Design and Stress Analysis of Extraterrestrial ... - The Black Vault

Fig. 2.69. Thermal trap
with controllable flaps.
Figure 2.69 shows the design of the thermal trap with flaps
for controlling the thermal flux. The trap consists of a ring 1
for attaching to the concentrator the housing parts 2, 3, which
form the cavity 4 through which the liquid metal is pumped.
peculiarity
A
of this design is the possibility of controlling
amount of thermal the
flux by the flaps 5. The dashes show
of
the
the
position
flaps when the thermal flux is maximum. The device 6 which
compensates for the variation in the volume of metal in the trap
during heating is shown in the inset.
2.4. FUEL ELEMENTS
A fuel element is the electrochemical device in which tie
chemical energy of the fuel is
converted directly into electrical
energy without intermediate conversion into thermal and mechanical
energy.
The advantages of thermal elements are:
- high efficiency. Theoretically the efficiency
elements
of thermal
is double the efficiency of installations with mechanical
power conversion and can reach 60%;
- low specific weight of the power installation on fuel elements,
it is considerably lower than a turbogenerator converter;
- comparatively simple structural shapes for the installation.
There are no revolving parts as exist in
with mechanical power conversion.
installations, for example,
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