LAUSR

Abstract The Control Rod Drive Mechanism (CRDM) is an essential part of the reactor, which realizes the start-stop and power adjustment of the reactor by lifting and lowering the control rod assembly. As a moving part in CRDM, the latch directly contacts with the control rod assembly, and the life of latch is closely related to the service life of the reactor. In this paper, the relationship between the life of the latch and the step stress, friction stress, and impact stress in the process of movement is analyzed, and the optimization methodology and process of latch life based on the approximate model are proposed. The design variables that affect the life of the latch are studied through the experimental design, and the optimization objective of design variables based on the latch life is established. Based on this, an approximate model of the life of the latch is built, and the multi-objective optimization of the life of the latch is optimized through the NSGA-II algorithm.