• Journal of the Korean Society for Nondestructive Testing
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• v.29 no.2
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• pp.98-103
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• 2009

The nuclear power plants have been safely operated by plugging the steam generator tubes which have the crack indications. Tube rupture events can occur if analysts fail to detect crack indications during in-service inspection. There are various types of crack indication in steam generator tubes and they have been detected by the eddy current test. The integrity assessment should be performed using the crack-sizing results from eddy current data when the crack indication is detected. However, it is not easy to evaluate the crack-depth precisely and consistently due to the complexity of the methods. The current crack-sizing methods were reviewed in this paper and the suitable ones were selected through the laboratory tests. The retired steam generators of Kori Unit 1 were used for this study. The round robin tests by the domestic qualified analysts were carried out and the statistical models were introduced to establish the appropriate depth-sizing techniques. It is expected that the proposed techniques in this study can be utilized in the Steam Generator Management Program.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.30 no.12 s.255
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• pp.1618-1625
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• 2006

During the last two decades, several guidelines have been developed and used for assessing the integrity of a defective steam generator (SG) tube that is generally caused by stress corrosion cracking or wall-thinning phenomenon. However, as some of SG tubes are also failed due to fretting and so on, alternative failure estimation schemes are required for relevant defects. In this paper, parametric three-dimensional finite element (FE) analyses are carried out under internal pressure condition to simulate the failure behavior of SG tubes with different defect configurations; elliptical wear, tapered and flat wear type defects. Maximum pressures based on material strengths are obtained from more than a hundred FE results to predict the failure of SG tube. After investigating the effect of key parameters such as defect depth, defect length and wrap angle, simplified failure estimation equations are proposed in relation to the equivalent stress at the deepest point in wear region. Comparison of failure pressures predicted by the proposed estimation scheme with corresponding burst test data showed a good agreement.

• Journal of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea
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• v.2 no.4
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• pp.23-30
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• 1998

During an earthquake, there are three components of excitation : horizontal excitation of the ground, vertical excitation of the pile due to superstructure feedback produced by vertical excitation of the ground, and the seawater excitation by the vertical ground shaking, that is, "the seaquake." These excitations could have effects on the pore pressure buildup mode induced in the near-field of open-ended pile and the soil plugs in open-ended pipe piles installed at offshore sites. While the ground and pile excitation could be modeled by exciting the soil and pile with simulated motions, seaquake excitation induced by the vertical ground shaking can be modeled by pulsing the water pressure at the seabed. The objectives of this study were to observe buildup trend for the porewater pressures developed in near-field of open-ended pipe pile installed in the calibration chamber during the simulated earthquake and seaquake and, also to confirm the cause for reduction of soil plugging according to pore pressure buildup. During the simulated horizontal seismic motion, there was no upward flow through soil plug because the similar magnitude of excess porewater pressure were occurred at the top and under the toe of soil plug. During the horizontal seismic motion, relatively higher hydraulic gradients caused upward flow in the soil plug and then the degradation of plugging resistance was about 20%. During seaquake, in the case of the open-ended pile installed in a deep sea with more than 220m of water depth, soil plug failed completely because of high upward hydraulic gradients through soil plug.soil plug.

• Journal of Korean Tunnelling and Underground Space Association
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• v.24 no.2
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• pp.153-170
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• 2022

Waterjet has been comprehensively used in urban areas owing to a suitable technique for cutting concrete and rock, and low noise and vibration. Recently, the abrasive waterjet technique has been adopted and applied by the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute to demolish concrete plugging without disturbing and damaging In-situ Demonstration of Engineered Barrier System in the disposal research tunnel. In this study, the use of abrasive waterjet in the tunnel was evaluated for practical applicability and the existing cutting model was compared with the experimental results. As a variable for waterjet cutting, multi-cutting, water flow rate, abrasive flow rate, and standoff distance were selected for the diversity of analysis. As regarding the practical application, the waterjet facilitated path selection for cutting the concrete plugging and prevented additional disturbances in the periphery. The pump's noise at idling was 64.9 dB which is satisfied with the noise regulatory standard, but it exceeded the standard at ejection to air and target concrete because the experiment was performed in the tunnel space. The experimental result showed that the error between the predicted and measured cutting volume was 12~13% for the first cut and 16% for second cut. The standoff distance had a significant influence on the cutting depth and width, and the error tended to decrease with decrement of standoff distance.

• Journal of the Korean GEO-environmental Society
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• v.23 no.12
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• pp.5-15
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• 2022

Conventionally, because evaluation methods of the bearing capacity for double steel pipe-concrete composite pile design have not been established, the conventional vertical bearing capacity equations for steel hollow pile are used. However, there are severe differences between the predictions from these equations, and the most conservative one among vertical bearing capacity predictions are conventionally adopted as a design value. Consequently, the current prediction method for vertical bearing capacity of composite pile prediction composite pile causes design reliability and economical feasibility to be low. This paper investigated mechanical behaviors of a new composite pile, with a cross-section composed of double steel pipes filled with concrete (DSCT), vertical bearing capacities were analyzed for several DSCT pile conditions. Axisymmetric finite element models for DSCT pile and surrounding ground were created and they were used to analyze effects on behaviors of DSCT pile pile by embedding depth, stiffness of plugging material at pile tip, height of plugging material at pile tip, and rockbed material. Additionally, results from conventional design prediction equations for vertical bearing capacity at steel hollow pile tip were compared with that from numerical results, and the use of the conventional equations for steel hollow pile was examined to apply to that for DSCT pile.

• Journal of the Earthquake Engineering Society of Korea
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.45-54
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• 1999

It is known from the previous study on the behavior of sharter single pile during simulated seaquake induced by the vertical component of earthquake that the compressive capacity and the soil plugging resistance of single open-ended pipe pile were completely degraded. But, the capacity of single open-ended pipe pile with greater penetration and the capacity of piles group with shorter penetration were expected to be stable after seaquake motion. In this study, first single pile, 2-pile or 4-pile groups with several simulated penetrations were driven into the calibration chamber with saturated fine medium sand and the compressive load test for each installed pile or pile groups was performed. Then, about 95% compressive load of the ultimate capacity was applied on the pile head during the simulated seaquake motion. Finally, to confirm the reduction of pile capacity during the simulated seaquake motion, the compressive load test for each single pile or pile groups after seaquake motion was performed. During the simulated seaquake, compressive capacities of single open-ended pipe pile and piles group installed in shallow sea were not decreased. But, the stability of open-ended pile installed in deep sea was depended on the pile penetration depth. So, single open-ended pile with greater penetration of 27 m was stable, and 2-pile and 4-pile groups with penetration more than 13m were stable. But, 2-pile groups with penetration of 7m was failed, and the compressive capacity of 4-pile groups with penetration of 7m was degraded about 15%.