Follow-up fuel plate stability experiments and analyses for the Advanced Neutron Source

Abstract

The reactor for the plannedAdvancedNeutron Sourceuses closely spaced plates cooled by heavy water flowing through narrow channels.Two sets of tests were performedon the upperand lower fuel plates for the structuralresponseof the fuel plates to the requiredhigh coolant flow velocities. This reportcontains the data from the second round of tests. Results and conclusions from all of the tests are also included in this report. The tests were done using light wateron full-scale epoxy models, and through model theory, the results were related to the prototypeplates, which are aluminum-cladaluminum/uraniumsilicide involuteshapedplates.

Research and Development of Multiphysics Models in Support of the Conversion of the High Flux Isotope Reactor to Low Enriched Uranium Fuel

“…Experimental testing of the Miller Critical Velocity has been performed by many researchers [56][57][58][59]. These experimenters found that the Miller Critical Velocity was conservative, with flows tested to with no total plate collapse.…”

“…The reactor design was to meet or exceed the neutron flux characteristics of the HFIR making it the highest neutron flux reactor in the world. Due to the extremely high flow rates, extensive analysis was done to ensure the stability and integrity of the fuel plate structure in the reactor [101,63,102,103,59].…”

“…Flow tests measuring thermal characteristics of the fuel plates were performed that were designed to measure the heat transfer capabilities of the design [104][105][106][107]. Another set of experiments were performed to test the deflection caused by the pressure differentials from the coolant flow [101,63,102,59,103,108,109,110].…”

Structural thermal tests on Advanced Neutron Source reactor fuel plates

“…(3)(4)(5) are expanded using Eqs. (2), three equations are realized that can be solved for the three boundary loads at @ = 0. The three boundary loads at the outside boundary can be found from equilibrium as…”