Abstract
Tubes in heat exchanger of fuel rods in reactor core are supported at intemediate point by support p0lates or springs. Current practice is, in case of heat exchanger, to allow clearance between tube and support plate for design and manufacturing consideration. And in case of fuel rod the clearance in support point can be generated due to the support spring force relaxation. Flow-induced vibration of a tube can cause it to impact or rub against support plate or against adjacent tubes and can result in fretting-wear. The tube-to- support dynamic interaction is used to relate experimental wear data from single-span test rigs to real multi-span heat exchanger configurations. The dynamic interaction cna be measured during experimental wear tests. However, the dynamic interaction is difficult to measure in real heat exchangers and, therefore, analytical techniques are required to estimate this interaction. This paper describels the nonlinear impact model of DAGS(Dynamic Analysis of Gapped Structure) code which simulates the tube response to external sinusodial or step excitation and predicts tube motion and tube-to-support dynamic interaction. Three experimental measurements-two single span rods excited by sinusodial force and a two span rod impacted by a steel ball are compared from the simulation nonlinear model of DAGS code. The simulation results from DAGS code are in good agreement with measurements. Therefore, the developed model of DAGS code is good analytical tool for estimating tube-to-support dynamic interaction in real heat exchangers.
