Download Free Effect Of Stress On Radiation Damage In Neutron Irradiated Zirconium Alloys Book in PDF and EPUB Free Download. You can read online Effect Of Stress On Radiation Damage In Neutron Irradiated Zirconium Alloys and write the review.

Structures developed in zirconium alloys during irradiation creep have been characterized by transmission electron microscopy (TEM). Alloys investigated were annealed Zircaloy-2, cold-worked Zircaloy-2 and cold-worked Zr-2.5Nb pressure tube material. Thin films were taken from material deformed in the NRU, NRX and Pickering-3 reactors at temperatures of 530 to 600 K under stresses of 117 to 552 MPa giving strains in the range 0.14 to 8.8 percent. Stress-induced orientation of dislocation loops makes a negligible contribution to irradiation creep at all stresses. At the lower stresses (and hence strains), the size and distribution of the damage is unaffected by stress, being the same in the head and gage sections of creep specimens. At higher stresses (strains), there is much clearing of the damage by plastic deformation. The deformation however is very uneven, producing structures in different grains of the same specimen that can show no deformation, swaths cleared of irradiation damage, or dislocation tangles or cell formation. The relevance of these TEM observations to irradiation creep mechanisms is discussed.
Maintaining the integrity of nuclear power plants is critical in the prevention or control of severe accidents. This monograph deals with both basic groups of structural materials used in the design of light-water nuclear reactors, making the primary safety barriers of NPPs. Emphasis is placed on materials used in VVER-type nuclear reactors: Cr-Mo-V and Cr-Ni-Mo-V steel for RPV and Zr-Nb alloys for fuel element cladding. The book is divided into 7 main chapters, with the exception of the opening one and the chapter providing a phenomenological background for the subject of radiation damage. Chapters 3-6 are devoted to RPV steels and chapters 7-9 to zirconium alloys, analysing their radiation damage structure, changes of mechanical properties due to neutron irradiation as well as factors influencing the degree of their performance degradation. The recovery of damaged materials is also discussed. Considerable attention is paid to a comparison of VVER-type and western-type light-water materials. This monograph will be of great value to postgraduate students in nuclear engineering and materials science, and for designers and research workers in nuclear energy.
Zirconium alloys are commonly used in pressurized water reactor as fuel rod cladding tubes. After irradiation and cooling in pool, the spent nuclear fuel assemblies are either transported for wet storage to a devoted site or loaded in suitable casks for dry storage on a nuclear power plant site. During dry transportation or at the beginning of dry storage, at temperatures around 400°C, the cladding experiences a creep deformation under the hoop stress induced by the internal pressure of the fuel rod. During creep, a recovery of the radiation damage can occur that can affect the subsequent mechanical properties. The mechanical behavior of the cladding has been investigated in laboratory on two neutron irradiated cladding materials: fully recrystallized Zr-1 % Nb and stress-relieved Zircaloy-4. Creep tests under internal pressure were conducted at 400 and 420°C. After depressurization and cooling, ring tensile tests were carried out at room temperature. In addition, transmission electron microscopy observations have been performed after testing. The post-creep mechanical response exhibited a decrease of the strength compared to the as-irradiated material. This decrease is associated with a significant recovery of the ductility, which becomes close to the ductility of the unirradiated material. The transmission electron microscopy examinations, conducted on recrystallized Zr-1 % Nb ring samples, revealed that the radiation defects have been annealed. It was also observed that as for the unirradiated material, the deformation occurred homogeneously throughout the grains. No dislocation channeling was observed contrary to the as-irradiated material. These observations explain the recovery of the strength and of the ductility after post-irradiation creep that may also occur during dry transportation or at the beginning of dry storage.
The effect of fast-neutron (>1 Mev) irradiation on the mechanical properties of structural metals and alloys was studied. Although the yield strengths and ultimate tensile strengths are increased su stantially for most materials, the ductility suffers severe decreases. This report presents these changes in properties of several structural metals for a number of neutron exposures within the 1.0 x 10 to the 18th power to 5.0 x 10 to the 21st power n/sq cm range. Data summarizing these effects on several classes of materials such as carbon steels, low-alloy steels, stainless steels, Zr-base alloys, ni-base alloys, Al-base alloys, and Ta are given. Additional data which show the influence f irradiation temperatures and of post-irradiation annealing on the radiation-induced property changes are also given and discussed. Increases as great as 175% in yield strength, 100% in ultimate strength, and decreases of 80% in total elongation are reported for fast-neutron exposures as great as 5 10 to the 21st power n/sq cm. (Author).
During neutron irradiation, both interstitial and vacancy loops are formed in high concentration in zirconium alloys. Due to this high density of loops, the material is considerably hardened, but the recovery of the radiation damage during a heat treatment leads to a progressive softening of the irradiated material. The recovery of the radiation induced hardening has been investigated using microhardness tests. Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) observations performed on irradiated foils have also shown that the loop density falls while the loop size increases during the thermal annealing. Furthermore, the TEM analysis has revealed that only vacancy loops are present in the material after long term annealing, the interstitial loops having entirely disappeared. A numerical cluster dynamic modeling has also been used in order to reproduce the material recovery for various annealing conditions. The microstructural evolution during mechanical testing with various loading conditions has also been studied. It has been shown that during a creep test with low applied stress (130 MPa) and high temperature (450°C), the microstructure evolution can essentially be explained by the thermal recovery of the loops leading to glide of dislocations as found for an non-irradiated material. At intermediate temperature (400°C), it is shown that for low stress level (130 MPa) the microstructure evolution can also be explained by the thermal recovery of loops, whereas for higher stress (250 MPa), sweeping of loops by gliding dislocations can also occur. In addition, for an applied stress of 130 MPa and a temperature of 400°C, dislocation density is higher in the irradiated material than in the non-irradiated material deformed in the same conditions. It is also shown that secondary slip systems are more activated in the irradiated material than in the non-irradiated material. From this detailed analysis, the mechanical behavior during creep is interpreted in terms of microscopic deformation mechanisms.