Monitoring of hot pipes at the power plant Neurath using guided waves

Bianca Weihnacht; Thomas Klesse; Robert Neubeck; Lars Schubert

doi:10.1117/12.2008479

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19 April 2013 Monitoring of hot pipes at the power plant Neurath using guided waves

Bianca Weihnacht, Thomas Klesse, Robert Neubeck, Lars Schubert

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Proceedings Volume 8692, Sensors and Smart Structures Technologies for Civil, Mechanical, and Aerospace Systems 2013; 86921T (2013) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2008479
Event: SPIE Smart Structures and Materials + Nondestructive Evaluation and Health Monitoring, 2013, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

In order to reduce the CO2-emissions and to increase the energy efficiency, the operating temperatures of power plants will be increased up to 720°C. This demands for novel high-performance steels in the piping systems. Higher temperatures lead to a higher risk of damage and have a direct impact on the structure stability and the deposition structure. Adequately trusted results for the prediction of the residual service life of those high strength steels are not available so far. To overcome these problems the implementation of an online monitoring system in addition to periodic testing is needed. RWE operates the lignite power plant Neurath. All test and research activities have to be checked regarding their safety and have to be coordinated with the business operation of the plant. An extra bypass was established for this research and made the investigations independent from the power plant operating. In order to protect the actuators and sensors from the heat radiated from the pipe, waveguides were welded to the bypass. The data was evaluated regarding their dependencies on the environmental influences like temperature and correction algorithms were developed. Furthermore, damages were introduced into the pipe with diameters of 8 mm to 10 mm and successfully detected by the acoustic method.

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Bianca Weihnacht, Thomas Klesse, Robert Neubeck, and Lars Schubert "Monitoring of hot pipes at the power plant Neurath using guided waves", Proc. SPIE 8692, Sensors and Smart Structures Technologies for Civil, Mechanical, and Aerospace Systems 2013, 86921T (19 April 2013); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2008479

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