Sodium Natural Convection Testing in the Thermal-Hydraulic Out-of-Reactor Safety (THORS) Facility

摘要

A comparison is made between experimental data and analytical results for a single-phase natural convection test in an experimental sodium loop. The test was conducted in the Thermal-Hydraulic Out-of-Reactor Safety (THORS) facility, an engineering-scale high temperature sodium loop at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), used for thermal-hydraulic testing of simulated Liquid Metal Fast Breeder Reactor (LMFBR) subassemblies at normal and off-normal operating conditions. Electrical heating in the 19-pin assembly during the test was typical of decay heat levels. The test chosen for analysis in this paper was one of seven natural convection runs conducted in the facility. In this test the bypass line was open to simulate a parallel heated assembly and the test was begun with a pump coastdown from a small initial forced flow. (ERA citation 06:022072)