Patent Number: 053234332
Section: abstract

An apparatus is presented for drying wet ground fuel pellets for nuclear reactors, inspecting the surface quality of the pellets, and loading the inspected pellets on a tray for storage. The pellets are discharged from a wet grinder, and are charged one at a time into pellet pockets formed at the periphery of a rotation disc, with the pellet axis aligned in the direction of transport. The rotation disc changes the transport direction from an axial direction to a radial direction, at right angle to the pellet axis. The rotation disc is provided with a gas circulation device, which delivers a flow of air from in-ports to edge surfaces of the pellets and discharges the air from out-ports. The direction of the air flow is alternated so that both end surfaces of the pellets will be dried completely. The underside of the pellets is also dried by an air flow directed to the pellets from gas outflow port disposed at the bottom region of the pellet pocket. The end surfaces and the side surface of each dried pellet are inspected in the pellet inspection section by image processing techniques, and the machine-inspected pellets are further examined visually in the visual confirmation section. The inspected pellets are loaded onto a tray, and are stored in the tray storage rack.