Use of Guided Wave Inspections to Monitor the Integrity of Nuclear Power Station Boilers

Abstract

Owing to potential concerns about creep occurring in the mid-part of the central tubular spines of nuclear plant boilers, as a precautionary measure TWI and its subsidiary, Plant Integrity Ltd, were contracted in 2002/2003 to develop a test procedure to check the integrity of the spines using their Teletest ultrasonic guided wave testing (GWT) system. At that time, both the thickness and complexity of the component were beyond the normal operating window of the Teletest equipment, which was designed for testing pipelines. To validate the operation and capabilities of the method, a full-scale mock-up component was produced. Field testing was commenced in 2003. The eight boilers around a reactor were tested when it was shut down for a statutory outage, which occurs on a 3-year cycle for each reactor.

Original document

The different versions of the original document can be found in:

• https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=5010&context=qnde

• http://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/978-3-319-69233-3_5,

http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-69233-3_5 under the license http://www.springer.com/tdm

• https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/qnde/2016/abstracts/143,

https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-3-319-69233-3_5,

https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=5010&context=qnde,

https://rd.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-69233-3_5,

https://academic.microsoft.com/#/detail/2565571649