The typical operating temperatures of a reactor pressure vessel is typically between \~290°C-300°C. Most of the literature and neutron irradiation damage is therefore focused on those irradiation temperatures. It is well-known that the lower the irradiation temperature, the more neutron irradiation damage occurs. Because no appreciable annealing of radiation effects occurs during an irradiation at temperatures below \~230°C. This gives the opportunity to scientifically investigate the defect evolution during post-thermal annealing. However, it gives some restrictions on the post-irradiation experiments. Especially for mechanical properties, the test temperatures are limited in order to not anneal out the defects during the tests.

The NOMAD-0 irradiation campaign at BR2 was performed on an A508 Cl.2 grade at temperatures below 100°C, to damage dose of 0.025 dpa and 0.075 dpa. To keep the temperature gradient from the outside to the center of the blocks low, the neutron irradiated cylinders were limited in size. Tensile and fracture toughness data could therefore only be obtained with mini-tensile and mini-CT specimens. No influence of the temperature gradient could be found on the tensile and fracture toughness properties. The effect of the low temperature irradiation is discussed on the tensile properties and the transition temperature as determined by the master curve approach on the mini-CT samples.


Effect of Low Temperature Irradiation on the Mechanical Properties of an A508 cl.2 Forging

Division / Sponsors: 
Pressure Vessels & Piping (PVP)


Paper Proceedings: https://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/PVP/PVP2020/volume/83815

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