Potential Impact of Interfacial Bonding Efficiency on Used Nuclear Fuel Vibration Integrity During Normal Transportation

Finite element analysis (FEA) was used to investigate the impacts of interfacial bonding efficiency at pellet–pellet and pellet–clad interfaces on surrogate of used nuclear fuel (UNF) vibration integrity. The FEA simulation results were also validated and benchmarked with reversible bending fatigue test results on surrogate rods consisting of stainless steel (SS) tubes with alumina-pellet inserts. Bending moments (M) are applied to the FEA models to evaluate the system responses of the surrogate rods. From the induced curvature, κ, the flexural rigidity EI can be estimated as EI=M/κ. The impacts of interfacial bonding efficiency include the moment carrying capacity distribution between pellets and clad and cohesion influence on the flexural rigidity of the surrogate rod system. The result also indicates that the immediate consequences of interfacial de-bonding are a load carrying capacity shift from the fuel pellets to the clad and a reduction of the composite rod flexural rigidity. Therefore, the flexural rigidity of the surrogate rod and the bending moment bearing capacity between the clad and fuel pellets are strongly dependent on the efficiency of interfacial bonding at the pellet–pellet and pellet–clad interfaces. FEA models will be further used to study UNF vibration integrity.