Uralmashxavod is currently manufacturing some equipment for BN-800 reactor that will be installed in Beloyarskaya power station’s fourth block. This is going to be the world’s most powerful fast reactor, the spokesperson for Uralmash Machine-Building Corporation reports.


Uralmashzavod is Russia’s only enterprise capable of making the parts for this BN-800 nuclear reactor’s cover. All the reactor units are expected to be delivered to the power station in December 2008, so the machinery has to be shipped from Uralmashzavod no later than April 12, 2008. The plant’s produce will be delivered by car.


The construction of the power station’s fourth block began in the 90s but had to be frozen due to lack of financing. The process has recently been resumed, and eighteen modules have already been delivered there by ZiO-Podolsk. The latter is going to complete the whole reactor, using the parts supplied by Uralmashzavod (some pressed stainless steel ‘petals’ 8 mm long and 50 mm wide) to make the reactor cover and the reactor bottom. Given the fact that the equipment in question is to be used in nuclear industry, the quality and precision standards are sky-high. The intermediate products for the cover parts were made from some special steel by a Ukrainian enterprise. The product itself weighs 76 tons and has a very complex geometrical shape, so it has to be treated in three dimensions using two mills.


After the job has been finished, the equipment must undergo rigorous testing, to be carried out by ZiO-Podolsk’s experts.