A Re-Analysis of Historical Los Alamos Critical Assembly Reaction Rate Measurements

Abstract

Starting in the 1950s and continuing into the early 1970s, a number of foil irradiations and fission chamber measurements were made in a variety of Fast critical assemblies at Los Alamos National Laboratory. These include (i) Godiva, a bare HEU spherical assembly; (ii) Flattop-25, a spherical assembly consisting of an HEU core and a natural uranium reflector; (iii) Jezebel, a bare 239Pu assembly; and (iv) Flattop-Pu, a spherical assembly consisting of a 239Pu core and a natural uranium reflector. In most instances the irradiations occur at or near the center of the assembly, but in selected instances data were obtained for a radial traverse extending into the Flattop reflector region. Measurements were made for a number of threshold reactions, including 45Sc(n,2n)44mSc, 51V(n,α)48Sc, 75As(n,2n)74As, 89Y(n,2n)88Y, 90Zr(n,2n)89Zr, 103Rh(n,2n)102gRh, 107Ag(n,2n)106mAg, 169Tm(n,2n)168Tm, 175Lu(n,2n)174Lu, 191Ir(n,2n)190Ir, 197Au(n,2n)196Au, 203Tl(n,2n)202Tl, 204Pb(n,2n)203Pb and 238U(n,2n)237U. Fission ratio data for 238U(n,f)/235U(n,f) and 239Pu(n,f)/235U(n,f) were also obtained. We report C/E values from MCNP6 calculations using ENDF/B-VII.1 and IRDFF-v1.03 cross section data.