Mechanical and temperature contact in fuel rod and cladding

This paper presents a method of analysis for nuclear fuel rods. The paper concentrates on the interaction between fuel and cladding and between cracked surfaces. Both temperature and mechanical contact are considered. For the temperature contact an analysis model for the heat transfer conditions at fuel and cladding is presented. The most attention of the interaction problem is focused on the constitutive modelling of the mechanical interaction. A constitutive relation between contact stresses and the slip between fuel and cladding is presented. The paper presents a finite element solution of the proposed model. For assumed elastic material properties results from the proposed interaction models are presented. The effect of different contact conditions on contact stresses, stress intensities, etc. are presented.