Characterization of fluidized bed chemical vapor deposition ZrC coatings on PyC/YSZ kernels deposited under differing conditions

Peter Doyle; Eddie Lopez-Honorato; Gokul Vasudevamurthy; Jim Miller; Harry Meyer; Tyler Gerczak

doi:10.1016/j.jnucmat.2024.155019

Characterization of fluidized bed chemical vapor deposition ZrC coatings on PyC/YSZ kernels deposited under differing conditions

Peter Doyle, Eddie Lopez-Honorato, Gokul Vasudevamurthy, Jim Miller, Harry Meyer, Tyler Gerczak

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

2 Scopus citations

Abstract

Coated fuel particle architectures with ZrC coatings are candidate fuels for advanced power reactors and space nuclear propulsion (SNP) concepts. Owing to its relevance to SNP, the composition, microstructure, and mechanical properties of eight ZrC coatings prepared by fluidized bed chemical vapor deposition were evaluated. Evaluation by SEM and EBSD showed that all grains were columnar. Across the various examined samples, minor axis diameters varied between 0.3 and 1.1 μm, and major axis diameters varied between 0.4 and 2.3 μm. Major and minor diameters increased with thickness particularly at higher deposition temperatures in which the major grain axis (from an ellipse fit to the grain shape) increased by 2.5 μm over the entire coating. Coatings with higher reactive gas flows and Zr/C concentrations closer to 1 were observed to contain nanocrystalline graphite deposits. Reactive gas flow doubling led to increases in coating thickness from around 10–15 μm to around 22–27 μm.

Original language	English
Article number	155019
Journal	Journal of Nuclear Materials
Volume	594
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jnucmat.2024.155019
State	Published - Jun 2024

Funding

The authors gratefully acknowledge the excellent work of Tyson Jordan and Christopher Hobbs in the preparation of metallography mounts. Ryan Heldt assisted in the collection of the Raman data, and Roberta Meisner and Donovan Leonard of the High Temperature Materials Laboratory collected the microbe data in this work. The bulk of the characterization work was supported by NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate through the space nuclear propulsion project, and the production and microprobe analysis were supported through the Department of Energy's Deep Burn Program. Notice: This manuscript has been authored by UT-Battelle LLC under contract DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the US Department of Energy (DOE). The US government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the US government retains a nonexclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, worldwide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for US government purposes. DOE will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan (http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan)

Keywords

Electron backscatter diffraction
Nanoindentation
Raman
Space nuclear propulsion
X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy
ZrC
coatings

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10.1016/j.jnucmat.2024.155019

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title = "Characterization of fluidized bed chemical vapor deposition ZrC coatings on PyC/YSZ kernels deposited under differing conditions",

abstract = "Coated fuel particle architectures with ZrC coatings are candidate fuels for advanced power reactors and space nuclear propulsion (SNP) concepts. Owing to its relevance to SNP, the composition, microstructure, and mechanical properties of eight ZrC coatings prepared by fluidized bed chemical vapor deposition were evaluated. Evaluation by SEM and EBSD showed that all grains were columnar. Across the various examined samples, minor axis diameters varied between 0.3 and 1.1 μm, and major axis diameters varied between 0.4 and 2.3 μm. Major and minor diameters increased with thickness particularly at higher deposition temperatures in which the major grain axis (from an ellipse fit to the grain shape) increased by 2.5 μm over the entire coating. Coatings with higher reactive gas flows and Zr/C concentrations closer to 1 were observed to contain nanocrystalline graphite deposits. Reactive gas flow doubling led to increases in coating thickness from around 10–15 μm to around 22–27 μm.",

keywords = "Electron backscatter diffraction, Nanoindentation, Raman, Space nuclear propulsion, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, ZrC, coatings",

author = "Peter Doyle and Eddie Lopez-Honorato and Gokul Vasudevamurthy and Jim Miller and Harry Meyer and Tyler Gerczak",

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year = "2024",

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doi = "10.1016/j.jnucmat.2024.155019",

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AU - Doyle, Peter

AU - Lopez-Honorato, Eddie

AU - Vasudevamurthy, Gokul

AU - Miller, Jim

AU - Meyer, Harry

AU - Gerczak, Tyler

PY - 2024/6

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N2 - Coated fuel particle architectures with ZrC coatings are candidate fuels for advanced power reactors and space nuclear propulsion (SNP) concepts. Owing to its relevance to SNP, the composition, microstructure, and mechanical properties of eight ZrC coatings prepared by fluidized bed chemical vapor deposition were evaluated. Evaluation by SEM and EBSD showed that all grains were columnar. Across the various examined samples, minor axis diameters varied between 0.3 and 1.1 μm, and major axis diameters varied between 0.4 and 2.3 μm. Major and minor diameters increased with thickness particularly at higher deposition temperatures in which the major grain axis (from an ellipse fit to the grain shape) increased by 2.5 μm over the entire coating. Coatings with higher reactive gas flows and Zr/C concentrations closer to 1 were observed to contain nanocrystalline graphite deposits. Reactive gas flow doubling led to increases in coating thickness from around 10–15 μm to around 22–27 μm.

AB - Coated fuel particle architectures with ZrC coatings are candidate fuels for advanced power reactors and space nuclear propulsion (SNP) concepts. Owing to its relevance to SNP, the composition, microstructure, and mechanical properties of eight ZrC coatings prepared by fluidized bed chemical vapor deposition were evaluated. Evaluation by SEM and EBSD showed that all grains were columnar. Across the various examined samples, minor axis diameters varied between 0.3 and 1.1 μm, and major axis diameters varied between 0.4 and 2.3 μm. Major and minor diameters increased with thickness particularly at higher deposition temperatures in which the major grain axis (from an ellipse fit to the grain shape) increased by 2.5 μm over the entire coating. Coatings with higher reactive gas flows and Zr/C concentrations closer to 1 were observed to contain nanocrystalline graphite deposits. Reactive gas flow doubling led to increases in coating thickness from around 10–15 μm to around 22–27 μm.

KW - Electron backscatter diffraction

KW - Nanoindentation

KW - Raman

KW - Space nuclear propulsion

KW - X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy

KW - ZrC

KW - coatings

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Characterization of fluidized bed chemical vapor deposition ZrC coatings on PyC/YSZ kernels deposited under differing conditions

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