Hello, and welcome back to Beyond NERVA! Today, we’re going to return to our discussion of fission power plants, and look at a program that was unique in the history of astronuclear engineering: a Soviet-designed and -built reactor design that was purchased and mostly flight-qualified by the US for an American lunar base. This was the Enisy, known in the West as Topaz-II, and the Topaz International program.

This will be a series of three posts on the system: this post focuses on the history of the reactor in the Soviet Union, including the testing history – which as we’ll see, heavily influenced the final design of the reactor. The next will look at the Topaz International program, which began as early as 1980, while the Soviet Union still appeared strong. Finally, we’ll look at two American uses for the reactor: as a test-bed reactor system for a nuclear electric test satellite, and as a power supply for a crewed lunar base. This fascinating system, and the programs associated with it, definitely deserve a deep dive – so let’s jump right in!

We’ve looked at the history of Soviet astronuclear engineering, and their extensive mission history. The last two of these reactors were the Topaz (Topol) reactors, on the Plasma-A satellites. These reactors used a very interesting type of power conversion system: an in-core thermionic system. Thermionic power conversion takes advantage of the fact that certain materials, when heated, eject electrons, gaining a positive static charge as whatever the electrons impact gain a negative charge. Because the materials required for a thermionic system can be made incredibly neutronically robust, they can be placed inside the core of the reactor itself! This is a concept that I’ve loved since I first heard of it, and remains as cool today as it did back then.

The original Topaz reactor used a multi-cell thermionic element concept, where fuel elements were stacked in individual thermionic conversion elements, and several of these were placed end-to-end to form the length of the core. While this is a perfectly acceptable way to set up one of these systems, there are also inefficiencies and complexities associated with so many individual fuel elements. An alternative would be to make a single, full-length thermionic cell, and use either one or several fuel rods inside the thermionic element. This is the – wait for it – single cell thermionic element design, and is the one that was chosen for the Enisy/Topaz-II reactor (which we’ll call Enisy in this post, since it’s focusing on the Soviet history of the reactor). While started in 1967, and tested thoroughly in the 70s, it wasn’t flight-qualified until the 80s… and then the Soviet Union collapsed, and the program died.

After the fall of the USSR, there was a concerted effort by the US to keep the specialist engineers and scientists of the former Soviet republics employed (to ensure they didn’t find work for international bad actors such as North Korea), and to see what technology had been developed behind the Iron Curtain that could be purchased for use by the US. This is where the RD-180 rocket engine, still in use by the United Launch Alliance Atlas rockets, came from. Another part of this program, though, focused on the extensive experience that the Soviets had in astronuclear missions, and in paricular the most advanced – but as yet unflown – design of the renowned NPO Luch design bureau, attached to the Ministry of Medium Industry: the Enisy reactor (which had the US designation of Topaz-II due to early confusion about the design by American observers).

The Enisy, in its final iteration, was designed to have a thermal output of 115 kWt (at the beginning of life), with a mission requirement of at least 6 kWe at the electrical outlet terminals for at least three years. Additional requirements included a ten year shelf life after construction (without fissile fuel, coolant, or other volatiles loaded), a maximum mass of 1061 kg, and prevention of criticality before achieving orbit (which was complicated from an American point of view, more on that below). The coolant for the reactor remained NaK-78, a common coolant in most reactors we’ve looked at so far. Cesium was stored in a reservoir at the “bottom” (away from the spacecraft) end of the reactor vessel, to ensure the proper partial pressure between the cathode and anode of the fuel elements, which would leak out over time (about 0.5 g/day during operation). This was meant to be the next upgrade in the Soviet astronuclear fleet, and as such was definitely a step above the Topaz-I reactor.

Perhaps the most interesting part of the design is that it was designed to be able to be tested as a complete system without the use of fissile fuels in the reactor. Instead, electrical resistance heaters could be inserted in the thermionic fuel elements to simulate the fission process, allowing for far more complete testing of the system in flight configuration before launch. This design decision heavily influenced US nuclear power plant design and testing procedures, and continues to influence designs today (the induction heating testing of the KRUSTY thermal simulator is a good recent example of this concept, even if it’s been heavily modified for the different reactor geometry), however, the fact that the reactor used cylindrical fuel elements made this process much easier.

So what did the Enisy look like? This changed over time, but we will look at the basics of the power plant’s design in its final Soviet iteration in this post, and the examine the changes that the Americans made during the collaboration in the next post. We’ll also look at why the design changed as it did.

First, though, we need to look at how the system worked, since compared to every system that we’ve looked at in depth, the physics behind the power conversion system are quite novel.

Thermionics: How to Keep Your Power Conversion System in the Core

We haven’t looked at power conversion systems much in this blog yet, but this is a good place to discuss the first kind as it’s so integral to this reactor. If the details of how the power conversion system actually worked don’t interest you, feel free to skip to the next section, but for many people interested in astronuclear design this power conversion system offers the promise to potentially be the most efficient and reliable option available for in-space nuclear reactors geared towards electricity production.

In short, thermionic reactions are those that occur when a material is heated and gives off charged particles. This is something that has been known since ancient times, even though the physical mechanism was completely unknown until after the discovery of the electron. The name comes from the term “thermions,” or “thermal ions.” One of the first to describe this effect used a hot anode in a vacuum: the modern incandescent lightbulb: Thomas Edison, who observed a static charge building up on the glass of his bulbs while they were turned on. However, today this has expanded to include the use of anodes, as well as solid-state systems and systems that don’t have a vacuum.

The efficiency of these systems depends on the temperature difference between the anode and cathode, the work function (or minimum thermodynamic work needed to remove an electron from a solid to a vacuum immediately outside the solid surface) of the emitter used, and the Boltzmann Constant (which relates to the average kinetic energy of particles in a gas), as well as a number of other factors. In modern systems, however, the structure of a thermionic convertor which isn’t completely solid state is fairly standard: a hot cathode is separated from a cold anode, with cesium vapor in between. For nuclear systems, the anode is often tungsten, the cathode seems to vary depending on the system, and the gap between – called the inter-electrode gap – is system specific.

The cesium exists in an interesting state of matter. Solid, liquid, gas, and plasma are familiar to pretty much everyone at this point, but other states exist under unusual circumstances; perhaps the best known is a supercritical fluid, which exhibits the properties of both a liquid and a gas (although this is a range of possibilities, with some having more liquid properties and some more gaseous). The one that concerns us today is something called Rydberg matter, one of the more exotic forms of matter – although it has been observed in many places across the universe. In its simplest form, Rydberg matter can be seen as small clusters of interconnected molecules within a gas (the largest number of atoms observed in a laboratory is 91, according to Wikipedia, although there’s evidence for far larger numbers in interstellar gas clouds). These clumps end up affecting the electron clouds of those atoms in the clusters, causing them to orbit across the nuclei of those atoms, causing a new lowest-energy state for the entire cluster to occur. These structures don’t degrade any faster under radioactive bombardment due to a number of quantum mechanical properties, which brought them to the attention of the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory staff in the 1950s, and a short time later Soviet nuclear physicists as well.

This sounds complex, and it is, but the key point is this: because the clumps act as a unit within Rydberg matter, their ability to transmit electricity is enhanced compared to other gasses. In particular, cesium seems to be a very good vehicle for creating Rydberg matter, and cesium vapor seems to be the best available for the gap between the cathode and anode of a thermionic convertor. The density of the cesium vapor is variable and dependent on many factors, including the materials properties of the cathode and anode, the temperature of the cathode, the inter-electrode gap distance, and a number of other factors. Tuning the amount of cesium in the inter-electrode gap is something that must occur in any thermionic power conversion system; in fact the original version of the Enisy had the ability to vary the inter-electrode gap pressure (this was later dropped when it was discovered to be superfluous to the efficient function of the reactor).

This type of system comes in two varieties: in-core and out-of-core. The out-of-core variant is very similar to the power conversion systems we saw (briefly) on the SNAP systems: the coolant from the reactor passes around or through the radiation shield of the system, heats the anode, which then emits electrons into the gap, collected by the cathode, and then the electricity goes through the power conditioning unit and into the electrical system of the spacecraft. Because thermionic conversion is theoretically more efficient, and in practice is more flexible in temperature range, than thermoelectric conversion, even keeping the configuration of the power conversion system’s relationship to the rest of the power plant offers some advantages.

The in-core variant, on the other hand, wraps the power conversion system directly around the fissile fuel in the core, with electrical power being conducted out of the core itself and through the shield. The coolant runs across the outside of the thermionic unit, providing the thermal gradient for the system to work, and then exits the reactor. While this increases the volume of the core (admittedly, not by much), it also eliminates the need for more complex plumbing for the primary coolant loop. Additionally, it allows for less heat loss from the coolant having to travel a farther difference. Finally, there’s far less chance of a stray meteor hitting your power conversion system and causing problems – if a thermionic fuel element is damaged by a foreign object, you’re going to have far bigger problems with the system as a whole, since it means that it damaged your control systems and pressure vessel on the way to damaging your power conversion unit!

The in-core thermionic power conversion system, while originally proposed by the US, was seen as a curiosity on their side of the Iron Curtain. Some designs were proposed, but none were significantly researched to the level of being able to be serious contenders in the struggle to gain the significant funding needed to develop as complex a system as an astronuclear fission power plant, and the low conversion efficiency available in practice prevents its application in terrestrial power plants, which to this day continue to use steam turbine generators.

On the other side of the Iron Curtain, however, this was seen as the ideal solution for a power conversion system: the only systems needed for the system to work could be solid-state, with no moving parts: heaters to vaporize the cesium, and electromagnetic pumps to move it through the reactor. Greater radiation resistance and more flexible operating temperatures, as well as greater conversion efficiency, all offered more promise to Soviet astronuclear systems designers than the thermoelectric path that the US ended up following. The first Soviet reactor designed for in-space use, the Romashka, used a thermionic power conversion system, but the challenges involved in the system itself led the Krasnya Zvezda design bureau (who were responsible for the Romasha, Bouk, and Topol reactors) to initially choose to use thermoelectric convertors in their first flight system: the BES-5 Bouk, which we’ve seen before.

Now that we’ve looked at the physics behind how you can place your power conversion system within the reactor vessel of your power plant (and as far as I’ve been able to determine, if you’re looking to generate electricity beyond what a simple sensor needs, this is the only option without going to something very exotic), let’s look at the reactor itself.

Enisy: The Design of the TOPAZ-II Reactor

The Enisy was a uranium oxide fueled, zirconium hydride moderated, sodium-potassium eutectic cooled reactor, which used a single-element thermionic fuel element design for in-core power conversion. The multi-cell version was used in the Topol reactor, where each fuel pellet was wrapped in its own thermionic convertor. This is sometimes called a “flashlight” configuration, since it looks a bit like the batteries in a large flashlight, but this comes at the cost of complexity, mass, and increased inefficiencies. To offset this, many issues are easier to deal with in this configuration, especially as your fuel reaches higher burnup percentages and your fuel swells. The ultimate goal was single-unit thermionic fuel elements, which were realized in the Enisy reactor. While more challenging in terms of materials requirements, the greater simplicity, lower mass, and greater efficiency of the system offered more promise.

The power plant was required to provide 6 kWe of electrical power at the reactor terminals (before the power conditioning unit) at 27 volts. It had to have an operational life of three years, and a storage life if not immediately used in a mission of at least ten years. It also had to have an operational reliability of >95%, and could not under any circumstances achieve criticality before reaching orbit, nor could the coolant freeze at any time during operation. Finally, it had to do all of this in less than 1061 kg (excluding the automatic control system).

Thirty-seven fuel elements were used in the core, which was contained in a stainless steel reactor vessel. These contained uranium oxide fuel pellets, with a central fission gas void about 22% of the diameter of the fuel pellets to prevent swelling as fission products built up. The emitters were made out of molybdenum, a fairly common choice for in-core applications. Al2O3 (sapphire) insulators were used to electrically isolate the fuel elements from the rest of the core. Three of these would be used to power the cesium heater and pump directly, while another (unknown) number powered the NaK coolant pump (my suspicion is that it’s about the same number). The rest would output power directly from the element into the power conditioning unit on the far side of the power plant.

Nine control drums, made mostly out of beryllium but with a neutron poison along one portion of the outer surface (Boron carbide/silicon carbide) surrounded the core. Three of these drums were safety drums, with two positions: in, with the neutron poison facing the center of the core, and out, where the beryllium acted as a neutron reflector. The rest of the drums could be rotated in or out as needed to maintain reactivity at the appropriate level in the core. These had actuators mounted outside the pressure vessel to control the rotation of the drums, and were connected to an automatic control system to ensure autonomous stable function of the reactor within the mission profile that the reactor would be required to support.

The NaK coolant would flow around the fuel elements, driven by an electromagnetic pump, and then pass through a radiator, in an annular flow path immediately surrounding the TFEs. Two inlet and two outlet pipes were used to connect the core to the radiator. In between the radiator and the core was a radiation shield, made up of stainless steel and lithium hydride (more on this seemingly odd choice when we look at the testing history).

The coolant tubes were embedded in a zirconium hydride moderator, which was contained in stainless steel casings.

Finally, a reservoir of cesium was at the opposite end of the reactor from the radiator. This was necessary for the proper functioning of the thermionic fuel elements, and underwent many changes throughout the design history of the reactor, including a significant expansion as the design life requirements increased.

Once the Topaz International program began, additional – and quite significant – changes were made to the reactor’s design, including a new automated control system and an anti-criticality system that actually removed some of the fuel from the core until the start-up commands were sent, but that’s a discussion for the next post.

I saved the coolest part of this system for last: the TISA, or “Thermal Simulators of Apparatus Cores” (the acronym was from the original Russian), heaters. These units were placed in the active section of the thermionic fuel elements to simulate the heat of fission occurring in the thermionic fuel elements, with the rest of the systems and subsystems being in flight configuration. This led to unprecedented levels of testing capability, but at the same time would lead to a couple of problems later in testing – which would be addressed as needed.

How did this design end up this way? In order to understand that, the development and testing process of the Soviet design team must be looked at.

The History of Enisy’s Design

The Enisy reactor started with the development of the thermionic fuel element by the Sukhumi Institute in the early 1960s, which had two options: the single cell and multiple cell variants. In 1967, these two options were split into two different programs: the Topol (Topaz), which we looked at in the Soviet Astronuclear History post, led by the Krasnaya Zvezda design bureau in Moscow, and Enisy, which was headed by the Central Design Bureau of Machine Building in Leningrad (now St. Petersburg). Aside from the lead bureau, in charge of the overall program and system management, a number of other organizations were involved with the fabrication and testing of the reactor system: the design and modeling team consisted of: the Kurchatov Institute of Atomic Energy was responsible for nuclear design and analytics, the Scientific Industrial Association Lutch was responsible for the thermionic fuel elements, the Sukhumi Institute remained involved in the reactor’s automatic control systems design; fabrication and testing was the responsibility of: the Research Institute of Chemical Machine Building for thermal vacuum testing, the Scientific Institute for Instrument Building’s Turaevo nuclear test facility, Kraznoyarsk Spacecraft Designer for mechanical testing and spacecraft integration, Prometheus Laboratory for materials development (including liquid metal eutectic development for the cooling system and materials testing) and welding, and the Enisy manufacturing facility was located in Talinn, Estonia (a decision that would cause later headaches during the collaboration).

The Enisy originally had three customers (the identities of which I am not aware of, simply that at least one was military), and each had different requirements for the reactor. Originally designed to operate at 6 kWe for one year with a >95% success rate, but customer requirements changed both of these characteristics significantly. As an example, one customer needed a one year system life, with a 6 kWe power output, while another only needed 5 kWe – but needed a three year mission lifetime. This longer lifetime ended up becoming the baseline requirement of the system, although the 6 kWe requirement and >95% mission success rate remained unchanged. This led to numerous changes, especially to the cesium reservoir needed for the thermionic convertors, as well as insulators, sensors, and other key components in the reactor itself. As the cherry on top, the manufacture of the system was moved from Moscow to Talinn, Estonia, resulting in a new set of technicians needing to be trained to the specific requirements of the system, changes in documentation, and at the fall of the Soviet Union loss of significant program documentation which could have assisted the Russia/US collaboration on the system.

The nuclear design side of things changed throughout the design life as well. An increase in the number of thermionic fuel elements (TFEs) occurred in 1974, from 31 to 37 in the reactor core, an increase in the height of the “active” section of the TFE, although whether the overall TFE length (and therefore the core length) changed is information I have not been able to find. Additional space in the TFEs was added to account for greater fuel swelling as fission products built up in the fuel pellets, and the bellows used to ensure proper fitting of the TFEs with reactor components were modified as well. The moderator blocks in the core, made out of zirconium hydride, were modified at least twice, including changing the material that the moderator was kept in. Manufacturing changes in the stainless steel reactor vessel were also required, as were changes to the gamma shielding design for the shadow shield. All in all, the reactor went through significant changes from the first model tested to theend of its design life.

Another area with significantly changing requirements was the systems integration side of things. The reactor was initially meant to be launched in a reactor-up position, but this was changed in 1979 to a reactor-down launch configuration, necessitating changes to several systems in what ended up being a significant effort. Another change in the launch integration requirements was an increase in the acceleration levels required during dynamic testing by a factor of almost two, resulting in failures in testing – and resultant redesigns of many of the structures used in the system. Another thing that changed was the boom that mounted the power plant to the spacecraft – three different designs were used through the lifetime of the system on the Russian side of things, and doubtless another two (at least) were needed for the American spacecraft integration.

Perhaps the most changed design was the coolant loop, due to significant problems during testing and manufacturing of the system.

Design Driven by (Expected) Failure: The USSR Testing Program

Flight qualification for nuclear reactors in the USSR at the time was very different from the way that the US did flight qualification, something that we’ll look at a bit more later in this post. The Soviet method of flight qualification was to heavily test a number of test-beds, using both nuclear and non-nuclear techniques, to validate the design parameters. However, the actual flight articles themselves weren’t subjected to nearly the same level of testing that the American systems would be, instead going through a relatively “basic” (according to US sources) workmanship examination before any theoretical launch.

In the US, extensive systems modeling is a routine part of nuclear design of any sort, as well as astronautical design. Failures are not unexpected, but at the same time the ideal is that the system has been studied and modeled mathematically thoroughly enough that it’s not unreasonable to predict that the system will function correctly the first time… and the second… and so on. This takes not only a large amount of skilled intellectual and manual labor to achieve, but also significant computational capabilities.

In the Soviet Union, however, the preferred method of astronautical – and astronuclear – development was to build what seemed to be a well-designed system and then test it, expecting failure. Once this happened, the causes of the failure were analyzed, the problem corrected, and then the newly upgraded design would be tested again… and again, for as many times as were needed to develop a robust system. Failure was literally built into the development process, and while it could be frustrating to correct the problems that occurred, the design team knew that the way their system could fail had been thoroughly examined, leading to a more reliable end result.

This design philosophy leads to a large number of each system needing to be built. Each reactor that was built underwent a post-manufacturing examination to determine the quality of the fabrication in the system, and from this the appropriate use of the reactor. These systems had four prefixes: SM, V, Ya, and Eh. Each system in this order was able to do everything that the previous reactor would be able to do, in addition to having superior capabilities to the previous type. The SM, or static mockup, articles were never built for anything but mechanical testing, and as such were stripped down, “boilerplate” versions of the system. The V reactors were the next step up, which were used for thermophysical (heat transfer, vibration testing, etc) or mechanical testing, but were not of sufficient quality to undergo nuclear testing. The Ya reactors were suitable for use in nuclear testing as well, and in a pinch would be able to be used in flight. The Eh reactors were the highest quality, and were designated potential flight systems.

In addition to this designation, there were four distinct generations of reactor: the first generation was from V-11 to Ya-22. This core used 31 thermionic fuel elements, with a one year design life. They were intended to be launched upright, and had a lightweight radiation shield. The next generation, V-15 to Ya-26, the operational lifetime was increased to a year and a half.

The third generation, V-71 to Eh-42 had a number of changes. The number of TFEs was increased from 31 to 37, in large part to accommodate another increase in design life, to above 3 years. The emitters on the TFEs were changed to the monocrystaline Mo emitters, and the later ones had Nb added to the Mo (more on this below). The ground testing thermal power level was reduced, to address thermal damage from the heating units in earlier non-nuclear tests. This is also when the launch configuration was changed from upright to inverted, necessitating changes in the freeze-prevention thermal shield, integration boom, and radiator mounting brackets. The last two of this generation, Eh -41 and Eh-42, had the heavier radiation shield installed, while the rest used the earlier, lighter gamma shield.

The final generation, Ya-21u to Eh-44, had the longest core lifetime requirement of three years at 5.5 kWe power output. These included all of the other changes above, as well as many smaller changes to the reactor vessel, mounting brackets, and other mechanical components. Most of these systems ended up becoming either Ya or Eh units due to lessons learned in the previous three generations, and all of the units which would later be purchased by the US as flight units came from this final generation.

A total of 29 articles were built by 1992, when the US became involved in the program. As of 1992, two of the units were not completed, and one was never assembled into its completed configuration.

Sixteen of the 21 units were tested between 1970 and 1989, providing an extensive experimental record of the reactor type. Of these tests, thirteen underwent thermal, mechanical, and integration non-nuclear testing. Nuclear testing occurred six times at the Baikal nuclear facility. As of 1992, there were two built, but untested, flight units available: the E-43 and E-44, with the E-45 still under construction.

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Unit Name

Generation

Series #

Core Life

# of TFEs

TFE Generation

ACS Unit

Launch configuration

Manufacturing location

Test type

Test stand

Testing begin

Testing end

Testing duration

System notes

SM-0

0

Static Model 1

n/a

n/a

n/a

Upright

CDBMB

Static

01/01/76

01/01/76

Original mockup, with three main load bearing systems.

SM-1

0

Static Model 2

n/a

n/a

n/a

Inverted

CDBMB

Static

Krasnoyarsk

01/01/83

01/01/84

Inverted launch configuration static test model.

SM-2

0

Static Model 3

n/a

n/a

n/a

Inverted

CDBMB

Static

Krasnoyarsk

01/01/83

01/01/84

Inverted launch configuration static test model.

V-11

1

Prototype 1

1

1

Upright

CDBMB

Electric heat

Baikal

07/23/71

02/03/72

3200

Development of system test methods and operations. Incomplete set of TFEs

V-12

1

Prototype 2

1

31

1

Upright

CDBMB

Electrical

Baikal

06/21/72

04/18/73

850

Development of technology for prelaunch operations and system testing

V-13

1

Prototype 3

1

31

1

Upright

Talinn

Mechanical

Baikal, Mechanical

08/01/72

05/01/73

?

Transportation, dynamic, shock, cold temperature testing. Reliability at freezing and heating.

Ya(?)-20

1

Specimen 1

1

31

1

Upright

Talinn

Nuclear

Romashka

10/01/72

03/01/74

2500

Zero power testing. Neutron physical characteristics, radiation field characterization. Development of nuclear tests methods.

Ya-21

1

Specimen 2

1

31

1

Upright

Talinn

Nuclear

Baikal, Romashka

?

?

?

Nuclear test methods and test stand trials. Prelaunch operations. Neutron plysical characteristics

Ya-22

1

Specimen 3

1

31

1

Upright

Talinn

n/a

n/a

n/a

n/a

n/a

Unfabricated, was intended to use Ya-21 design documents

Unit Name

Generation

Series #

Core Life

# of TFEs

TFE Generation

ACS Unit

Launch configuration

Manufacturing location

Test type

Test stand

Testing begin

Testing end

Testing duration

System notes

V-15

2

Serial 1

1-1.5

31

2

Upright

Talinn

Cold temp

Baikal, Cold Temp Testing

02/12/80

?

Operation and functioning tests at freezing and heating.

V-16

2

Serial 2

1-1.5

31

2

Upright

Talinn

Mechanical, Electrical

Mechanical

08/01/79

12/01/79

2300

Transportation, vibration, shock. Post-mechanical electirc serviceability testing.

Ya-23

2

Serial 3

1-1.5

31

2

SAU-35

Upright

Talinn

Nuclear

Romashka

03/10/75

06/30/76

5000

Nuclear testing revision and development, including fuel loading, radiation and nuclear safety. Studied unstable nuclear conditions and stainless steel material properties, disassembly and inspection. LiH moderator hydrogen loss in test.

Eh-31

2

Serial 4

1-1.5

31

2

SAU-105

Upright

Talinn

Nuclear

Romashka

02/01/76

09/01/78

4600

Nuclear ground test. ACS startup, steady-state functioning, post-operation disassembly and inspection. TFE lifetime limited to ~2 months due to fuel swelling

Ya-24

2

Serial 5

1-1.5

31

2

SAU-105

Upright

Talinn

Nuclear

Tureavo

12/01/78

04/01/81

14000

Steady state nuclear testing. Significant TFE shortening post-irradiation.

(??)-33

2

Serial 6

1-1.5

31

2

Upright

Talinn

Spacecraft integration

Tureavo

n/a

n/a

n/a

TFE needed redesign, no systems testing. Installed at Turaevo as mockup. Used to establish transport and handling procedures

V(?)-25

2

Serial 7

1-1.5

31

2

Upright

Talinn

Spacecraft integration

Krasnoyarsk

n/a

n/a

?

System incomplete. Used as spacecraft mockup, did not undergo physical testing.

(??)-35

2

Serial 8

1-1.5

31

2

Upright

Talinn

Test stand preparation

Baikal

?

?

?

Second fabrication stage not completed. Used for some experiments with Baikal test stand. Disassembled in Sosnovivord.

V(?)-26

2

Serial 9

1-1.5

31

2

Upright

Talinn, CDBMB

n/a

n/a

n/a

n/a

n/a

Refabricated at CDBMB. TFE burnt and damaged during second fadrication. Notch between TISA and emitter

Unit Name

Generation

Series #

Core Life

# of TFEs

TFE Generation

ACS Unit

Launch configuration

Manufacturing location

Test type

Test stand

Testing begin

Testing end

Testing duration

System notes

V-71

3

Serial 10

1.5

37

3

Upright, Inverted

Talinn

Mechanical, Electrical, Spacecraft integration

Baikal, Krasnoyarsk, Cold Temp Testing

01/01/81

01/01/87

1300

Converted from upright to inverted launch configuration, spacecraft integration heavily modified. First to use 37 TFE core configuration. Transport testing (railroad vibration and shock), cold temperature testing. Electrical testing post-mechanical. Zero power testing at Krasnoyarsk.

Ya-81

3

Serial 11

1.5

37

3

Ground control (no ACS)

Inverted

Talinn

Nuclear

Romashka

09/01/80

01/01/83

12500

Nuclear ground test, steady state operation. Leaks observed in two cooling pipes 120 hrs into test; leaks plugged and test continued. Disassembly and inspection.

Ya-82

3

Serial 12

1.5

37

3

Prototype Sukhumi ACS

Inverted

Talinn

Nuclear

Tureavo

09/01/83

11/01/84

8300

Nuclear ground test, startup using ACS, steady state. Initial leak in EM pump led to large leak later in test. Test ended in loss of coolant accident. Reactor disassembled and inspected post-test to determine leak cause.

Eh(?)-37

3

Serial 13

1.5

37

3

Inverted

Talinn

Static

?

?

?

?

Quality not sufficient for flight (despite Eh “flight” designation). Static and torsion tests conducted.

Eh-38

3

Serial 14

1.5

37

3

Factory #1

Inverted

Talinn

Nuclear

Romashka

02/01/86

05/01/86

4700

Nuclear ground test, pre-launch simulation. ACS startup and operation. Steady state test. Post-operation disassembly and examination.

(??)-39

3

Serial 15

1.5

37

3

Inverted

Talinn

special

special

special

special

special

Fabrication begin in Estonia, with some changed components. After changes, system name changed to Eh-41, and serial number changed to 17. Significant reactor changes.

Eh-40

3

Serial 16

1.5

37

3

Inverted

Talinn

Cold temp, coolant flow

?

01/03/88

12/31/88

?

Cold temperature testing. No electrical testing. Filled with NaK during second stage of fabrication.

Eh-41

3

Serial 17

1.5

37

3

Inverted

Talinn

Mechanical, Leak

Baikal, Mechanical

01/01/88

?

?

Began life as Eh(?)-39, post-retrofit designation. Transportation (railroad) dynamic, and impact testing. Leak testing done post-mechanical testing. First use of increased shield mass.

Eh-42

3

Serial 18

1.5

37

3

Inverted

Talinn

n/a

n/a

Critical component welding failure during fabrication. Unit never used.

Unit Name

Generation

Series #

Core Life

# of TFEs

TFE Generation

ACS Unit

Launch configuration

Manufacturing location

Test type

Test stand

Testing begin

Testing end

Testing duration

System notes

Ya-21u

4

Serial 19

3

37

4

Inverted

Talinn

Electrical

Baikal

12/01/87

12/01/89

?

First Gen 4 reactor using modified TFEs. Electrical testing on TFEs conducted. New end-cap insulation on TFEs tested.

Eh-43

4

Serial 20

3

37

4

Inverted

Talinn

n/a

6/30/88 (? Unclear what testing is indicated)

n/a

n/a

n/a

Flight unit. First fabrication phase in Talinn completed, second incomplete as of 1994

Eh-44

4

Serial 21

3

37

4

Inverted

Talinn

n/a

n/a

n/a

n/a

n/a

Flight unit. First fabrication phase in Talinn completed, second incomplete as of 1994

Eh(?)-45

4

Serial 22

3

37

4

Inverted

Talinn

n/a

n/a

n/a

n/a

n/a

Partially fabricated unit with missing components.

Not many fine details are known about the testing of these systems, but we do have some information about the tests that led to significant design changes. These changes are best broken down by power plant subsystem, because while there’s significant interplay between these various subsystems their functionality can change in minor ways quite easily without affecting the plant as a whole. Those systems are: the thermionic fuel elements, the moderator, the pressure vessel, the shield, the coolant loop (which includes the radiator piping), the radiator coatings, the launch configuration, the cesium unit, and the automatic control system (including the sensors for the system and the drum drive units). While this seems like a lot of systems to cover, many of them have very little information about their design history to pass on, so it’s less daunting than it initially appears.

Thermionic Fuel Elements

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It should come as no surprise that the thermionic fuel elements (TFEs) were extensively modified throughout the testing program. One of the big problems was short circuiting across the inter-electrode gap due to fuel swelling, although other problems occurred to cause short circuits as well.

Perhaps the biggest change was the change from 31 to 37 TFEs in the core, one of the major changes to minimize fuel swelling. The active core length (where the pellets were) was increased by up to 40 mm (from 335 mm to 375 mm), the inter-electrode gap was widened by 0.05 mm (from 0.45 to 0.5 mm). In addition, the hole through the center of the fuel element was increased in diameter to allow for greater internal swelling, reducing the mechanical stress on the emitter.

The method of attaching the bellows for thermal expansion were modified (the temperature was dropped 10 K) to prevent crystalization of the palladium braze and increase bellows thermal cycling capability after failures on the Ya-24 system (1977-1981).

Perhaps the biggest change was to the materials used in the TFE. The emitter started off as a polycrystaline molybdenum in the first two generations of reactors, but the grain boundaries between the Mo crystals caused brittleness over time. Because of this, they developed the capability to use monocrystalline Mo, which improved performance in the early third generation of reactors – just not enough. In the final version seen in later 3^rd generation and fourth generation systems, the Mo was doped with 3% niobium, which created the best available material for the emitter.

There were many other changes during the development of the thermionic fuel elements, including the addition of coatings on some materials for corrosion resistance, changes in electrical insulation type, and others, but these were the most significant in terms of functionality of the TFEs, and their impact on the overall systems design.

ZrH Moderator

The zirconium hydride neutron moderator was placed around the outside of the core. Failures were observed several times in testing, including the Ya-23 test, which resulted in loss of hydrogen in the core and the permanent shutdown of that reactor. Overpower issues, combined with a loss of coolant, led to moderator failure in Ya-82 as well, but in this case the improved H barriers used in the stainless steel “cans” holding the ZrH prevented a loss of hydrogen accident despite the ZrH breaking up (the failure was due to the ZrH being spread more thinly across the reactor, not the loss of H due to ZrH damage).

This development process was one of the least well documented areas of the Soviet program.

Reactor Vessel

Again, this subsystem’s development seems poorly documented. The biggest change, though, seems to be changing the way the triple coating (of chrome, then nickel, then enamel) was applied to the stainless steel of the reactor vessel. This was due to the failure of the Ya-23 unit, which failed at the join between the tube and the end of the tube on one of the TFEs. The crack self-sealed, but for future units the coatings didn’t go all the way to the weld, and the hot CO2 used as a cover gas was allowed to carbonize the steel to prevent fatigue cracking.

Radiation Shield

The LiH component of the radiation shield (for neutron shielding) seems to not have changed much throughout the development of the reactor. The LiH was contained in a 1.5 mm thick stainless steel casing, polished on the ends for reflectivity and coated black on the outside face.

However, the design of the stainless steel casing was changed in the early 1980s to meet more stringent payload gamma radiation doses. Rather than add a new material such as tungsten or depleted uranium as is typical, the designers decided to just thicken the reactor and spacecraft sides of the LiH can to 65 mm and 60 mm respectively. While this was definitely less mass-efficient than using W or U, the manufacturing change was fairly trivial to do with stainless steel, and this was considered the most effective way to ensure the required flux rates with the minimum of engineering challenges.

The first unit to use this was the E-41, fabricated in 1985, which was also the first unit to be tested in the inverted flight configuration. The heavier shield, combined with the new position, led to the failure of one of the shield-to-reactor brackets, as well as the attachment clips for the radiator piping. These components were changed, and no further challenges occurred with the shield in the rest of the test program.

Coolant Loop

The NaK coolant loop was the biggest source of headaches dueing the development of the Enisy. A brief list of failures, and actions taken to correct them, is here:

V-11 (July 1971-February 1972): A weld failed at the join between the radiator tubing and collector during thermophysical testing. The double weld was changed to a triple weld to correct the failure mode.

Ya-21 (1971): This reactor seemed to have everything go wrong with it. Another leak at the same tube-to-collector interface led to the welding on of a small sleeve to repair the crack. This fix seemed to solve the problem of failures in that location.

Ya-23 (March 1975-June 1976): Coolant leak between coolant tube and moderator cavity. Both coating changes and power ramp-up limits eliminated issues.

V-71 (January 1981-1994?): NaK leak in radiator tube after 290 hours of testing. Plugged, testing continued. New leak occurred 210 test hours later, radiator examined under x-ray. Two additional poorly-manufactured tubes replaced with structural supports. One of test reactors sent to US under Topaz International.

Ya-81 (September 1980-January 1983): Two radiator pipe leaks 180 hours into nuclear testing (no pre-nuclear thermophysical testing of unit). Piping determined to be of lower quality after switching manufacturers. Post-repair, the unit ran for 12,500 hours in nuclear power operation.

Ya-82 (September 1983 to November 1984): Slow leak led to coolant pump voiding and oscillations, then one of six pump inlet lines being split. There were two additional contributions to this failure: the square surfaces were pressed into shape from square pipes, which can cause stress microfractures at the corners, and second the inlet pump was forced into place, causing stress fracturing at the joint. This failure led to reactor overheating due to a loss-of-coolant condition, and led to the failure of the ZrH moderator blocks. This led to increased manufacturing controls on the pump assembly, and no further major pump failures were noted in the remainder of the testing.

Eh-38 (February 1986-August 1986): This failure is a source of some debate among the Russian specialists. Some believe it was a slow leak that began shortly after startup, while others believe that it was a larger leak that started at some point toward the end of the 4700 hour nuclear test. The exact location of the leak was never located, however it’s known that it was in the upper collector of the radiator assembly.

Ya-21u (December 1987-December 1989): Caustic stress-corrosion cracking occurred about a month and a half into thermophysical testing in the lower collector assembly, likely caused by a coating flaw growing during thermal cycling. This means that subsurface residual stresses existed within the collector itself. Due to the higher-than-typical (by U.S. standards) carbon content in the stainless steel (the specification allowed for 0.08%-0.12% carbon, rather than the less than 0.8% carbon content in the U.S. SS-321), the steel was less ductile than was ideal, which could have been a source of the flaw growing as it did. Additionally, increased oxygen levels in the NaK coolant could have exacerbated the problem more as well. A combination of ensuring that heat treatments had occurred post-forming, as well as ensuring a more oxygen-poor environment, were essential to reducing the chances of this failure happening again.

Radiator

The only known data poing on the radiator development was during the Ya-23 test, where the radiator coating changed the nuclear properties of the system at elevated temperature (how is unknown). This was changed to something that would be less affected by the radiation environment. The final radiator configuration was a chrome and polymer substrate with an emissivity of 0.85 at beginning of life.

Launch configuration

As we saw, the orientation that the reactor was to be launched in was changed from upright to inverted, with the boom to connect the reactor to the spacecraft being side by side inside the payload fairing. This required the thermal cover used to prevent the NaK from freezing to be redesigned, and modified after the V-13 test, when it was discovered to not be able to prevent freezing of the coolant. The new cover was verified on the V-15 tests, and remained largely unchanged after this.

Some of the load-bearing brackets needed to be changed or reinforced as well, and the clips used to secure the radiator pipes to the structural components of the radiator.

Cesium Supply Unit

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For the TFEs to work properly, it was critical that the Cs vapor pressure was within the right pressure range relative tot he temperature of the reactor core. This system was designed from first physical principles, leading to a novel structure that used temperature and pressure gradients to operate. While initially throttleable, but there were issues with this functionality during the Ya-24 nuclear test. This changed when it was discovered that there was an ideal pressure setting for all power levels, so the feed pressure was fixed. Sadly, on the Ya-81 test the throttle was set too high, leading to the need to cool the Cs as it returned to the reservoir.

Additional issues were found in the startup subsystem (a single-use puncture valve) used to vent the inert He gas from the interelectrode gap (this was used during launch and before startup to prevent Cs from liquefying or freezing in the system), as well as to balance the Cs pressure by venting it into space at a rate of about 0.4 g/day. The Ya-23 test saw a sensor not register the release of the He, leading to an upgraded spring for the valve.

Finally, the mission lifetime extension during the 1985/86 timeframe tripled the required lifetime of the system, necessitating a much larger Cs reservoir to account for Cs venting. This went from having 0.455 g to 1 kg. These were tested on Ya-21u and Eh-44, despite one (military) customer objecting due to insufficient testing of the upgraded system. This system would later be tested and found to be acceptable as part of the Topaz International program.

Automatic Control System

The automatic control system, or ACS, was used for automatic startup and autonomous reactor power management, and went through more significant changes than any other system, save perhaps the thermionic fuel elements. The first ACS, called the SAU-35, was used for the Ya-23 ground test, followed by the SAU-105 for the Eh-31 and Ya-24 tests. Problems arose, however, because these systems were manufactured by the Institute for Instrument Building of the Ministry of Aviation Construction, while the Enisy program was under the purview of the Ministry of Atomic Energy, and bureaucratic problems reared their heads.

This led the Enisy program to look to the Sukhumi Institute (who, if you remember, were the institute that started both the Topol and Enisy programs in the 1960s before control was transferred elsewhere) for the next generation of ACS. During this transition, the Ya-81 ground nuclear test occurred, but due to the bureaucratic wrangling, manufacturer change, and ACS certification tests there was no unit available for the test. This led the Ya-81 reactor to be controlled from the ground station. The Ya-82 test was the first to use a prototype Sukhumi-built ACS, with nine startups being successfully performed by this unit.

The loss-of-cooling accident potentially led to the final major change to the ACS for the Eh-38 test: the establishment of an upper temperature limit. After this, the dead-band was increased to allow greater power drift in the reactor (reducing the necessary control drum movement), as well as some minor modifications rerouting the wires to ensure proper thermocouple sensor readings, were the final significant modifications before Topaz International started.

Sensors

The sensors on the Enisy seem to have been regularly problematic, but rather than replace them, they were either removed or left as instrumentation sensors rather than control sensors. These included the volume accumulator sensors on the stainless steel bellows for the thermionic fuel elements (which were removed), and the set of sensors used to monitor the He gas in the TFE gas gap (for fission product buildup), the volume accumulator (which also contained Ar), and the radiation shield. This second set of sensors was kept in place, but was only able to measure absolute changes, not precise measurements, so was not useful for the ACS.

Control Drive Unit

The control drive unit was responsible for the positioning of the control drums, both on startup as well as throughout the life of the reactor to maintain appropriate reactivity and power levels. Like in the SNAP program, these drive systems were a source of engineering headaches.

Perhaps the most recurring problem during the mid-1970s was the failure of the position sensor for the drive system, which was used to monitor the rotational position of the drum relative to the core. This failed in the Ya-20, Ya-21, and Ya-23, after which it was replaced with a sensor of a new design and the problem isn’t reported again. The Ya-81 test saw the loss of the Ar gas used as the initial lubricant in the drive system, and later seizing of the bearing the drive system connected to, leading to its replacement with a graphite-based lubricant.

The news wasn’t all bad, however. The Eh-40 test demonstrated greater control of drum position by reducing the backlash in the kinematic circuit, for instance, and improvements to the materials and coatings used eliminated problems of coating delamination, improving the system’s resistance to thermal cycling and vibrational stresses, and radiator coating issues.

The Eh-44 drive unit was replaced against the advice of one of the Russian customers due to a lack of mandatory testing on the advanced drive system. This system remained installed at the time of Topaz International, and is something that we’ll look at in the next blog post.

A New Customer Enters the Fold

During this testing, an American company (which is not named) was approached about possibly purchasing nearly complete Enisy reactors: the only thing that the Soviets wouldn’t sell was the fissile fuel itself, and that they would help with the manufacturing on. This was in addition to the three Russian customers (at least one of which was military, but again all remain unnamed). This company did not purchase any units, but did go to the US government with this offer.

This led to the Topaz International program, funded by the US Department of Defense’s Ballistic Missile Defense Organization. The majority of the personnel involved were employees of Los Alamos and Sandia National Laboratories, and the testing occurred at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, NM.

As a personal note, I was just outside the perimeter fence when the aircraft carrying the test stand and reactors landed, and it remains one of the formational events in my childhood, even though I had only the vaguest understanding of what was actually happening, or that some day, more than 20 years, later, I would be writing about this very program, which I saw reach a major inflection point.

The Topaz International program will be the subject of our next blog post. It’s likely to be a longer one (as this was), so it may take me a little longer than a week to get out, but the ability to compare and contrast Soviet and American testing standards on the same system is too golden an opportunity to pass up.

Stay tuned! More is coming soon!

References:

Topaz II Design Evolution, Voss 1994 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/234517721_TOPAZ_II_Design_Evolution

Russian Topaz II Test Program, Voss 1993 http://gnnallc.com/pdfs_r/SD%2006%20LA-UR-93-3398.pdf

Overview of the Nuclear Electric Propulsion Space Test Program, Voss 1994 https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/10157573

Thermionic System Evaluation Test: Ya-21U System, Topaz International Program, Schmidt et al 1996 http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/b222940.pdf