An experimental study of pressure drop correlations for wire-wrapped fuel assemblies

The main objective of the present study is to perform an experimental evalu ation of five existing correlations for the subchannel pressure drop analys is of a wire-wrapped fuel assembly. For this purpose, a series of water exp eriments have been performed using a helical wire-wrapped 19-pin fuel assem bly for various test parameters. Four different test sections with differen t pitch to rod diameter ratios (PID) and wire lead length to rod diameter r atios (HID) have been fabricated. A series of pressure drop measurements we re made to obtain friction factors for these four test sections. The new da ta along with existing data are used to evaluate existing correlations. Bot h the original and the simplified Cheng and Todreas correlations give the b est agreement with experimental data for all flow regions.