Process, installation and device for compacting flexible, oblong objects, particularly fuel pencils of nuclear reactors

The invention relates to a process for forming a more or less compact bundle of flexible oblong objects of small transverse dimensions, such as fuel pencils for nuclear reactors, said objects constituting, prior to compacting, an assembly in which they occupy parallel, transversely spaced apart positions. According to the invention, a plurality of guiding tubes are arranged in a general vertical direction, of which tubes the upper ends are disposed in register with the initial arrangement of said assembly of objects, and of which the lower ends are disposed in the desired arrangement, the dimensions of said guiding tubes being such that one of said objects may slide in each of them with the aid of gravity, and said assembly of objects is guided vertically above the plurality of guiding tubes, after which each object is introduced by its lower end into the upper end of one of said guiding tubes and the assembly of said objects is allowed to slide downwardly