Optimization of thermal design for nitrogen shield of JET cryopump

摘要

The reference design of JET cryopump nitrogen shield consists of an outer section made of copper chevrons fastened to two cooling tubes and an inner stainless steel section and backing plate with two cooling tubes. These tubes are fed in a parallel flow arrangement. The inlet flow is divided into two parallel paths so that both tubes on either section are always at the same temperature. This arrangement was selected due to concern about conduction between warm and cold parts of the shield during cooldown transients. If the heat loads are unequal, such a parallel flow arrangement can result in flow starvation in the path with higher heat load. This will cause large temperature differences and, ultimately, structural failure. Hence, an analysis was undertaken to investigate the conduction effects in the shield for other flow arrangements. 4 refs., 8 figs.