Detection of graphite balls for the fuel handling system in HTGR using eddy current testing

Abstract

The spherical graphite fuel elements (graphite balls) are transported into and out of the core in high-temperature gas-cooled pebble bed reactors (HTGR) by a fuel handling system (FHS) during plant operation. In order to control the reactor, it is necessary to have information on the location and movement of the graphite balls at various points of the FHS. In this paper, a new through-transmission eddy current testing probe has been put forward to detect the graphite balls. The probe's electromagnetic finite element model (FEM) has been established so as to study the factors affecting the performance of the probe. On this basis, electromagnetic detection parameters and probe designs have been optimised. According to the results of analysis, a bidirectional detector for the fuel ball handling system of HTGR has been developed. The experimental results confirm the validity of the FEM, and show that the detector works accurately and reliably, which meets the requirements of application in HTGR.

Keywords:

• eddy current testing
• fuel ball detecting
• finite element model
• HTGR