Studies and applications of neutron radiography with film methods

Neutron radiography has been studied with film methods and applied to some industrial applications. The film methods include not only conventional silver-halide emulsion films, such as industrial, medical or soft X-ray ones, but also track-etch films and those for indirect methods. The characteristics of the film methods are analyzed and investigated with using various image converters, such as gadolinium metal foil and evaporation films, or some scintillation converters such as NE426. The sensitivities and MTFs for various sets of films and converters have been obtained, which gives a chart of the correlation between the appropriate exposure and resolving powers for them. From the chart, one can select some proper sets for the purpose and given conditions of neutron radiography facilities. The film methods have been applied to inspect very fine cracks in thick steel blocks and plates. It is also applied to observe nuclear fuel pellets or irradiated nuclear fuel pins. Furthermore, the film method has been used for neutron computed tomography. Very fine Eu-particles in TiO pellets, which diameters are nearly 300 micron, can be reconstructed by the neutron CT. The fine neutron CT will be useful for the inspection of Pu-particles in mixed oxide nuclear fuel pellets for future advance nuclear reactors. (author)