Mitigation technologies for damage induced by pressure waves in high-power mercury spallation neutron sources, 4; Measurement of pressure wave response and microbubble effect on mitigation in mercury target at J-PARC

Kogawa, Hiroyuki  ; Naoe, Takashi   ; Futakawa, Masatoshi  ; Haga, Katsuhiro  ; Wakui, Takashi  ; Harada, Masahide   ; Takada, Hiroshi   

A mercury target system has been operated to produce neutron beams at the spallation neutron source in the Japan Proton Accelerator Research Complex (J-PARC). Pressure waves are generated in mercury by rapid heat generation at the time of high-intensity short-pulse proton beam injection. Not only they cause cyclic stress but also induce the cavitation damage on the target vessel made from type 316L stainless steel. Reduction of these pressure waves is very important issue to ensure enough lifetime of the target vessel. To solve the issue, we have been developing the technique to inject microbubbles into mercury. In this study, we installed a microbubble generator in the mercury target vessel, and investigate the effect of proton beam condition and the microbubbles on the pressure wave mitigation by measuring the displacement velocity of the target vessel with an in-situ diagnostic system. As a result, we observed that the peak displacement velocity of the target vessel decreased down to 1/3 and 2/3 for the injected gas fractions of 0.4% and 0.1%, respectively.