Characterizing and improving passive-active shufflers for assays of 208-Liter waste drums

A passive and active neutron shuffler for 208-L waste drums has been used to perform over 1500 active and 500 passive measurements on uranium and plutonium samples in 28 different matrices. The shuffler is now better characterized and improvements have been implemented or suggested. An improved correction for the effects of the matrix material was devised from flux-monitor responses. The most important cause of inaccuracies in assays is a localized instead of a uniform distribution of fissile material in a drum; a technique for deducing the distribution from the assay data and then applying a correction is suggested and will be developed further. A technique is given to detect excessive amounts of moderator that could make hundreds of grams of {sup 235}U assay as zero grams. Sensitivities (minimum detectable masses) for {sup 235}U with active assays and for {sup 240}Pu{sub eff} with passive assays are presented and the effects of moderators and absorbers on sensitivities noted