Integrity of repair welds in high temperature plant operating under creep and creep-fatigue conditions - a new European Commission supported initiative

Repair welds and welds fabricated during component replacement procedures are commonly found in high temperature plants. Our validated understanding about remnant life or crack initiation and growth behaviour of such welds which will contain different heat affected zones in virgin and service exposed materials is more limited. Recently, a research project was started to obtain information about the integrity of repair welds operating under high temperature creep and creep-fatigue conditions. This paper gives an overview on the work packages concerned in this project, highlighting the experimental, numerical and full size component validation work as well as the preparation of guidelines for remnant life assessment. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.