Remote field eddy current technique applied to the inspection of nonmagnetic steam generator tubes

Abstract

As steam generator (SG) tubes have aged, new and subtle degradations have appeared. Most of them start growing from outside the tubes. Since outer diameter defects might not be detected by conventional eddy current testing due to skin effect phenomena, this paper studies the feasibility of using the remote field eddy current (RFEC) technique, which has shown equal sensitivity to inner diameter (ID) and outer diameter (OD) defects in ferromagnetic pipe inspection. Finite element modeling studies show that the operating frequency needs to be increased up to a few hundred kHz in order for RFEC effects to occur in the nonmagnetic SG tube. The proper distance between exciter and sensor coils is also found to be 1.5 OD, which is half of the distance used in ferromagnetic pipe inspection. The resulting defect signals show equal sensitivity to ID and OD defects. These results demonstrate superior capability of the proposed RFEC probe compared to the differential ECT probe in detecting OD defects.