Proposal for pressure drop prediction for a fuel bundle with grid spacers using Rehme pressure drop correlations

The aim of this paper is to correlate experimentally measured pressure drop data across grid spacers to the set of correlations proposed by Rehme, based on the experiments performed in a water loop at the Scalbatraio Laboratory of Pisa University (2003), as well as in a water loop of the KALLA test facility (2008). Based on the presented study one can state that using slightly modified Rehme/Dalle Donne pressure drop correlations for pressure drop prediction in a fuel bundle with grid spacers, it is possible to obtain very good agreement with the experimental measurements of the fuel assembly pressure drops in various segments of a fuel assembly, provided that the grid spacer blockage factor can be estimated to a reasonable degree of confidence.