Designs for remote inspection of the ALMR Reactor Vessel Auxiliary Cooling System (RVACS)

Conference · Fri Jan 01 04:00:00 EST 1993

OSTI ID:6945022

Sweeney, F J ^[1]; Carroll, D G ^[2]; Chen, C ^[3]; Crane, C; Dalton, R ^[4]; Taylor, J R ^[5]; Tosunoglu, S ^[6]

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1. Oak Ridge National Lab., TN (United States)
2. General Electric Co., San Jose, CA (United States)
3. Tennessee Univ., Knoxville, TN (United States)
4. Florida Univ., Gainesville, FL (United States)
5. Martin Marietta Energy Systems, Inc., Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
6. Texas Univ., Austin, TX (United States)

One of the most important safety systems in General Electric's (GI) Advanced Liquid Metal Reactor (ALMR) is the Reactor Vessel Auxiliary Cooling System (RVACS). Because of high temperature, radiation, and restricted space conditions, GI desired methods to remotely inspect the RVACS, emissive coatings, and reactor vessel welds during normal refueling operations. The DOE/NE Robotics for Advanced Reactors program formed a team to evaluate the ALMR design for remote inspection of the RVACS. Conceptual designs for robots to perform the required inspection tasks were developed by the team. Design criteria for these remote systems included robot deployment, power supply, navigation, environmental hardening of components, tether management, communication with an operator, sensing, and failure recovery. The operation of the remote inspection concepts were tested using 3-D simulation models of the ALMR. In addition, the team performed an extensive technology review of robot components that could survive the environmental conditions in the RVACS.

• Research Organization: Texas Univ., Austin, TX (United States); Oak Ridge National Lab., TN (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: DOE; USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
• DOE Contract Number: FG02-86NE37966; AC05-84OR21400
• OSTI ID: 6945022
• Report Number(s): DOE/NE/37966-T2; CONF-930403--10; ON: DE93005782
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

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42 ENGINEERING
420203 -- Engineering-- Handling Equipment & Procedures
AUXILIARY SYSTEMS
CONTAINERS
CONTROL
COOLING SYSTEMS
DESIGN
INSPECTION
LIQUID METAL COOLED REACTORS
MAINTENANCE
REACTOR COMPONENTS
REACTOR COOLING SYSTEMS
REACTOR MAINTENANCE
REACTOR VESSELS
REACTORS
REMOTE CONTROL
ROBOTS
SAFETY