Development of SMART CRDM Coil Design

A control rod drive mechanism (CRDM) is an electromagnetic device which drives a control rod assembly linearly to regulate reactivity of a nuclear core. Driving force is electromagnetic force generated from coils installed outside of a motor housing. The magnetic parts of a motor assembly installed inside of a motor housing are magnetized when a coil is activated, and adhere to each other to produce latching or driving force as a result. A coil assembly consists of a lifting coil, a movable latch coil and a stationary latch coil as shown in Fig. 1. The latch coils make a drive shaft engaged with or released from latches, and the lift coil makes a drive shaft and a control rod assembly move up or drop. A CRDM control system supplies controlled electric current to a specified coil in order, and then a control rod assembly moves up or down. The coil assembly for SMART CRDM has been developed based on the design concept of a coil assembly for control element drive mechanism (CEDM) of the OPR1000, and modified to satisfy dedicated design requirements for SMART reactor. Some of representative design requirements are the lifting capacity of 3200N which is greater, the lifting step of 15.875mm which is longer than that for CEDM, and one step driving instead of two step driving. Design process through an electromagnetic analysis for a lift coil is described herein as a representative example, and representative results of the analysis are presented