This document presents a summary of work and progress at the Hanford Engineer Works for December 1953. The report is divided into sections by department. A plant wide general summary is included at the beginning of the report, after which the departmental summaries begin. The Manufacturing Department reports plant statistics, and summaries for the Metal Preparation, Reactor and Separation sections. The Engineering Department`s section summaries work for the Technical, Design, and Project Sections. Costs for the various departments are presented in the Financial Department`s summary. The Medical, Radiological Sciences, Utilities and General Services, Employee and Public Relations, and Community Real Estate and Services departments have sections presenting their monthly statistics, work, progress, and summaries.

This document presents a summary of work and progress at the Hanford Engineer Works for May 1954. The report is divided into sections by department. A plant wide general summary is included at the beginning of the report, after which the departmental summaries begin. The Manufacturing Department reports plant statistics, and summaries for the Metal Preparation, Reactor and Separation sections. The Engineering Department`s section summaries work for the Technical, Design, and Project Sections. Costs for the various departments are presented in the Financial Department`s summary. The Medical, Radiological Science, Utilities and General Services, Employee and Public Relations, and Community Real Estate and Services departments have sections presenting their monthly statistics, work, progress, and summaries.

Present methods for monitoring Ru{sup 103}, Ru{sup 106}, and I{sup 131} in stack gases involve sampling by filtration and scrubbing and analysis by chemical separation and counting or by gamma spectrometry. Filtered samples, which are ordinarily collected over a complete day, are analyzed for total ruthenium and iodine by gamma spectrometry and for the individual isotopes by chemical separation and counting. The present scrubber monitors the sampler gas for total activity. As an aid to Radiological Sciences evaluation of stack gas hazards and to operations control of radioactive gas emission, Methods and Instrument Development collaborated on the planning of a continuous monitoring system. This memorandum has the purpose of outlining the plan, reviewing progress since conception in October, 1953, and reporting work still to be done.

This report, dated March 22, 1954 details work procedures for the 200- West Area at HAPO. Topics discussed include emergency procedures, safety and housekeeping practices, policies and procedures, instruments and equipment located at the 622 tower, instruments and equipment located offsite, observational procedures, form entries, and card punching, and weather forecasting.

Letter opinion issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, John Ben Shepperd, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Applicability of the travel expense limitations in the Appropriation Act to consultants of the Good Neighbor Commission.

Letter opinion issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, John Ben Shepperd, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Necessity of Performance Bonds for Business Managers of Gainesville State School for Girls, Gatesville State School for Boys, and Crockett State School for Colored Girls, and related questions.

Letter opinion issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, John Ben Shepperd, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Authority of the State to enter into an agreement with the Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare for the purpose of obtaining Federal Old Age and Survivors Insurance coverage for federally paid civilian employees of the Texas National Guard.

Introduction: The object of this test work was to determine the practicability of a two-stage leach using ion-exchange as the method of uranium concentration.

"The external wave drag of bodies of revolution moving at supersonic speeds can be expressed either in terms of the geometry of the body, or in terms of the body-simulating axial source distribution. For purposes of deriving optimum bodies under various given conditions, it is found that the second of the methods mentioned is the more tractable. By use of a quasi-cylindrical theory, that is, the boundary conditions are applied on the surface of a cylinder rather than on the body itself, the variational problems of the optimum bodies having prescribed volume or caliber are solved" (p. 131).

Report presenting results from a limited flight program to obtain information on airplane response and actual rates and amounts of control motion used by service pilot in performance of squadron operational training. Results regarding control deflection, control rates, airplane angular velocities, airplane angular accelerations, angle of attack and angle of sideslip, airplane load factors, and airspeed and altitude are provided.

Report presenting the results of an investigation to determine the pressure ratios required to operate a slotted tunnel through a range of Mach numbers where the speed variation is affected by removal of air from the main stream by auxiliary pumping, use of a main-stream-operated ejector located downstream of the test section, and a combination of these methods. Testing was conducted in order to improve the accuracy of transonic wind-tunnel testing.

Report presenting two-group theory calculations to determine the effect of nonuniform uranium loading as compared to uniform loading on the reflector control effectiveness attainable in a large thermal reactor usable for aircraft power application. Results regarding reactivities and investments, uranium distributions, and power distributions are provided.

Report presenting a flight and preflight evaluation of an automatic thrust-coefficient control system in a twin-engine ram-jet missile. A flicker-type single-loop servocontrol system is shown to be a usable way of controlling ram-jet thrust coefficients.

Report presenting an investigation of 57 experimental tubular designs embodying adjacent fuel-rich and air-rich regions and axial staging of the fuel introduction at simulated high-altitude conditions. Results regarding the development of pilot, development of secondary-air admission sleeve, development of final configuration, and performance of best configuration are provided.

Report presenting the results of an experimental investigation of the dynamic stability and control of a simple ducted-fan model in hovering flight in order to provide basic information on the stability and control of jet vertically rising airplanes in hovering flight. The investigation primarily consisted of flight tests with the model hovering at altitude and near the ground.

The present investigation was made at a free-stream Mach number of 1.59 to compare the afterbody drags to a series of conical boattailed models at zero angle of attack. Afterbody drags were obtained for both the power-off and the power-on conditions. Power-on drags were obtained as a function of afterbody fineness ratio, jet pressure ratio and divergence, and jet Mach number.

"Flow-angle and pressure surveys behind five, thin, pointed-tip wings of varying plan form have been made at Mach numbers 1.62 and 2.41. Schlieren studies at a Mach number 1.93 for the same five plan-form wings were made to illustrate the behavior of the vortex sheet. The surveys were conducted at 1.5, 3, and 4 root chords behind three triangular wings of 50 degree, 63 degree, and 72 degree leading-edge sweep angle, and behind the 50 degree triangular wing reversed" (p. 1067).

This document discusses studies of the behavior of uranium metal as a fuel element which previously have been hampered by the lack of understanding of the nature of radiation damage to the crystal structures. With the aid of the double crystal x-ray spectrometer, samples from irradiated fuel elements which had receive total exposure of 150 MWD/T and 1,000 MWD/T were studied and gross radiation damage was not present. Although these findings are of a preliminary nature, they are well in agreement with theoretical calculations in which the equilibrium concentration of displaced atoms at temperatures above 200{degrees}C would be extremely low. Assuming this to be the case, most of the crystallographic imperfection induced by pile radiations must have been annealed out of the metal studied. On the basis of this work it would seem quite likely that some fundamental facts about the nature of radiation damage could be learned by keeping the temperature low. This production test is designed so as to give information regarding the crystal structure damage where the uranium temperature during irradiation and post-irradiation operations is kept below 35{degrees}C.

The Uranium Recovery Plant, over the life of the operation, will be required to attain maximum recovery of stored uranium and to produce aqueous waste in a volume equivalent to the volume of stored uranium waste which, after acidification, constitutes the feed stream for the process. Due to variations in the composition of the feed stream, the waste stream does not consistently have a volume equivalent to the volume of the stored metal waste. This variation volume equivalence impedes tank farm scheduling because of the necessity for return of the process waste to underground tanks made available by the recovery operations. A plant test, using nickel ferricyanide to remove Cs-137 and Sr-90 from the Uranium Recovery Plant wastes has been completed and this memorandum has been prepared to summarize and report the results obtained from this test.

Production Test 105-524-A authorized the installation of a washer seal on the ``A`` horizontal control rod at C Pile in order to determine the characteristics of this type seal when used on unlubricated rods. The most important characteristic to be observed during the test was the gas leakage rate. A qualitative study of the seal wear and radiation damage to the seal were also to be made. This document reports the conclusion of the test and discusses the results obtained.

Characteristics of the heavy water moderated and cooled reactor when fueled with natural uranium were compared with those of Hanford. The following topics were covered: (1) fundamental safety of the Savannah River Plant reactor and its fundamental efficiency as neutron collector; (2) many critical volumes result in a complex control system and high sensitivity of flux pattern to rod position changes; (3) due to lack of time had to sue slugs initially; (4) had to use D{sub 2}O sparingly; (5) effects of circulating cooling system; and (6) heat transfer considerations. Topics also discussed were Savannah River reactor with enriched loadings and irradiation of thorium in lieu of lithium alloy.

The following report discusses the operation of the nuclear research reactor at the University of Michigan, as well as the maximum credible accident to the reactor.

"An experimental investigation has been conducted to determine the stability and control characteristics of a 0.13-scale free-flight model of the Convair XFY-1 airplane during take-offs and landings in steady winds. The tests indicated that take-offs in headwinds up to at least 20 knots (full scale) will be fairly easy to perform although the airplane may be blown downstream as much as 3 spans before a trim condition can be established. The distance that the airplane will be blown down-stream can be reduced by restraining the upwind landing gear until the instant of take-off" (p. 1).

Report presenting the results of deflection tests on the wing of a full-scale, swept-wing jet bomber in the form of structural influence coefficients relating the deflection of a system of points on the wing and concentrated loads applied on the wing spars. The procedures for determining the coefficients are included.