High temperature validation of a line heat source technique for in-pile thermal conductivity determination

• DOI: 10.1016/j.ijthermalsci.2024.108907
• Publication Date: 2024-01-24T07:12:45Z
• Authors: Katelyn Wada; Allyssa Bateman; Tony Valayil Varg...; Austin Fleming; Brian J. Jaques; David Estrada
• Keywords: Thermal conductivity measurement; Atmospheric temperature range; Instrumentation; Thermal effusivity

In-pile instrumentation is critical for advancing operations and materials discovery in the nuclear industry. Ensuring optimal performance of sensors high temperatures first step demonstrating their viability harsh in-pile environment. This work demonstrates temperature capabilities a line heat source measurement technique previously shown to extract thermal conductivity fuel sized samples within laboratory environment at room temperature. method uses hybrid AC/DC obtain rapid measurements dependent voltage change heater wire, which also acts as resistance thermometer. Once profile heating element extracted it matched multilayered analytical model determine sample. Measurements are conducted over range function 10 mm diameter 6061 aluminum samples. Each had coefficient correlation (R2) value higher than 0.995 when its corresponding model. The diffusivity values each identified reported. Microstructure analysis was further characterize material measured.