAC) and Erosion-Corrosion (EC) continues to occur, even after the Mihama Power Station unit 3 secondary pipe rupture in 2004, in which workers were seriously injured or died. Nuclear power plants in many countries have experienced FAC and EC-related cases in steam cycle piping systems. Korea has also experienced piping wall thinning cases including thinning in the downstream straight pipe of a check valve in a feedwater pump line, the downstream elbow of a control valve in a feedwater flow control line, and failure of the straight pipe downstream of an orifice in an auxiliary steam return line. Cause analyses were performed by reviewing thickness data using Ultrasonic Techniques (UT) and, Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) images for the failed pipe, and numerical simulation results for FAC and EC cases in Korea Nuclear Power Plants. It was concluded that the main cause of wall thinning for the downstream pipe of a check valve is FAC caused by water vortex flow due to the internal flow shape of a check valve, the main cause of wall thinning for the downstream elbow of a control valve is FAC caused by a thickness difference with the upstream pipe, and the main cause of wall thinning for the downstream pipe of an orifice is FAC and EC caused by liquid droplets and vortex flow. In order to investigate more cases, additional analyses were performed with the review of a lot of thickness data for inspected pipes. The results showed that pipe wall thinning was also affected by the operating condition of upstream equipment. Management of FAC and EC based on these cases will focus on the downstream piping of abnormal or unusual operated equipment.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2014.10a
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• pp.545-547
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• 2014

The portable vibration signal-based pipe wall thinning inspection device was developed in this work. Compared to wall-thinning detection using conventional ultrasonic thickness measurement gauge, the proposed device can estimate average wall thickness of wide range and be applied to in-service pipes. The measurement principle of the device was briefly described and the configrations of hardware and software were explained. It was shown that the device can gauge average wall-thickness of test specimens with high precision.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.48 no.3
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• pp.820-830
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• 2016

Pipe wall thinning by flow-accelerated corrosion and various types of erosion is a significant and costly damage phenomenon in secondary piping systems of nuclear power plants (NPPs). Most NPPs have management programs to ensure pipe integrity due to wall thinning that includes periodic measurements for pipe wall thicknesses using nondestructive evaluation techniques. Numerous measurements using ultrasonic tests (UTs; one of the nondestructive evaluation technologies) have been performed during scheduled outages in NPPs. Using the thickness measurement data, wall thinning rates of each component are determined conservatively according to several evaluation methods developed by the United States Electric Power Research Institute. However, little is known about the conservativeness or reliability of the evaluation methods because of a lack of understanding of the measurement error. In this study, quantitative models for UT thickness measurement deviations of nuclear pipes and fittings were developed as the first step for establishing an optimized thinning evaluation procedure considering measurement error. In order to understand the characteristics of UT thickness measurement errors of nuclear pipes and fittings, round robin test results, which were obtained by previous researchers under laboratory conditions, were analyzed. Then, based on a large dataset of actual plant data from four NPPs, a quantitative model for UT thickness measurement deviation is proposed for plant conditions.

• Transactions of Materials Processing
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.79-87
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• 2010

The Pipe bending process using high frequency local induction heating is an advanced technique to bend pipes with a small bending radius and a large diameter. Even though the pipe bending process is a quite widespread engineering practice, it depends heavily upon trial and error method by field engineers with several years of experience. So it is necessary to develop an integrated methodology for optimum design of the pipe bending process. During hot pipe bending using induction heating, outward wall thickness of a pipe is thinned due to tensile stress and the reduction of wall thickness is not allowed to exceed 12.5%. Taguchi method and dynamic reverse moment is proposed to maintain a reduction ratio of thickness within 12.5%, when D/t ratio is high. An application of the proposed approach was compared with those of the finite element analysis and has good in agreements.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.18-26
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• 2017

This work proposes an alternative pipe wall-thinning inspection method based on change of eigenfrequencies of shell vibration modes in wall-thinned pipes. It takes much time to detect wall-thinning of pipes using ultrasonic thickness gauge and only a limited number of pipes are under regular inspection. In a pipe with locally decreased thickness, stiffness varies along circumferential direction and natural frequencies of shell vibration modes of the pipe change or frequencies of same modes bifurcate into two different values. Therefore, one can monitor pipe wall-thinning by measuring change of natural frequencies or estimate wall-thinning shape qualitatively. The feasibility of the proposed method was studied by FE vibration analysis for wall-thinned pipes. Modal testing was also carried out for the pipes with artificial wall-thinned section to verify the working performance of the suggested technique.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Pressure Vessels and Piping
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• v.7 no.1
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• pp.27-34
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• 2011

The objective of this study is to classify the geometry of wall-thinning defect that causes a circumferential crack in the pipe elbows subjected to internal pressure. For this objective, first of all a criterion to determine the occurrence of circumferential cracking at wall-thinned area was developed based on finite element simulation for burst tests of pipe elbow specimens that showed axial and circumferential cracking at wall-thinned area. In addition, parametric finite element analysis including various wall-thinning geometries, locations, and pipe geometries was conducted and the wall-thinning geometries that initiate circumferential crack were determined by applying the criterion to the results of parametric analysis. It showed that the circumferential crack occurs at wall-thinning defect, which has a deep, wide, and short geometry. Also, it is indicated that the pipe elbows with larger radius to thickness ratio are more susceptible to circumferential cracking at wall-thinned area.