The influence of cold-work level on the irradiation creep and swelling of AISI 316 stainless steel irradiated as pressurized tubes in the EBR-II fast reactor

Pressurized tubes of AISI 316 stainless steel irradiated in the P-1 experiment in the EBR-II fast reactor have been measured to determine the dependence of irradiation-induced strains resulting from plastic deformation, irradiation creep, void swelling and precipitation. It is shown that the Soderberg relation predicting no axial creep strains in biaxially-loaded tubes is correct for both plastic and creep strains. Swelling strains are shown to be isotropically distributed both for stress-free and stress-affected swelling, while precipitation strains are somewhat anisotropic in their distribution. When corrected for stress-enhancement of swelling, the derived irradiation creep strains appear to be identical for both annealed and 20% cold-worked specimens, and also for tubes strained by rise to power increases in pressure. For relatively small creep strains it is often difficult to separate the creep and non-creep components of deformation.