The Cassini project: Lessons learned through operations
- Los Alamos National Laboratory, P.O. Box 1663 MS E502, Los Alamos, New Mexico 87545 (United States)
The Cassini space probe requires 180 {sup 238}Pu Light-weight Radioisotopic Heater Units (LWRHU) and 216 {sup 238}Pu General Purpose Heat Source (GPHS) pellets. Additional LWRHU and GPHS pellets required for non-destructive (NDA) and destructive assay purposes were fabricated bringing the original pellet requirement to 224 LWRHU and 252 GPHS. Due to rejection of pellets resulting from chemical impurities in the fuel and/or failure to meet dimensional specifications a total of 320 GPHS pellets were fabricated for the mission. Initial plans called for LANL to process a total of 30 kg of oxide powder for pressing into monolithic ceramic pellets. The original 30 kg commitment was processed within the time frame allotted; an additional 8 kg were required to replace fuel lost due to failure to meet Quality Assurance specifications for impurities and dimensions. During the time frame allotted for pellet production, operations were impacted by equipment failure, unacceptable fuel impurities levels, and periods of extended down time, {gt}30 working days during which little or no processing occurred. Throughout the production process, the reality of operations requirements varied from the theory upon which production schedules were based. {copyright} {ital 1998 American Institute of Physics.}
- OSTI ID:
- 664629
- Report Number(s):
- CONF-980103--
- Journal Information:
- AIP Conference Proceedings, Journal Name: AIP Conference Proceedings Journal Issue: 1 Vol. 420; ISSN 0094-243X; ISSN APCPCS
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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