Development of an Eddy Current Test Configuration for Welded Carbon Steel Pipes under the Change in Physical Properties

Abstract

Carbon steel pipe is used in various industries, including nuclear power plants. Due to the daily cyclic operation of the pipe over time, environmental influences, and extreme working conditions, the probability of developing small fine cracks in the welded areas of the pipes increases. For that reason, it requires earlier assessment, and providing adequate inspection and evaluation of the weld area of the pipes used in such an installation is crucial to increase the safety level. In this paper, two different probe configurations were used to assess the integrity of the girth weld of the SA106 carbon steel pipe welded by gas tungsten arc welding. The conventional eddy current probe was initially used, but as it had some limitations, a new probe configuration was proposed to overcome these constraints. Numerical simulations using the finite element method were performed, based on the real measurement of the physical properties of the specimen, to complement the experimental data. In addition, the experimental results were successfully reproduced by the simulations. Simulation and experimental results show that the proposed probe configuration allows adequate inspection.

Distribution of Magnetic Flux Density under Stress and Its Application in Nondestructive Testing

“…The presence of even a tiny amount of heterogeneity formed during the process of manufacturing and operating the material can alter its mechanical properties, and endanger the performance and safety of the structure or part, and can arise unexpectedly without prior prevention. To this end, it is necessary to regularly inspect the infrastructure with the appropriate nondestructive testing (NDT) techniques to identify defects and prevent any type of failure [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10]. Multiple nondestructive testing techniques, such as magnetic particle testing (MPT), liquid penetrant testing (PT), eddy current testing (ECT), magnetic Barkhausen emission (MBE), magneto-acoustic emission (MAE), magnetic flux leakage (MFL), etc., can be used for this purpose [11][12][13][14][15][16].…”

Estimation of Depth Direction of Crack by measuring the Residual Magnetic Vector Flux Density around Grains

“…They provide outstanding toughness and strength when subjected to environmental and mechanical stresses and strains, and are able to resist stresses and strains without compromising the safety of the equipment. They are capable of effectively resisting stress and strain and ensure safe operation of equipment by means of nondestructive testing (NDT) techniques and equipment [1,2,3,4,5,6,7]. There are a number of investigations on crack failure prediction in metallic materials using different fatigue approaches to predict failure as well as measurement by employing different techniques and scanning methods with different tools [8,9,10,11].…”