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Colin Judge: Testing structural materials in Idaho’s newest hot cell facility
Idaho National Laboratory’s newest facility—the Sample Preparation Laboratory (SPL)—sits across the road from the Hot Fuel Examination Facility (HFEF), which started operating in 1975. SPL will host the first new hot cells at INL’s Materials and Fuels Complex (MFC) in 50 years, giving INL researchers and partners new flexibility to test the structural properties of irradiated materials fresh from the Advanced Test Reactor (ATR) or from a partner’s facility.
Materials meant to withstand extreme conditions in fission or fusion power plants must be tested under similar conditions and pushed past their breaking points so performance and limitations can be understood and improved. Once irradiated, materials samples can be cut down to size in SPL and packaged for testing in other facilities at INL or other national laboratories, commercial labs, or universities. But they can also be subjected to extreme thermal or corrosive conditions and mechanical testing right in SPL, explains Colin Judge, who, as INL’s division director for nuclear materials performance, oversees SPL and other facilities at the MFC.
SPL won’t go “hot” until January 2026, but Judge spoke with NN staff writer Susan Gallier about its capabilities as his team was moving instruments into the new facility.
Jun Feng, Frank A. McClintock, Rui Vieira, Regis M. Pelloux, Richard J. Thome
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 19 | Number 3 | May 1991 | Pages 1177-1182
Ignition Device | doi.org/10.13182/FST91-A29502
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The conductor for the central solenoid of the Compact Ignition Tokamak (CIT) operates with a multiaxial stress condition in which the ratios of the principal stresses are not proportional during the operating cycle. The stresses arise from both the self-electromagnetic loads and interactions with the toroidal field coils. The latter primarily provide a radial compressive load which varies during a pulse. This paper presents the status of conductor evaluation and design criteria development. Analysis of the stress conditions during a pulse indicates that the bulk of the fatigue life damage is done during one portion of the total current scenario. This is based on the postulate that the multiaxial stress and lifetime condition can be characterized approximately by examining the worst combination of shear stress range with tensile stress normal to the shear plane at reversal. The latter is found by tracing the history of the principal shear stresses and their associated normal stresses for all three principal shear planes at the worst point in the coil. The analysis thus provides the operating conditions to be simulated in uniaxial and multiaxial tests from which lifetime correlations can be found for the conductor. Evaluation of existing multiaxial fatigue life data on Alloy 718 has led to a postulate for a criterion to be applied to the conductor. Uniaxial and biaxial data are being taken on candidate conductors to verify the postulated lifetime correlations. The primary candidates for the conductor are C15715 (an alumina-dispersion-strengthened copper) and a CuCrZr alloy. The conductor will be required in plate form, nominally 1-inch thick and 70-inches square. Tests have thus far only been conducted on specimens from subscale plates. The status of the test program and of the full-scale plate development program are given.