• Transactions of the Korean Society of Pressure Vessels and Piping
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.39-48
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• 2024

Research reactors are operated under ambient temperature and atmospheric pressure, which is much less severe conditions compared to those in typical nuclear power plants. Due to the high temperature, heat resistant materials such as austenite stainless steel should be used for the reactors in typical nuclear power plants. Whereas, as the effect of temperature is low for research reactors, materials with high resistance to neutron irradiation, such as zircaloy and beryllium, are used. Therefore, these conditions should be considered when performing integrity assessment for research reactors. In this study, a computational technique through finite element (FE) analysis was developed considering the operating conditions and materials of research reactor when conducting integrity assessment. Neutron irradiation analysis techniques using thermal expansion analysis were proposed to consider neutron irradiation growth and swelling in zirconium alloys and beryllium. A user subroutine program that can calculate the strain rate induced by neutron irradiation creep was developed for use in the commercial analysis program Abaqus. To validate the proposed technique and the user subroutine, FE analysis results were compared with hand-calculation results, and showed good agreement. Consequently, developed technique and user subroutine are suitable for evaluating structural integrity of research reactors.