Papers by Keyword: Fracture Resistance Curve

Abstract: In this paper, the applicability of local approach is examined for SA515 Gr.60 nuclear steel through a series of finite element analyses incorporating modified GTN and Rousselier models as well as fracture toughness tests. To achieve the goal, fracture toughness test data of standard compact tension (CT) specimens are used for calibration of micro-mechanical parameters. Then, from finite element analyses employing the calibrated parameters, fracture resistance (J-R) curves of CT specimens with different crack length to width ratio, with different thickness and with/without 20% side-grooves are predicted. Finally, suitability of the numerically estimated J-R curves was verified by comparison with the corresponding experimental J-R curves.

Abstract: In order to analyze the elastic-plastic fracture behavior of a structure, the fracture resistance curve of the material should be known. However, it is difficult to evaluate the fracture characteristics with an experiment on the piping system. Instead, the fracture toughness obtained from standard specimen tests is used to analyze the structure and assess the fracture characteristics of the total structure. It is known that toughness data from the standard specimen test are conservative to predict fracture behavior of the real piping. Thus the fracture resistance curve by the fracture test of the real scaled pipe specimen would be applied to the integrity evaluation for the piping system. However, it is not only difficult to perform but also very expensive to perform full-scale pipe tests. The objective of this thesis is to propose a method to estimate the fracture resistance curve of a pipe from the result of standard specimen fracture test. To estimate the fracture resistance curve for a pipe specimen, load – load-line displacement records of a standard specimen were transformed to those of the pipe specimen. The load ratio method was proposed in order to calculate the crack length from load – crack mouth opening displacement records for the pipe specimen. To prove the validity of this estimation results, fracture tests for pipe specimens were performed. Consequently the applicability of the proposed method was investigated by comparing estimated results with tested results.

Abstract: In this study, we performed the static test of nuclear piping materials by the unloading compliance method and the normalization data reduction technique and obtained two fracture resistance curves (J-R curves). The two curves were similar, which proves that the normalization data reduction technique can be adopted in the static test. Then we performed the dynamic fracture toughness test for welding part of nuclear piping. The J-R curves were obtained from the dynamic test by the normalization data reduction technique and were compared to those of the static test results.

Abstract: The influences of stress triaxiality on ductile fracture have been emphasized to explain the geometry independent fracture resistance characteristics of specimens and structures during past two decades. For the estimation of this material behavior, two-parameter global approach and local approach can be used as case by case manner. Recently, the interests for the local approach and micro-mechanical damage model are increased again due to progress of computational environments. In this paper, the applicability of the local approach has been assessed through a series of finite element analyses incorporating both modified GTN model and Rousselier model. The ductile crack growth behaviors are examined to guarantee the transferability on different sizes and geometries of C(T) specimens and SE(T) specimens. The material fitting constants are determined from calibration of tensile tests and numerical analyses results, and used to simulate the fracture behaviors of typical specimens. Then, a comparison is drawn between the numerically estimated crack resistance curves and experimentally determined ones. The comparison results show a good agreement and the two damage models are regarded as promising solutions for ductile crack growth simulation.