• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.30 no.8 s.251
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• pp.818-824
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• 2006

The hydrodynamic performance analysis of an axial-flow main coolant pump for the modular nuclear reactor has been carried out using a commercial computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software. The prediction capability of the CFD software adopted in the present study was validated in comparison with the experimental data. Predicted performance curves agree satisfactorily well with the experimental results for the main coolant pump over the normal operating range. π Ie prediction method presented herein can be used effectively as a tool for the hydrodynamic design optimization and assist the understanding of the operational characteristics of general purpose axial-flow pumps.

• The KSFM Journal of Fluid Machinery
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• v.3 no.2 s.7
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• pp.24-30
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• 2000

The structural analysis of a reactor coolant pump(RCP) of a nuclear power plant is very important for the safety assessment of the plant. Accurate boundary conditions for the heat transfer coefficient are required for reliable thermal stress analysis of the pump casing, especially in transient operations of the pump since the coolant properties are largely dependent on operational conditions. In the present study, a 3D mixed flow type coolant pump was modeled from the RCP drawings and analyzed in the steady state and number of transient flow conditions by using a commercial code STAR-CD. From the result of the computation, it is seen that the average heat transfer coefficients for the cases considered are found to be the suggested values of the manufacturer, Westinghouse Energy System. The unevenness in local heat transfer coefficients, however, is found to be considerable so that the use of average heat transfer coefficients in all boundaries might not give reliable thermal stress predictions.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.53 no.7
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• pp.2207-2220
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• 2021

Lead alloy is used as coolant in Lead-based cooled Fast Reactor (LFR). The natural characteristics of lead alloy are combined with the simple structural design of LFR. This constitutes the inherent safety characteristics of LFR. The main work of this paper is to take the main coolant pump (MCP) in the lead-cooled fast reactor (LFR) as the research object, and to study the flow pattern distribution of the internal flow field under the reverse rotation pump condition, the reverse rotation positive-flow braking condition and the reverse rotation negative-flow braking condition. In this paper, the double-outlet volute type and the space guide vane are selected as the potential designs of the CLEAR-I MCP. In this paper, the CFD method is used to study the potential reverse accident of the MCP. It is found that the highest flow velocity in the impeller appears at the impeller outlet, and the Q-H curves of the two design programs basically coincide. The space guide vane type MCP has better hydraulic performance under the reverse rotation positive-flow condition, the Q-H curves of the two designs gradually separate with increasing flow rate, and the maximum flow velocity inside the space guide vane type MCP is obviously lower than that of the double-outlet volute type. For the reverse rotation test of MCP, only the condition of the forward rotating pump of the main coolant pump is tested and verified. For the simulation of the MCP in LBE medium, it proved that the turbulence model and basic settings selected in the simulation are reliable.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.48-59
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• 2017

In this study, an analysis of the thermo-fluid dynamic and missile-motion performance was carried out through a numerical simulation inside the missile canister. Calculation was made in an analytical volume using dynamic grid and evaporated water was used as a coolant. To analyze the interaction among the hot gas, coolant, and mixture flow, Realizable $k-{\varepsilon}$ turbulence and VOF (Volume Of Fluid) model were chosen and a parametric study was performed with the change of coolant flow rate. As a result of the analysis, pressure of the canister showed a large difference depending on the presence or absence of the coolant, and also showed a dependancy on the amount of coolant. Velocity and acceleration were dependent on the canister pressure.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.53 no.8
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• pp.2547-2555
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• 2021

The frequency of reactor coolant leakage is expected to increase over the lifetime of a nuclear power plant owing to degradation mechanisms, such as flow-acceleration corrosion and stress corrosion cracking. When loss of coolant accidents (LOCAs) occur, several parameters change rapidly depending on the size and location of the cracks. In this study, leak flow during LOCAs is predicted using a deep fuzzy neural network (DFNN) model. The DFNN model is based on fuzzy neural network (FNN) modules and has a structure where the FNN modules are sequentially connected. Because the DFNN model is based on the FNN modules, the performance factors are the number of FNN modules and the parameters of the FNN module. These parameters are determined by a least-squares method combined with a genetic algorithm; the number of FNN modules is determined automatically by cross checking a fitness function using the verification dataset output to prevent an overfitting problem. To acquire the data of LOCAs, an optimized power reactor-1000 was simulated using a modular accident analysis program code. The predicted results of the DFNN model are found to be superior to those predicted in previous works. The leak flow prediction results obtained in this study will be useful to check the core integrity in nuclear power plant during LOCAs. This information is also expected to reduce the workload of the operators.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.179-189
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• 1994

A performance of reactor coolant pump in two-phase flow is examined using the pump geometric conditions and the performance of the pump in single-phase flow. Wall friction loss of the reactor coolant pump in single-phase flow is prdicted using the Truckenbrodt boundary layer theory, and the head loss in two-phase flow is predicted with calculated well friction loss and separation loss coefficients. The analysis results are compared with the Combustion Engineering pump test data. The effect of two-phase multiplier on the peak clad temperature in Loss-of-Coolant Accident is also examined using the RELAP5 and the results indicate the importance of its accuracy.

• The KSFM Journal of Fluid Machinery
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.61-67
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• 2016

Turbine blade cooling is one of the major technologies to enhance the performance of gas turbine and combined cycle power plants. In this study, two cases of coolant pre-cooling schemes were applied in combined cycle power plant: decrease of coolant mass flow needed to cool turbine blade and increase of turbine inlet temperature (TIT). Both schemes are benefited by the decrease of coolant temperature through coolant pre-cooling. Under the same degree of pre-cooling, increasing TIT exhibits larger plant power boost and higher plant efficiency than reducing coolant flow. As a result, the former produces the same gas turbine power with a much smaller degree of pre-cooling than the latter. Another advantage of increasing TIT is a higher plant efficiency. Even with an assumption of partial achievement of the theoretically predicted TIT, the method of increasing TIT can provide considerably larger power output.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Propulsion Engineers Conference
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• 2003.05a
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• pp.127-130
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• 2003

This paper presents the numerical thermal analysis for regeneratively cooled rocket thrust chambers. An integrated numerical model incorporates computational fluid dynamics for the hot-gas thermal environment, and thermal analysis for the liner and coolant channels. The flow and temperature fields in rocket thrust chambers is assumed to be axisymmetric steady state which is presumed to the combustion liner. The heat flux computed from nozzle flow is used to predict the temperature distribution of the combustion liner. As a result, we present the wall temperature of combustion liner and the temperature change of coolant.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.53 no.3
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• pp.1020-1028
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• 2021

The nuclear reactor coolant pump transferring heat energy inherently brings with it the unsteady flow and inevitably threatens to the safe operation of the pump unit, especially with the pressure pulsation induced by the rotor-stator interaction. In this paper, the characteristics of pressure pulsation of the diffuser in a nuclear reactor coolant pump were investigated by the numerical simulation with experimental validation. Pressure pulsation signals measured synchronously from sensors mounted on the radial diffuser of a model pump were analyzed via Welch's method. Frequency components induced by the rotor-stator interaction can be revealed by the diameter mode analysis method. The pressure pulsation of the diffuser is dominated by the blade passing frequency and its harmonics, which are free from the effect of flow rate and rotational speed while the corresponding amplitudes are easily affected by different operational conditions and measuring positions. The non-uniformity is much more affected by the rotational speed than the flow rate. This research is helpful for further work to reduce the pressure pulsation for the reactor coolant pump.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2001.11b
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• pp.735-740
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• 2001

In the nuclear power plant, emergency core coolant system(ECCS) is furnished at reactor coolant system(RCS) in order to cool down high temperature water in case of emergency. However, in this coolant system, it occurs thermal stratification phenomena in case that there is the mixing of cooling water and high temperature water due to valve leakage in ECCS. This thermal stratification phenomena raises excessive thermal stresses at pipe wall. Therefore, this phenomena causes the accident that reactor coolant flows in reactor containment in the nuclear power plant due to the deformation of pipe and thermal fatigue crack(TFC) at the pipe wall around the place that it exists. Hence, in order to fundamental identification of this phenomena, it requires the experimental research of modeling test in the pipe flow that occurs thermal stratification phenomena. So, this paper models RCS and ECCS pipe arrangement and analyzes the mechanism of thermal stratification phenomena by measuring of temperature in variance with leakage flow rate in ECCS modeled pipe and Reynold number in RCS modeled pipe. Besides, results of this experiment is compared with computational analysis which is done in advance.