Thermo-mechanical behavior of Pressure Tube of Indian PHWR at 20 bar

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Subtitle: Thermo-mechanical behavior of Pressure Tube of Indian PHWR at 20 bar

Publisher: World Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology (WASET)

Publication year: 2010

Volume number: 61

Start page: 205

End page: 213

Number of pages: 9

ISSN: 2010-376X

eISSN: 2010-3778

Languages: English-United States (EN-US)

Abstract

In a nuclear reactor Loss of Coolant accident (LOCA) considers wide range of postulated damage or rupture of pipe in the heat transport piping system. In the case of LOCA with/without failure of emergency core cooling system in a Pressurised Heavy water Reactor, the Pressure Tube (PT) temperature could rise significantly due to fuel heat up and gross mismatch of the heat generation and heat removal in the affected channel. The extent and nature of deformation is important from reactor safety point of view. Experimental set-ups have been designed and fabricated to simulate ballooning (radial deformation) of PT for 220 MWe IPHWRs. Experiments have been conducted by covering the CT by ceramic fibers and then by submerging CT in water of voided PTs. In both the experiments, it is observed that ballooning initiates at a temperature around 665C and complete contact between PT and Caldaria Tube (CT) occurs at around 700C approximately. The strain rate is found to be 0.116% per second. The structural integrity of PT is retained (no breach) for all the experiments. The PT heatup is found to be arrested after the contact between PT and CT, thus establishing moderator acting as an efficient heat sink for IPHWRs.

Keywords

—Pressure Tube, Calandria Tube, Thermo-mechanical deformation, Boiling heat transfer, Reactor safety

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