Cockenzie power station

The advantages of hydraulic proof pressure testing are best demonstrated by reference to the failure of a large steam separator drum at Cockenzie Power Station in East Lothian, Scotland, on May 6, 1966. (Separator drums are large, horizontal, cylindrical, thick-walled steel pressure vessels used to separate steam and water in coal-fired or nuclear power stations.)... 

Cockenzie was a coal-fired power station in construction at the lime. (Cockenzie power station went into service in 1967. It operated until March 2013.) To satisfy the designers and the boiler insurance company, each of the boiler drums was put through a number of hydraulic pressure cycles. Each drum weighed 164 tonnes, had an inside diameter of 5 feet 6 inches (1.67 m) and an overall length of 74 feet 9 inches (22.78 m). The drum was an all-welded construction, fabricated from forged steel plates 5.5625 inches thick (14.13 cm). The material was amild manganese steel alloy called Ducol. 

Report on the Brittle Fracture of a High-pressure Boiler Drum at Cockenzie Power Station, Sonth of Scotland Electricity Board, January 1967. 

The Cockenzie incident was a near-thing any such failure had to be ruled out with extremely high confidence in the manufacture of pressure vessels for nuclear power stations. Confidence had to be so high that an in-service failure of a nuclear reactor pressure vessel would, in effect, be an incredible event. This meant that there had to be clear answers to some basic questions, including the following ... 

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See also in sourсe #XX -- [ ]

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