Experimental and Numerical Study on the Flow Distribution and the Pressure Drop of a Tubular Fuel

A tubular-type fuel assembly has been considered as one of the candidates for the fuel of the Advanced HANARO Reactor (AHR). The hydraulic characteristics of the tubular fuel under consideration have been investigated by an experiment and a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis. To measure the flow distribution and the pressure drop, a test facility was constructed, and a mock-up of a tubular fuel was fabricated. A pitot tube was employed to measure the coolant velocity in the flow channels. Numerical analysis by the CFD code was also conducted to compare its results with the test results and to obtain insight into the flow structure in a tubular fuel. The simulation results by the CFD analysis showed reasonable agreement with the measurements for the flow distribution as well as good agreement for the pressure drop in a tubular fuel.