PSI - Issue 60

R.P. Pandey et al. / Procedia Structural Integrity 60 (2024) 324–334 R.P. Pandey/ StructuralIntegrity Procedia 00 (2023) 000 – 000

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Fig. 6: Variation of true stress-strain curve of Zr2.5Nb pressure tube with temperature as used in FE analysis

4. Boundary and contact conditions used in the FE simulation

4.1. Details of boundary conditions

In FE analysis of the rolling process between the pressure tube and end-fitting of a PHWR, the method of imposition of boundary condition is very important as a slight variation of boundary condition can produce different results. In this analysis, the boundary conditions, which model the exact rolling process (as used during the rolling) has been imposed and the details are shown in Fig. 7.

Fig. 7: Boundary conditions used in FE simulation for the rolling process

4.2. Details of contact conditions

Penalty friction formulation with coefficient of friction 0.3 has been used for tangential interaction between outer surface of pressure tube and inner surface of end fitting, whereas hard contact is used for normal interaction between