In the pressurized water nuclear reactors (PWRs), the upper and bottom head penetration nozzles, the geometric asymmetry of the welded part increases from the center to the outer part, increasing the possibility of defects. For this reason, it is important to perform early detection and management through analysis of defects occurring in the welded parts of upper and bottom penetration nozzles of reactor vessel. However, it is very difficult to operate boat sampling of the welding area because the spacing of the penetration nozzle of the bottom head of the reactor is very narrow. In addition, it is more difficult to collect welded specimens of bottom penetration nozzles by electrical discharge machining in a boric acid water environment of nuclear reactor. In this work, to overcoming these technical difficulties, we developed a boat sampling robot system, which is composed of the specimen collection electrode head, borate-mediated discharge electrode and control system. Also, we performed basic performance tests and summarize the results.

• Hyunggyu Lee(Orion Enc.) Corresponding author
• Hyeonjun Jeong(Orion Enc.)
• Unjang Lee(Orion Enc.)
• Junghue Byun(Orion Enc.)
• Sewon Chung(Orion Enc.)