2018 | AFC ACCOMPLISHMENTS 95 The mechanical strains on the tube samples were calculated using custom DIC software.Validation of the DIC- strain measurement was performed by generating virtual images with speckle patterns at the prescribed strains and the loading paths.The DIC-calculated strains of 360°-wrapped pictures were compared with the prescribed strain values.The accuracy of the DIC- calculated strains was high (~150 µε) for the generated virtual images and the 360°-wrapped ones.The results indicated that the DIC-calculated strains from the wrapped images were in strongly significant agreement with the prescribed strain values. ATF cladding candidates of SiC/SiC composite and long-term heat-treated (thermal aging) Gen-I FeCrAl alloy tubes were tested using MBT. SiC/ SiC composite samples were tested at room temperature and FeCrAl alloys tubes were tested at 250 °C. The results of the SiC/SiC composite tests showed that the failure hoop strain decreased from 1.2% to 0.6% while the pressurization rate increased from 1.75 GPa/s to 18 GPa/s during PCMI-like loading (see Figure 2). This increasing pressurization rate corresponded to the decrease of the RIA pulse width from 100 ms to 12 ms.The thermally-aged Gen-I FeCrAl alloys failed in a ductile manner at rupture hoop strains of ~6%.The ductility of the Gen-I FeCrAl alloy specimens was preserved during PCMI tests at RIA relevant strain-rates.