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The authors are planning a calculation to be done on the Univac at the Louviers Building to estimate the effect of xenon transients, a high reactor power. This memorandum outlines the reasons why they prefer to do the work at Louviers rather than at another location, such as N.Y.U. They are to calculate the response of the reactor to a sudden change in position of the half rods. Qualitatively, the response will be a change in the rooftop ratio of the neutron flux. The rooftop ratio may oscillate with high damping, or, instead, it may oscillate for many cycles. It has not been possible for them to determine this response by hand calculation because of the complexity of the problem, and yet it is important for them to be certain that high power operation will not lead us to inherently unstable operation. Therefore they have resorted to machine computation. The system of differential equations that describes the response has seven dependent variables; therefore there are seven equations, each coupled with one or more of the others. The authors have discussed the problem with R.R. Haefner at the plant, and it is his opinion that the IBM 650 cannot adequately handle …

Many rivers are burdened with tributary streams of warm water and/or liquid wastes containing dissolved or suspended matter. The warm water and waste matter mix thoroughly with the river water some distance downstream from the point of entry of the tributary, but near the point of entry there may be high local temperatures or concentrations of waste. It is often necessary to know the local temperatures or concentrations of waste. The authors have used a formula for computing the turbulent mixing that takes place in such a situation; this formula fits quite well in the case of one Southern river.

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A meeting was held in Wilmington on May 15, 1956, with representatives of Allegheny Ludlum to discuss possible production by Allegheny of uranium tubes in the number needed this next year for development work on tubular elements by Savannah River. Allegheny Ludlum, through king, had expressed a possible interest in the manufacture of uranium tubes. The Allegheny representatives, in the meeting, reiterated their interest in trying to determine whether Allegheny should consider entering the business of fabricating nuclear fuel elements and nuclear fuel element components, pointing out that the did not wish to do this work in existing facilities. Woodhouse covered the work done by Nuclear Metals, Inc., on bare uranium tubes. He stated that this work had reached a stage in which there would be needed, for development purposes, a supply of the order of 500 bare tubes at Savannah River over the next twelve months. These will be in excess of Nuclear Metals ability to supply. King as a director of NMI and Pierce as a former director were familiar with the NMI situation. On question by King, Worthington stated the order-of-magnitude of the tube requirements if the development work is successful and tubes are used on a …

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Slug ruptures characterized by intergranular corrosion failure of the aluminum can (Hot Spot Ruptures) have been a major cause for loss of reactor production, particularly during the past year. Although the cause for these failures is not definitely known, it is suspected that fuel elements when cocked in the process tube will sufficiently distort the neutron flux and the heat transfer characteristics in a localized area that very high local temperatures will exist and the corrosion rate of the aluminum can in these areas will be accelerated. It is the purpose of this test to introduce slugs that are known to be cocked and compare their resistance to rupture with slugs that are known to be uncocked when initially charged.

This letter transmits the data from the 189-D Hydraulics Laboratory flow test on three CG-482 rear pigtails. The tests were run with a standard B, D, Dr and F rear nozzle and rear Parker fitting over the range of flows and temperatures anticipated for early CG-558 operation. The data from the test are given. All three pigtails gave essentially identical results. For comparison the results of previous tests with present rear pigtails are also plotted.

This document presents a summary of work and progress at the Hanford Engineer Works for April 1956. 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 Service departments have sections presenting their monthly statistics, work, progress, and summaries.

In a previous study it was determined experimentally that heat deterioration, or burnout, of the shield masonite is more severe than radiation damage under existing and proposed operating conditions. Higher shield temperatures, which are expected to result from increased power levels, fringe enrichment, and higher graphite temperatures, will markedly increase the rate at which the masonite burns out. The laminated iron-masonite biological shield will lose, as a result of burnout, the hydrogen and oxygen necessary to attenuate and moderate neutrons. The purpose of this production test has been to obtain experimental data from which future shield leakage rates could be estimated. The attenuation data reported here were obtained in the DR pile bulk shield facility from experiments using various void spacings to simulate burnout conditions. From these data it was hoped to determine (1) the resultant attenuation properties of the shields, and (2) the exposure rates due to radiation penetrating the shield.

The following lists describe facilities in the Hanford project for disposal of radioactive liquid waste into the ground. Most are for planned disposals, but included are several which were not intended to become contaminated, but did, and several others which may be expected to become contaminated similarly. Not included are sanitary, powerhouse and a few other liquid disposal facilities which may receive only insignificant amounts of radioactive material. The lists do not include solid waste disposal facilities, or others (such as tanks, buried barrels) in which contaminated liquid is contained against entry into the soil.

Pilot plant experiments are described in which trichloroethylene was used for the reduction of uranium hexafluoride to uranium tetrafluoride. After unsatisfactory preliminary results with liquid phase reduction, satisfactory results were obtained with a vapor phase reduction system. It was found that vapor phase reduction at approximately 450 deg F, produced a low density product which contained only small quantities of uranium(VI); sintering the uranium tetrafluoride in a hydrogen fluoride atmosphere increased the product density to approximately 3 g/cc. The reduction was essentially complete, and the effluent gas contained less than 1 ppm of uranium hexafluoride. The purity of the uranium tetrafluoride produced was equivalent to that of the uranium hexafluoride used as feed. A complete discussion is given of the operation of the various parts of the system. (auth)

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