Hanford Laboratories Monthly Activities Report July, 1963

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MONTHLY ACTIVITIES REPORT THiS DOCUMENT HAS BEEN SCANNED !AND I S STORED ONTHE OPTICAL DISK DRIVE HANFORD ATOMIC PRODUCTS OPERATION

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This report was prepared as an account of Government sponsored work. Neither the United States, nor the Commission, nor any person acting on behalf of the Commission: Makes any warranty or representation, expressed or implied, with respect to the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of the information contained in this report, or that the use of any information, apparatus, method, or process disclosed in this report may not infringe privately owned rights; or Assumes any liabilities with respect to the use of, or for damages resulting from the use of any information, apparatus, method, or process disclosed in this report. As used in the above, "person acting on behalf of the Commission' includes any employee or contractor of the Commission, or employee af such contractor, to the extent that such employee or contractor of the Commission, or employee of such contractor prepares, disseminates, or provides access to, any information pursuant to his employment or contract with the Commission, or his employment with

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P. R. No. Location Route Date Signature and D a r t MONTHLY ACTIVITIES REPORT HANFORD ATOMIC PRODUCTS OPERATION This report was prepared only for use within Gener-;l Electric Company in the course of work under Atomic Er-ergy Commission Contract AT(45-11-1S50. Any mews or opinions expressed in the report are those of the author only. Excluded from automatic downgrading and d ecl as sIfic at ion

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Atomic Energy Commission, Richland Operations Office F. P. Baranowski, Director, Division of Production Savannah River Operations Office, Aken, South Carolina

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ivF orce Report and Personnel Status Changes. Reactor and Fuels Laboratory . Physics and Instruments Laboratory . Applied Mathematics Operation . Radiation Protection Operation . Finance and Administration Operation . Test Reactor and Auxiliaries Operation

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BUDGET AND COST SUMMARY Information received too late for inclusion in last month's report reveals June operating costs totaling $3, 441, 000. F Y 1963 research and development costs for June and the completed fiscal year compared with the control budget are shown below: t hous ands) cost cost July operating costs totaled $2,418, 000 o r 7% of the $32, 455, 000 preliminary control budget. ment costs f o r July compared with the control budget were: (Dollars in July FY 1964 70 thousands )cost Budget Spent

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RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT 1. Reactor and Fuels Sixteen experimental lithium- aluminum target elements are under irradiation for evaluation of a tritium producing element for N- Reactor. Initial specimens will be discharged in August. Autoclaving N-fuel elements produced oriented hydride platelets in the inner supports which drastically reduced their ductility. supports at 750 o r 700 C before welding them to the fuel elements prevents subsequent orientation of hydrides and allows supports to retain t h e i r ductility after autoclaving. Buggy spring" supports from N-inner fuel components ir ra dated to 1500 Mwd/ton show little hydrogen pickup i n - reactor but do show oriented hydride platelets. However, no indications of inadequate support performances were evident. In the studies of the effect of clad uniformity on strain limits for N-fuel cladding, 25 rod specimens irradiated to 1100 Mwd/ton have been examined. Clad necking occurs more rapidly on unalloyed fuel rods than

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On specimens with the cladding deliberately striated to a depth of 0.004 inch, the localized cladding strain was approximately 20 times the average cladding strain. Continuing tests on damage to process tubes by scratching have shown that a 400 C autoclaving cycle does not accelerate damage by causing recovery of cold-worked scratched surfaces. claving between tests causes increased damage rates ; this effect is apparently associated with t h e autoclave film. Metal Fabrication Development Operation recently completed by MFDO is 113,474. The total number of outer supports produced Ductile Z r strip has been successfully made for cold swaging 1-inch-diameter extruded rod, followed by t u r k ' s heading to finished as compared to t h e 3070loss entailed in the rolled sheet method. This fabrication procedure reduced scrap loss t o about 10% Pure vanadium wire of 0.030-inch diameter has been drawn from be procured from off-site vendors. This w i r e was successfully fabricated after it could not Three prototype thorium-uranium fuel elements have been irradiated t h r e e ETR cycles to an exposure of 2400 Mwd/ton. detectable volume increases had occurred. After two cycles, no Zircaloy- 2 clad thorium-uranium rods containing a solid Zircaloy- 2 core have been successfully fabricated. fuel pieces for heat transfer studies. These rods will be thermocouple indicates that radiolysis of the water at low temperature is considerably less with NH40H than LiOH. Initial, although not conclusive, results indicate that turbidity (crud level) is no w o r s e with NH40H than LiOH.

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(using LiOH) indicates that t h e radiation levels in KER-2 a r e about 1-1/2 times as great during startup. Examination of two zirconium-clad N- Reactor target elements whicl: had been subjected to a rupture t e s t showed that although the corrosion of the aluminum outer layer was very severe, the attack had not penetrated to the Li-A1 core. detection of such a rupture before t h e Li-A1 would be affected. There was enough A1 release to the coolant for the An investigation of t h e possible contaminants which could have caused the stress cracking and intergranular pitting found in t h e N-Reactor steam generators has uncovered no likely cause. be very clean except for vapor phase inhibitor (VPI) and a small amount of residue from chemical cleaning. V P I could have caused stress cracking. The units were found to Analyses of this residue are not yet Accelerated tests are being conducted to determine whether A test was started in T F - 3 to determine whether corrosion in the heated crevice under N-Reactor fuel supports can be prevented by using N-Reactor supports welded to it is being tested under conditions of s u r f a c e An electrically heated zirconium-clad rod with Preparations were made to perform heat transfer experiments with an electrically heated t e s t section representing a half-length column of N- Reactor fuel elements. Comparison of boiling burnout results for data obtained at 1000 psi with flow through a heated tube f r o m Columbia University and Hanford showed has been completed and a run has been made. well with rate constants previously determined for the homogeneous reaction. The results agree reasonably

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In static experiments under irradiation, a G value of 4. 1 f 0. 7 f o r hydrogen formation has been determined. in t h e helium affects %hewater-carbon monoxide reaction. There is indication that energy absorbed N- Reactor graphite irradiations are proceeding satisfactorily in the of an irradiated PR TR test element that had been charged into the reaclr>r without t h e usual autoclaving of t h e completed fuel rods; irradiation of the fuel element is being continued. were charged into the PRTR. An excellent, uniform black oxide layer was observed on the sur ii cr : Two adhtiona! nonautoclaved fuel elerner,:. One hundred thirty-one days of exposure in the TF-7 facility were completed by a special U 0 2 Mark-I fuel element having ring end bracket contacts; only negligible wear was observed. elements for evaluation in the EDEL-1 loop is proceeding. Assembly of other test Newly developed analytical techniques disclosed excessive eoncentrations of fluorine and water in PuO powder that had recently been now being used in PRTR may contain PuO contaminated by these halides. These elements should be considered candidates for mild claddmg failure by a mechanism involving these impurities. archive specimens, fuel currently in process, and development of additionai fuel purification processes are proceechng on a high priority basis. An extensive evaluation of Four hundred pounds of "cold" Salt-Cycle U02was received from the Chemical Development Operation for experiments in the remote fabrication A rejuvenated fuel element, GEH-4-84, completed the second irradiation cycle in t h e MTR. An underwater drill for fuel repairs was fabricated and tested. A small spot welding device of the pliers type was purchased and installed for experiments in underwater resistance joining of a sheath to awire.

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No evidence of nonuniform o r excessive corrosion w a s seen on spots observed randomly on the uniform oxide surface are apparently stalri= Sensing lines from the PRTR calandria to the moderator level servr?- manometer in which the normal transmitting medium is dry helium have corroded through in several areas. Examination of aluminum sensing tube sections indicates failure by pitting, apparently the results of periodic flooding with water contaminated by chlorides for the gas drying system. Hydride analysis of Tube 5679 from PR TR (the fourth tube discharged) indicated that this tube had about 1 0 0 ppm hydrogen. This is an increase of Zirconium concentrations in the PRTR primary coolant were normal (1-1 ppb), except f o r two excursions, 1 for 3 days with concentrations g r e a t e r than 1 0 ppb, the other for 1 day and 3 ppb. in dic at e signific ant fretting . The first excursion may Testing of a colorimetric procedure for continuous zirconium analysis indicates that concentrations as low a s 1 o r 2 ppb can be detected. Preliminary design of the entire shim rod assembly is complete. Fabrication of components for two assemblies is estimated to be 90% complete, exclusive of procurement items. Installation of the prototypical PR TR process tube in the EDEL-I test The pressure tubepit is complete. seal testing station is approximately 60% complete. Preliminary test runs are in progress. Preliminary tests show that it may be feasible to enrich U02 fuel by inserting plutonium alloy wires into the U O The vaporization rate of PuO was considerably greater than that of Pneumatically impacted PuN - W cer mets were quite stable towards

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The melting points of mixed PuC - TaC alloys with greater than 50 wt% Pu C were higher than 2400 C. A plutonium carbide irradiation sample reached a burnup of 37, OOC nitrides are ready f o r irradiation testing. Additional capsules containing plutonium oxides and plutonium Nine capsules containing 1 vol70 tungsten spheres randomly dispersed in sintered U02 pellets were prepared and shipped t o NRTS for irradiation. The test is expected to identify structural features associated with central melting in U02 fuel elements that have been irradiated for various periods. A newly developed computer code (CHEAT) reduced manhours requireci for computing radial temperature profiles of ceramic fuel rods (needed for irradiation test proposals) by a factor of ten or more. Autoradiographs of cross sections of the electrical resistivity test element discussed in previous reports revealed a high concentration of fission products at the inner boundary of the columnar grain region. Additional UOz- W cer met irradiatlons at cladding surface temperatures greater than 2000 Cwere conducted in the Hanford Snout facility. The cooperative study with BMI on U02thermal conductivity has been a burnup of 1.3x lo1’ fission s / c c and showed a further small decrease in low temperature thermal conductivity. The last samples measured received afour - year irradiation to Photographs taken by transmitted light through v e r y thin sections of single crystal UO reveal impurity sites and lattice defects. A new magnetic force welding chamber was received. The new chambey provides approximately 5070 more volume and a much larger viewing window than the present chamber. A nickel-chromium alloy, Incoloy-800, was successfully joined by this process.

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A can containing a layer of nine small containers filled with Be-UO,Y mixtures was pneumatically impacted. mixture will be made. at 800 Cwere found to expand slightly in the GETR's last irradiation period, thus reversing the trend of contraction observed up to this time. irradiated at lower temperatures continue to ccntract, contraction being greater and increasing in the parallel cut samples. Basic compatibility studies of the Transverse cut EGCR graphite samples irradiated Samples of EGCR graphite irradiated under a 800 psi tensile load showed less contraction than unirradiated samples. Porous graphite processed to 1500 C had a thermal conductivity about twice that of material processed at 1000 C. Samples of CSF and TSX graphite held at 800 C and subjected to different thermal-cycling treatment f o r 3 0 days showed essentially no Apparatus for coefficient of thermal expansion measurement was tested at temperatures up to 800 C using CSF and pyrolytic graphite. 21Lampblack-base graphite exposed incrementally to 2 . 1 x 1 0 nvt, E > 0.18 MeV showed a smaller contraction rate during the last irradiation period, thus implying saturation of the contraction effect. irradiation of high density graphite (2.1g / cm) which was heat treated to 3550 C underwent greater parallel contraction and smaller transverse expansion than material heat treated to 3000 C. T h e effect of self-shielding in the irradiation of boronated graphite is being studied by computational methods in the interest of improved experimental capsule design. Additional boiling burnout data w e r e obtamed under fog cooling cOndltic)r:, An electrically(flowing mixtures of steam and water) for 19-rod fuel elements. heated t e s t section was used where the 0.074-inch spacing between rods was maintained by small "warts". Comparison of the results with previous data indicated that the boiling burnout conditions w e r e affected only moderately by

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the method of introducing the fog coolant to the t e s t section and not at all by the use of "warts" instead of w i r e wraps to maintain spacing. Testing of the dome seal has been completed with all requirements In addition, the domein the original t e s t outline either met o r exceeded. deformation previously encountered has been eliminated and the s e a l has proved capable of withstanding a temperature rise of 400 F, in approximately 1 5 seconds, with no leakage detectable f o r 5 cycles. An extension of the economics vlalysis of the fast oxide r e a c t o r - D0pressure tube reactor, fuel r e - use system has been initiated. step is an examination of the fuel costs of theD20reactor as a function of the fuel service fee charged by the fast reactor (blanket) operator. The price of P u is assumed to be $1O/g fissile, the economic interest rate is fuel service fee is varied from $10 t o $40/# fuel. fuel costs for this fuel re-use cycle, a U235 cycle, and normal Pu recycle showed that the fuel r e - u s e cycle is cheaper over the full range implying that the thermal reactor could also pay the total fabrication costs for the blanket of the fast reactor and still generate power at a lower cost than a standard fuel cycle. A comparison of minimum The most recent fuel cycle cost estimate for the new reference core design of the Fast Supercritical Pressure Power Reactor is 1.3 …