Thermo-mechanical modelling of pebble bed–wall interfaces

Abstract In HCPB blankets, interfaces between pebble beds and structural material provide for an additional heat resistance, which depends on local mechanical stresses and temperature. The heat transfer coefficient of pebble bed–wall interfaces was investigated by modelling particle–wall contact, radiation effect, and interstitial gas. The predictions of the model were compared to the experimental data. Interfacial modelling as presented by this paper, which takes the coupled thermo-mechanical behaviour of the interface into account, opens up the possibility to implement these effects in a finite element simulation of a structure containing pebble beds.

[1]  M. Yovanovich,et al.  Correlation of thermal accommodation coefficient for 'engineering' surfaces , 1987 .

[2]  J. Reimann,et al.  Thermal conductivity of compressed ceramic breeder pebble beds , 2002 .

[3]  P. Lang.  CALCULATING HEAT TRANSFER ACROSS SMALL GAS-FILLED GAPS , 1962 .

[4]  G. Sordon,et al.  Heat Transfer in Pebble Beds for Fusion Blankets , 1990 .

[5]  Y. Gan,et al.  Identification of material parameters of a thermo-mechanical model for pebble beds in fusion blankets , 2007 .

[6]  C. Madhusudana.  Thermal Contact Conductance , 1996 .

[7]  Marc Kamlah,et al.  Thermo-mechanical analysis of pebble beds in HELICA mock-up experiments , 2008 .

[8]  W. A. Gray,et al.  The packing of solid particles , 1968 .

[9]  Yixiang Gan,et al.  Thermo-mechanics of pebble beds in fusion blankets , 2008 .

[10]  M. Abdou,et al.  Experimental Study of the Effect of External Pressure on Particle Bed Effective Thermal Properties , 1995 .

[11]  J. Reimann,et al.  Topology of compressed pebble beds , 2006 .

[12]  M. Abdou,et al.  Effect of external pressure on particle bed effective thermal conductivity , 1994 .

[13]  D. Kunii,et al.  Studies on heat transfer near wall surface in packed beds , 1960 .

[14]  M. M. Yovanovich,et al.  Thermal resistance of cylinder-flat contacts: Theoretical analysis and experimental verification of a line-contact model , 1985 .

[15]  A. Ying,et al.  Experimental Investigation and Analysis of the Effective Thermal Properties of Beryllium Packed Beds , 2003 .

[16]  E. Schlunder.  PARTICLE HEAT TRANSFER , 1982 .

[17]  M. Abdou,et al.  Analysis of wall-packed bed thermal interactions , 1995 .

[18]  Alice Ying,et al.  Thermomechanics of solid breeder and Be pebble bed materials , 2002 .

[19]  Marc Kamlah,et al.  Thermo-mechanical analyses of HELICA and HEXCALIBER mock-ups , 2009 .

[20]  J. Barbera,et al.  Contact mechanics , 1999 .

[21]  M. Michiel,et al.  X-ray tomography investigations on pebble bed structures , 2008 .

[22]  J. Reimann,et al.  Thermal conductivity of compressed beryllium pebble beds , 2006 .

[23]  G. Piazza,et al.  Experimental investigations on the thermal and mechanical behaviour of a binary beryllium pebble bed , 2000 .

[24]  S. Kikuchi.  Numerical analysis model for thermal conductivities of packed beds with high solid-to-gas conductivity ratio , 2001 .