A New Era of Nuclear Criticality Experiments: The First 10 Years of Flattop Operations at NCERC
David Hayes, T. A. Bredeweg, Theresa Cutler, Joetta Goda, Travis Grove, Jesson Hutchinson, Juliann Lamproe, George McKenzie, Alexander McSpaden, William Myers, Rene Sanchez, Jessie Walker
Abstract
The Flattop critical assembly was built and operated from 1958 through 2004 at the Pajarito Site (Technical Area-18), home to the Los Alamos Critical Experiments Facility. Flattop was disassembled in 2005 and refurbished over the course of 3 years. In 2008, Flattop was installed in the National Criticality Experiments Research Center (NCERC) located in the Device Assembly Facility at the Nevada National Security Site. Startup of Flattop with a uranium core occurred in 2011. This paper details the first 10 years of Flattop operations at NCERC (2011–present).