Water hydraulic actuators for ITER maintenance devices

The characteristic advantages of hydraulics (high power density, simple construction and reliability) together with the characteristics of water as the pressure medium (fire and environmentally safe, chemically neutral, not activated nor affected by radiation) are highlighted in critical applications such as remote handling operations in international thermonuclear experimental reactor (ITER). However, lack of commercial selection of water hydraulic components, common design expertise and known application experiences prevents wide use of water hydraulics. Since 1994, IHA has designed and manufactured water hydraulic tools for ITER divertor maintenance and experiences have been good. Therefore, IHA is developing water hydraulic component selection to be applied in coming systems where water hydraulics is foreseen to provide an advantage. Aim of the still on going project is to develop a set of components like power units, control components and actuators. By that way designers are able to apply water hydraulics where advantageous. In the paper the component types, their design and characteristics and results obtained so far are presented.