• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2002.05a
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• pp.1216-1221
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• 2002

The fuel rods in the pressurized water reactor are continuously supported by a spring system called a spacer grid which is one of the main structural components for the fuel rod cluster (fuel assembly). The fuel rods are vibrating within the reactor due to coolant flow. Since the vibration, what is called flow-induced vibration(FIV), can wear away the surface of the fuel rod, it is important to understand the vibration characteristics of it. In this paper, the vibration analyses and the tests for the dummy rods supported by New Doublet(ND) spacer grids are described. A new FE model which reflects the contact area between the rod and ND spacer grid spring is developed to replace the previous one by which a good agreement could not be obtained with the vibration test. The natural frequency and mode shape calculated by both the previous FE model and the new one are compared with those of experiment fur a single-spanned rod supported by two ND spacer grids. The results by the new model show good agreement to experiment as compared with the ones by previous model. In addition, the new FE model is applied to the vibration analysis fur the dummy rod of 2.19 m tall continuously supported by five ND spacer grids. It is also obtained that the analysis results by the new FE model well agree to experiment ones as the single-spanned rod.

• Proceedings of the KWS Conference
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• 2006.05a
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• pp.39-41
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• 2006

The weld quality of spacer grids in Pressurized Water Reactors(PWR) fuel is extremely important for the fuel assembly performance in the nuclear renter. The spacer grid welds are currently evaluated mainly by the metallographic examination although it reveals only cross-points which are welded by the laser beam. This experiment is also to compare the weldability of Zircaloy-4 spacer grids using by the GTA and laser beam. The effect of node geometries of spacer grids for GTAW and LBW has been studied and optimum conditions of spacer grid welding have been found. Microstructures and micro-hardness of GTA and laser beam welded zones have been also compared.

• Nuclear Engineering and Technology
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.326-336
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• 1990

Recent experiments show the existence of spacer grid improves the heat removal from the fuel rods during the reflood phase of LOCA. The local heat transfer within and downstream of the grid is increased due to the earlier quenching than rod surface, shattering of the entrained droplets into smaller ones which can be more easily evaporated and enhanced turbulent effect. Therefore, the consideration of these phenomena is necessary for the DFFB regime which prevails above the water level during the reflood. In this paper, droplet breakup model at spacer grid has been developed and incorporated into RELAP5/MOD2. Verification calculations are carried out for FEBA tests which examine the thermalhydraulic performance of grid spacer during reflood.

• Proceedings of the KWS Conference
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• 2006.10a
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• pp.125-127
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• 2006

A spacer grid assembly, which is an interconnected array of slotted grid straps and is welded at the intersections to form an egg crate structure, is one of the main structural components of the nuclear fuel assembly for pressurized water reactors(PWRs). The spacer grid assembly is structurally required to have enough buckling strength under various kinds of lateral loads acting on the nuclear fuel assembly so as to keep the nuclear fuel assembly straight. To meet this requirement, it is necessary to weld the welding parts carefully and precisely. In this study, weld qualities such as, weld bead size, penetration, spatter, etc. manufactured by various welders were compared and analyzed. Comparison results show that the weld qualities could be improved by selecting the optimal welding condition and also improving the welding technique.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2001.11a
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• pp.355-360
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• 2001

Design requirements for the nuclear fuel assembly grid of the pressurized light water reactor(PLWR) are scrutinized from the mechanical/structural point of view. As a result of the scrunity, mechanical/structural test facilities on the spacer grid of the PLWR Fuel are set up in KAERI to find out their mechanical/structural performance.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2005.11a
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• pp.149.2-149.2
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• 2005

• Proceedings of the Korean Radioactive Waste Society Conference
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• 2019.05a
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• pp.88-89
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• 2019

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2007.05b
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• pp.2396-2401
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• 2007

Freon CHF experiments are carried out to investigate the CHF enhancements by mixing vane shapes of spacer grids in nuclear fuel assembly. The experiments were performed for a wide range mass flux, 50$\sim}$3000 kg/$m^2s$. Three kinds of spacer grids in 5${\times}$5 rod bundles are tested: no mixing vane grids, hybrid mixing vane grids, and split mixing vane grids. The CHF performances are compared along with the data belong to the PWR operating conditions based on a water equivalence through a fluid-to-fluid modeling method. The average of the data in this range is 16.4% for 37 data of hybrid vane grid and 12.5% for 24 data of split vane. In the lower mass flux, however, the split vane grid shows slightly higher performance than the hybrid vane grid.

• Proceedings of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute Conference
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• 2006.04a
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• pp.828-835
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• 2006

Spacer grid springs support the fuel rods in a nuclear fuel system. The spacer grid is a part of a fuel assembly. Since a spring has repeated contacts with the fuel rod, fretting wear occurs on the surface of the spring. Design is usually performed to reduce the wear. The conceptual design process for the spring is defined by using the Independence of axiomatic design and the design is carried out based on the direction that the design matrix indicates. For detailed design an optimization problem is formulated. In optimization, homologous design is employed to reduce fretting wear. The deformation of a structure is called homologous if a given geometrical relationship holds for a given number of structural points before, during, and after the deformation. In this case, the deformed shape of the spring should be the same as that of the fuel rod. 1bis condition is transformed to a function and considered as a constraint in the optimization process. The objective function is minimizing the maximum stress to allow a local plastic deformation. Optimization results show that the contact occurs in a wide range. Also, the results are verified by nonlinear finite element analysis.

• Journal of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute of Korea
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• v.18 no.4 s.70
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• pp.405-416
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• 2005

This study contains the static buckling tests and static buckling analyses for small size grids and full size grids. The buckling tests and finite element analyses were performed to evaluate the buckling characteristics of the spacer grids in a pressurized water reactor fuel assembly and to evaluate the possibility of the prediction lot the buckling strength of spacer grids. The buckling tests were performed for small size grids and full size grids, and the correlations between buckling strength and the number of straps and the correlations between buckling strength and the number of rows are derived based on the test results. The static buckling analyses were performed to identify the effect of the number of rows and the number of columns on the buckling strength of spacer grid by a finite element method using ANSYS program and the results were compared with the buckling test results.