Ga Technologies, Inc.

General Atomic Company

Ling Yang

James L Kaae

Terry D Gulden

George H Reynolds

Russell R Medico

Stewart A Sterling

Wesley A Baugh

A massive article is coated by chemical vapor deposition in a chamber having a horizontal cross-sectional configuration generally matched to the horizontal cross-sectional configuration of the article. For an article which is relatively thin between a pair of opposed faces so that the article is subject to breakage by the force of surging particles of a fluidized particle bed, breakage is reduced in a coating chamber having vertical sidewalls that generally parallel the faces of the article and relatively narrow endwalls. The article is centered in the chamber with its faces parallel to the sidewalls leaving a region between the faces that accommodates an adequate flow of carrier gas and coating vapor without requiring a large charge of particles that would create undue surging force against the article.

Method and apparatus for coating fragile articles in a fluidized bed of

Spherical particles of lithium aluminate are formed by initially producing aluminum hydroxide spheroids, and immersing the spheroids in a lithium ion-containing solution to infuse lithium ions into the spheroids. The lithium-infused spheroids are rinsed to remove excess lithium ion from the surface, and the rinsed spheroids are soaked for a period of time in a liquid medium to remove water and NH.sub.4 OH from their surfaces. The soaked spheroids are then dried and sintered to form lithium aluminate spherical particles.

Method of producing spherical lithium aluminate particles

Coated nuclear fuel particles are made by first pyrolytically depositing low density carbon onto fuel cores and thereafter depositing a fission-product retentive, higher density exterior coating. In the improvement, cores of uranium, thorium or plutonium oxides are coated by co-depositing silicon carbide or zirconium carbide along with the low density pyrocarbon to create a uniform dispersion. Silicon or zirconium is deposited in an amount equal to at least about one atom for each fission anticipated during the fuel lifetime.

Nuclear fuel particles

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Ling Yang