Assessment of tensile properties across pressure vessel nozzle to primary piping safe-end employing instrumented indentation testing

This study deals with the assessment of tensile properties across the nozzle to primary piping safe-end employing the instrumented indentation testing (IIT). Standard tensile tests were performed in order to validate the results of IIT. Tensile properties were also estimated from conventional hardness test. Both the yield strength and tensile strength measured by IIT were in satisfactory agreement with the results of standard tensile tests and were found superior compared to the values estimated from the conventional hardness measurement. Highest deviation between the results of IIT and tensile tests was found in the regions of weldments. IIT showed as capable of measuring the variation of tensile properties across the pressure vessel nozzle to primary piping safe-end. Moreover, IIT has the advantage over the tensile testing that specimens do not need to be extracted from the studied piece and more detailed distribution of mechanical properties can be acquired.

Automated summary

This study assesses the tensile properties of the nozzle to primary piping safe-end using instrumented indentation testing (IIT). Standard tensile tests and conventional hardness tests were performed to validate the results of IIT and estimate tensile properties, respectively. The results showed that IIT provided satisfactory agreement with the standard tensile tests and superior values compared to the hardness measurement. It was found that the highest deviation between IIT and tensile tests occurred in the weldment regions, and IIT was capable of measuring the variation of tensile properties across the pressure vessel nozzle to primary piping safe-end, providing more detailed distribution of mechanical properties without the need for specimen extraction.