The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Mar. 19, 2002
Filed:
Jun. 06, 2000
Luciano Veronesi, Pittsburgh, PA (US);
James A. Drake, Pittsburgh, PA (US);
Westinghouse Electric Company LLC, Pittsburgh, PA (US);
Abstract
Cracks in the shaft of a reactor coolant pump adjacent a tapered end on which the impeller is mounted are removed by machining a circumferential groove in the pump shaft to a depth and an axial length which removes the cracks but does not extend into the tapered end of the pump shaft. A split ring fills the groove to an outer diameter which matches the outer diameter of the pump shaft. A thermal sleeve shrink fit over the split ring has internal annular ribs engaging the shaft and the ring to form an annulus which communicates with the pump chamber sufficiently to maintain a layer of substantially stagnant coolant over the split ring and the pump shaft at the pressure of the coolant being pumped. An oversized washer between the impeller and the impeller retainer nut overlaps the interface between the impeller and the tapered end of the pump shaft to impede the flow of hot reactor coolant along the keyways in the tapered end of the shaft and the impeller to minimize temperature fluctuations in the vicinity of the thermal sleeve. Preferably, the thermal sleeve has a lower coefficient of thermal expansion than those of the shaft and the split ring.