Development of structural response diagram approach to evaluation of thermal stress caused by thermal striping

Kasahara, Naoto; Yacumpai, A.*; Takasho, Hideki*

At incomplete mixing area of high temperature and low temperature fluids near the surface of structures, temperature fluctuation of fluid gives thermal fatigue damage to wall structures. This thermohydraulic and thermomechanical coupled phenomenon is called thermal striping, which has so complex mechanism and sometimes causes crack initiation on the structural surfaces that rational evaluation methods are required for screening rules in design codes. In this study, frequency response characteristics of structures and its mechanism were investigated by both numerical and theoretical methods. Based on above investigation, a structural response diagram was derived, which can predict stress amplitude of structures from temperature amplitude and frequency of fluids. Furthermore, this diagram was generalized to be the Non-dimensional structural response diagram by introducing non-dimensional parameters such as Biot number, non-dimensional frequency, and non-dimensional stress. The use of the Non-dimensional structural response diagram appears to evaluate thermal stress caused by thermal striping, rapidly without structural analysis, and rationally with considering attenuation by non-stationary heat transfer and thermal unloading. This diagram can also give such useful information as sensitive frequency range to adjust coupled thermohydraulic and thermomechanical analysis models taking account of four kinds of attenuation factors: turbulent mixing, molecular diffusion, non-stationaly heat transfer, and thermal unloading.