Summary of cavitation erosion investigations for the SNS mercury target

Haines, John; Riemer, Bernie; Felde, D.K.; Hunn, John D.; Pawel, S.J.; Tsai, C. C.

doi:10.1016/j.jnucmat.2004.08.033

Cited by 66 publications

(54 citation statements)

References 16 publications

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“…Roughly one cubic meter per minute of mercury is circulated through a stainless steel target vessel that -for both facilities -will have to be periodically replaced because of radiation damage. However, the phenomena of beam induced cavitation damage might limit the useful life of the target vessel more severely than radiation damage [4][5][6]. Collaborative research and development is being conducted find ways to mitigate the damage so that it is no more life limiting that radiation damage.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Cavitation damage experiments for mercury spallation targets at the LANSCE – WNR in 2005

Riemer¹,

Haines²,

Wendel³

et al. 2008

Journal of Nuclear Materials

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In-beam experiments investigating cavitation damage in short pulse mercury spallation targets were performed at the Los Alamos Neutron Science Center -Weapons Neutron Research (LANSCE -WNR) facility in 2005. Two main areas were investigated. First, damage dependence on three mercury conditions -stagnant, flowing, and flowing with bubble injection -was investigated by employing a small mercury target loop with replaceable damage test specimens. One hundred beam pulses were passed through the loop mercury and specimen pair for each test condition. Damage with flowing mercury (V = 0.4 m/s) was less than half that which was incurred with stagnant mercury. Gas bubble injection added into the flow further reduced damage to about one-fourth that of stagnant mercury. Acoustic emissions from cavitation bubble collapse were concurrently measured on the exterior of the loop using a laser Doppler vibrometer and were correlated to the observed damage. The second area of experimentation was erosion rate dependence on proton beam intensity. Prior research had indicated that incubation-phase cavitation erosion rate is strongly dependent on beam intensity, by a power law with the exponent perhaps as large as 4. The 2005 results are inconsistent with earlier in-beam test results and do not support the power law dependence. This paper will provide a detailed description of the experiment, present results and discuss the findings. Published by Elsevier B.V.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A prior experiment for damage mitigation with small bubbles was part of a 2002 WNR test [4]. Cavitation damage in a mercury test target was reduced by approximately a factor of four with the introduction of bubbles.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cavitation damage experiments for mercury spallation targets at the LANSCE – WNR in 2005

Riemer¹,

Haines²,

Wendel³

et al. 2008

Journal of Nuclear Materials

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show abstract

“…Cavitation erosion on beam windows in spallation sources is attributed to the immediate shock wave stemming from the pulsed heat deposition by the proton beam in the Mercury target volume [1][2][3]8].…”

Section: Pitting In Spallation Sourcesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The best way to protect beam windows found so far is to apply a special surface conditioning, i.e. 'Kolsterizing', which is a low temperature carburization treatment [2]. The such hardened surface exhibits a much prolonged incubation phase, but once severe erosion starts, degradation is considerably faster than for untreated 316 SS material; fatigue leads in the end to about the same rather short lifetime of the beam window [10].…”

Section: Pitting In Spallation Sourcesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The trigger for the present work stems from the occurrence of unexpected problems with cavitation at pulsed neutron sources, which turn out to be the limiting factor for the lifetime of beam windows [1][2][3]. Beyond the rather peculiar incidence at mercury targets in spallation sources, cavitation is an almost ubiquitous phenomenon occurring in a vast range of machinery involving liquids -amongst others in diesel engines, pumps, turbines, water ducts, and ship propellers [4].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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