Characterization of Mechanical Anisotropy of Zircaloy 4 Tube

Abstract

The claddings used to manufacture the fuels for power nuclear reactors in Argentina are fabricated through tube reduced extrusion (TREX) of Zircaloy 4 (Zry-4) alloy. These claddings are manufactured by Conuar-FAE through sequence of rolling steps known as pilgering. Due to the intrinsic anisotropy of zirconium (hexagonal close packed), the microstructure exhibits a clear anisotropic behavior during this process (W.C. Fuentes et al., AMCA V39, 2022), which is evident in the stressstrain curves. The elastic and plastic behavior of the material was characterized by compression tests. For this purpose, it was necessary to design, manufacture and fine-tune the tools used in the compression tests. Given the small size of the compression specimens, the digital image correlation (DIC) technique was employed to measure deformations. Compression simulations were also performed using the finite element method (FEM) incorporating the anisotropy parameters. Finally, the crystallographic texture was measured to understand its evolution.