The Theoretical Physics of the Argonaut Reactor

Technical Report · Wed May 01 04:00:00 EDT 1957

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/4371597· OSTI ID:4371597

Kelber, Charles N. ^[1]

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1. Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Lemont, IL (United States)

The Argonaut is a versatile, low-power reactor designed and constructed at Argonne for use as a training facility and for the conduct of experiments in reactor physics. The Argonaut assembly is comprised of a graphite cube with a central annulus formed by two concentric aluminum tanks. The inner tank contains a removable, graphite reflector. The outer tank, or core annulus, contains fuel assemblies, graphite, and water. The fuel plates are made of 20% enriched U₃O₈ in an aluminum matrix and are clad with aluminum. A fuel assembly is composed of a cluster of 17 plates. Moderation is provided by graphite wedges between clusters and by water between fuel plates in each cluster. The fuel loading is extremely flexible in principle. The annulus contains 24 graphite wedges outlining a like number of spaces of 3 x 6 in. cross section. Theoretically, each of these spaces could be filled with fuel assemblies or graphite blocks of equal cross section. This report is a summary of the methods used (with some degree of success) to compute the critical properties of four typical core loadings. Each loading requires a different type of solution of the critical problem.

• Research Organization: Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), Lemont, IL (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), Nuclear Criticality Safety Program (NCSP); US Atomic Energy Commission (AEC)
• DOE Contract Number: W-31109-ENG-38
• NSA Number: NSA-11-009091
• OSTI ID: 4371597
• Report Number(s): ANL-5710
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

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Core Loading
DIFFERENTIAL EQUATIONS
FERMI AGE
Fuel Assembly
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MATHEMATICS
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REACTOR FUELING
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