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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.
R. W. Callis, J. F. Tooker, J. Lohr, D. Ponce, R. C. O'Neill
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 30 | Number 3 | December 1996 | Pages 825-829
Plasma Fuelingand Heating, Control, and Currentdrive | doi.org/10.13182/FST96-A11963039
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The DIII–D program is presently commissioning the first MW gyrotron of a planned 3 MW, 110 GHz electron cyclotron heating (ECH) system for off-axis electron heating and current drive. Advanced tokamak (AT) research in DIII–D and other tokamaks requires the ability to control the current density profile. ECH offers the ability to localize the heating and driven current in a controllable manner and is not dependent upon, the local plasma conditions, so it appears to be an ideal tool for AT research. The planned rf sources for the DIII-D system are I MW state-of-the-art internal mode-converter gyrotrons, with one gyrotron being manufactured by GYCOM, a Russian company, and two gyrotrons being manufactured by CPI (formerly Varian). The GYCOM gyrotron has been tested at the factory to 960 kW, 2 seconds and has been shipped to GA where it is now undergoing initial checkout and testing. The first CPI gyrotron has been assembled and factory tested to 530 kW, 2 seconds and 350 kW, 10 seconds. Both the Gycom and CPI gyrotrons are limited in pulse length at full power by thermal limits on the output window. The second CPI gyrotron is expected to be ready for testing in April 1996.
This paper will report on the initial experiences of using the GYCOM I MW, 110 GHz internal mode-converter gyrotron, at General Atomics, and the observed effects the ECRH power has on the DIII-D plasma.
