# ATOMICS INTERNATIONAL MERCURY RANKINE CRU / SNAP PROGRAM NUCLEAR REACTOR FOR SPACE FLIGHT 72274

This short mid-1960s film from Atomics International, a division of North American Aviation, Inc., gives viewers a look at the July 1964 power conversion subsystem development status of The Mercury-Rankine program (CRU). This was part of the Systems Nuclear Auxiliary POWER (SNAP) program, a program of experimental radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs) and space nuclear reactors flown during the 1960s by NASA. SNAP-1 was a test platform that was never deployed, using cerium-144 in a Rankine cycle with mercury as the heat transfer fluid. Operated successfully for 2500 hours. The film opens with a scientist working in a laboratory on a nuclear reactor designed for space flight. Animation is used to show how mercury is used inside a Mercury Rankine power conversion subsystem (01:09). Viewers see a building of Thompson Ramo Woolridge, Inc. (01:54), where the CRU boiler and rotating unit is made. Illustrations are used to show the structure of the device. Viewers see a drawing of a CRU with its mercury pump. A hand holds a centrifugal pump for the device. The film then shows a modified CRU unit designated as CRU-IV-M, then the CRU-V. The parts of the CRU-IV-M are laid out on a table. A man monitors a computer that processes data from development testing (05:12). Another man runs a machine to fabricate the body of the CRU-V design (05:58). A CRU-V is covered with what appears to be cotton during an endurance test. Men watch gauges during a 1964 CRU demonstrated performance…

- Kind: Film
- By: PeriscopeFilm
- Genres: Space, Industrial and advertising
- Archive: [Internet Archive](https://archive.org/details/72274-mercury-rankine-program-vwr)
- Licence or status: none stated by the archive
- Who can watch: Teens profiles and older (the archive gives no rating; placed by Invisible Network from its collection and subjects)

[Watch now](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/watch/archive/ia/72274-mercury-rankine-program-vwr?play=1)