Study of high temperature oxidation of zirconium fuel element claddings with chromiferous coatings

Abstract

This paper presents the results of the study of resistance to corrosion of zirconium fuel element cladding fragments protected with nichrome and chrome coatings. Experiments were conducted on coatings deposition on fuel element claddings by cathodic arc deposition and electrochemical deposition methods. Argon ion beam pretreatment of the cladding surface is shown to have a beneficial effect on coating adhesion. Studies of resilience of the coatings were conducted in the atmosphere of super-heated steam at 900 °C and with an exposure of up to 10000 seconds. It has been shown that the coatings deposited impede formation of ZrO2 oxide layer at the outer surface and reduce the depth of oxygen penetration into the metallic sublayer as compared with the samples in their original condition.

Protective Cr Coatings with ZrO2/Cr Multilayers for Zirconium Fuel Claddings

“…The second type of steam oxidation tests was performed at the temperature of 1250, 1330 and 1400 • C using a GASPAR facility [24] in JSC LUCH (JSC LUCH, Podolsk, Russia). The mass flow of water steam and heating rates were equal to 40 mg/s and 33 • C/s, respectively.…”