Research and development of umbilical hose assembly concepts for manned space flight including design verification test report REDAR-RTR-351
Umbilical hose assembly and PLSS oxygen and water hose designs
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Umbilical hose assembly and PLSS oxygen and water hose designs
A recent development in spacecraft mission design involves the increasing use of Distributed Spacecraft Systems (DSS). Several key technologies must mature sufficiently to facilitate these missions, including the use of spacecraft flying in tightly controlled formations. Such formations may be controlled using "free flying" navigation schemes, or alternatively may use tethers to constrain the formation geometry. An investigation has been initiated here to further develop this technology using two small spacecraft connected by a short tether. After insertion into orbit, the tether will be extended and various data collected on the performance of the dual-spacecraft "formation." At some later time, the tether will be cut, and the spacecraft pair will be navigated in a manner to maintain a geometry as closely as possible to that of the tethered configuration. Comparisons and evaluations of the two modes of operation can then be made so that the merits of both approaches are available to mission designers.
Serial Bit Error Rate Testing under radiation to characterize single particle induced errors in high-speed IC technologies generally involves specialized test equipment common to the telecommunications industry. As bit rates increase, testing is complicated by the rapidly increasing cost of equipment able to test at-speed. Furthermore as rates extend into the tens of billions of bits per second test equipment ceases to be broadband, a distinct disadvantage for exploring SEE mechanisms in the target technologies. In this presentation the authors detail the testing accomplished in the CREST project and apply the knowledge gained to establish a set of guidelines suitable for designing arbitrarily high speed radiation effects tests.
The IceCube Neutrino Observatory, instrumenting about 1 km 3 of deep, glacial ice at the geographic South Pole, is due to be enhanced with the IceCube Upgrade. The IceCube Upgrade, to be deployed during the 2025/26 Antarctic summer season, will consist of seven new strings of photosensors, densely embedded near the bottom center of the existing array. Aside from a world-leading sensitivity to neutrino oscillations, a primary goal is the improvement of the calibration of the optical properties of the instrumented ice. This calibration will be applied to the entire archive of IceCube data, improving the angular and energy resolution of the detected neutrino events. For this purpose, the Upgrade strings include a host of new calibration devices. Aside from dedicated calibration modules, several thousand LED flashers have been incorporated into the photosensor modules. We describe the design, production, and testing of these LED flashers before their integration into the sensor modules as well as the use of the LED flashers during lab testing of assembled sensor modules.
Integral heat-pipe sandwich panels, which synergistically combine the thermal efficiency of heat pipes and the structural efficiency of honeycomb sandwich panel construction, were fabricated and tested. The designs utilize two different wickable honeycomb cores, facesheets with screen mesh sintered to the internal surfaces, and potassium or sodium as the working fluid. Panels were tested by radiant heating, and the results indicate successful heat pipe operation at temperatures of approximately 922 K (1200 F). These panels, in addition to solving potential thermal stress problems in an Airframe-Integrated Scramjet Engine, have potential applications as cold plates for electronic component cooling, as radiators for space platforms, and as low distortion, large area structures.
Integral heat-pipe sandwich panels, which synergistically combine the thermal efficiency of heat pipes and the structural efficiency of honeycomb sandwich panel construction, were fabricated and tested. The designs utilize two different wickable honeycomb cores, facesheets with screen mesh sintered to the internal surfaces, and potassium or sodium as the working fluid. Panels were tested by radiant heating, and the results indicate successful heat pipe operation at temperatures of approximately 922K (1200F). These panels, in addition to solving potential thermal stress problems in an Airframe-Integrated Scramjet Engine, have potential applications as cold plates for electronic component cooling, as radiators for space platforms, and as low distortion, large area structures.
NASA's Cassini Spacecraft, launched on October 15th, 1997 and arrived at Saturn on June 30th, 2004, is the largest and most ambitious interplanetary spacecraft in history. In order to meet the challenging attitude control and navigation requirements of the orbit profile at Saturn, Cassini is equipped with a monopropellant thruster based Reaction Control System (RCS), a bipropellant Main Engine Assembly (MEA) and a Reaction Wheel Assembly (RWA). In 2008, after 11 years of reliable service, several RCS thrusters began to show signs of end of life degradation, which led the operations team to successfully perform the swap from the A-branch to the B-branch RCS system. If similar degradation begins to occur on any of the B-branch thrusters, Cassini might have to assume a "mixed" thruster configuration, where a subset of both A and B branch thrusters will be designated as prime. The Cassini Fault Protection FSW was recently updated to handle this scenario. The design, implementation, and testing of this update is described in this paper.
Reliably mitigating disruptions is essential for ITER to meet its long-term operational research plan without damage to the in-vessel components. Currently, the shattered pellet injection (SPI) technique is the most effective radiator of thermal energy and has been chosen for the baseline disruption mitigation system (DMS) for ITER. The SPI process uses cryogenic temperatures to desublimate material into the barrel of a pipe gun forming a solid cylindrical pellet. Pellets for ITER will initially be hydrogen and hydrogen-neon mixtures. Once formed, pellets are dislodged and accelerated using high-pressure gas (40-60 bar) delivered by a fast-opening valve. The solenoid valves currently used for SPI experiments will not operate in an ITER environment due to the large background magnetic field. An ITER prototype fast-opening valve, called a flyer plate valve (FPV), has been designed and has undergone a wide range of testing. The FPV operates by pulsing current through a pancake coil that is closely coupled with a ``flyer plate.'' The flyer plate is an aluminum plate in which eddy currents are generated creating a repulsive force from the pancake coil. The force generated in the flyer plate rapidly lifts the valve tip off the seat and delivers a pulse of gas to the rear of the pellet, breaking it free from the barrel and accelerating the pellet downstream to its intended target. The design of the valve has been iterated on over the lifetime of this project, as the DMS for ITER shifted from massive gas injection (MGI) to SPI. The most recent design has been tested, and operational ranges have been mapped. The valve must survive 3000+ cycles in an ITER-like magnetic field. The principal functional requirement of this valve is to reliably dislodge and accelerate hydrogen (or H-Ne mixture) pellets into ITER. The valve was mated with an ITER SPI test stand and has been shown to be capable of launching pellets reliably. The valve and power supply design will be discussed in this article, along with the various testing setups used to determine the feasibility of this valve for use on ITER.
The successful Mach 7 flight test of the Hyper-X (X-43) research vehicle has provided the major, essential demonstration of the capability of the airframe integrated scramjet engine. This flight was a crucial first step toward realizing the potential for airbreathing hypersonic propulsion for application to space launch vehicles. However, it is not sufficient to have just achieved a successful flight. The more useful knowledge gained from the flight is how well the prediction methods matched the actual test results in order to have confidence that these methods can be applied to the design of other scramjet engines and powered vehicles. The propulsion predictions for the Mach 7 flight test were calculated using the computer code, SRGULL, with input from computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and wind tunnel tests. This paper will discuss the evolution of the Mach 7 Hyper-X engine, ground wind tunnel experiments, propulsion prediction methodology, flight results and validation of design methods.
In prior studies of the current Shuttle Spacesuit (SSA), where basic fabric lay-ups were tested for shielding capabilities, it was found that the fabric portions of the suit give far less protection than previously estimated due to porosity and non-uniformity of fabric and LCVG components. In addition, overall material transmission properties were less than optimum. A number of alternate approaches are being tested to provide more uniform coverage and to use more efficient materials. We will discuss in this paper, recent testing of new material layups/configurations for possible use in future spacesuit designs.
In support of the design of wind turbine generator airfoils/blades utilizing Douglas Fir/West System Epoxy laminated composite material, a program was undertaken to define pertinent material properties utilizing small scale test specimens. Task 1 was the development of suitable monotonic tension, compression, short beam shear and full reversed cyclic specimen designs and the companion grips and testing procedures. Task 2 was the generation of the material properties at two environmental conditions utilizing the specimens and procedures developed in Task 1. The monotonic specimens and procedures generated results which compare favorably with other investigators while the cyclic results appear somewhat conservative. Adding moisture and heat or scarf joints degraded the monotonic performance but had a more nebulus effect with cyclic loading.
The Fluid Combustion Facility (FCF) Project and the Power Technology Division at the NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC) at Lewis Field in Cleveland, OH along with the Sundstrand Corporation in Rockford, IL are jointly developing an Electrical Power Converter Unit (EPCU) for the Fluid Combustion Facility to be flown on the International Space Station (ISS). The FCF facility experiment contains three racks: A core rack, a combustion rack, and a fluids rack. The EPCU will be used as the power interface to the ISS 120V(sub dc) power distribution system by each FCF experiment rack which requires 28V(sub dc). The EPCU is a modular design which contains three 120V(sub dc)-to-28V(sub dc) full-bridge, power converters rated at 1 kW(sub e) each bus transferring input relays and solid-state, current-limiting input switches, 48 current-limiting, solid-state, output switches; and control and telemetry hardware. The EPCU has all controls required to autonomously share load demand between the power feeds and--if absolutely necessary--shed loads. The EPCU, which maximizes the usage of allocated ISS power and minimizes loss of power to loads, can be paralleled with other EPCUs. This paper overviews the electrical design and operating characteristics of the EPCU and presents test data from the breadboard design.
Propellant storage and management functions for the Propulsion Module of the U.S. Space Station Freedom are provided by the Propellant Tank Assembly (PTA). The PTA consists of a surface-tension type propellant acquisition device contained within a welded titanium pressure vessel. The PTA design concept was selected with high reliability and low program risk as primary goals in order to meet stringent NASA structural, expulsion, fracture control and reliability requirements. The PTA design makes use of Shuttle Orbital Maneuvering System and Peacekeeper Propellant Storage Assembly design and analysis techniques. This paper summarizes the PTA design solution and discusses the underlying detailed analyses. In addition, design verification and qualification test activities are discussed.
Distributed Space Systems (DSS) are an emerging class of mission designs that enable new scientific and commercial opportunities. In order to enable those new opportunities, these systems will need to have significantly expanded autonomous capabilities compared to their single-spacecraft predecessors. In this paper, we present Distributed Spacecraft Autonomy (DSA) project, a payload on NASA's Starling spacecraft experiment. We first describe a step-by-step process for characterizing what features are needed in an autonomous DSS, and show how this process applied to DSA. We then describe the Starling mission, a four-spacecraft swarm hosting multiple DSS payloads. We then describe DSA, which will mature in-space networking and autonomous planning technologies to measure topside ionosophere features using data from the Starling spacecraft's GPS receivers. We describe how DSA will coordinate observations of GPS satellites using Starling's underlying communications infrastructure combined with novel DSS technology. The flight validation of DSS technology will provide mature technology to enable future DSS missions.
An array of effectors and sensors has been designed, tested and implemented on a Blended Wing Body Uninhabited Aerial Vehicle (UAV). This UAV is modified to serve as a flying, controls research, testbed. This effectorhensor array provides for the dynamic vehicle testing of controller designs and the study of decentralized control techniques. Each wing of the UAV is equipped with 12 distributed effectors that comprise a segmented array of independently actuated, contoured control surfaces. A single pressure sensor is installed near the base of each effector to provide a measure of deflections of the effectors. The UAV wings were tested in the North Carolina State University Subsonic Wind Tunnel and the pressure distribution that result from the deflections of the effectors are characterized. The results of the experiments are used to develop a simple, but accurate, prediction method, such that for any arrangement of the effector array the corresponding pressure distribution can be determined. Numerical analysis using the panel code CMARC verifies this prediction method.
An array of effectors and sensors has been designed, tested and implemented on a Blended Wing Body Uninhabited Aerial Vehicle (UAV). The UAV is modified to serve as a flying, controls research, testbed. This effector/sensor array provides for the dynamic vehicle testing of controller designs and the study of decentralized control techniques. Each wing of the UAV is equipped with 12 distributed effectors that comprise a segmented array of independently actuated, contoured control surfaces. A single pressure sensor is installed near the base of each effector to provide a measure of deflections of the effectors. The UAV wings were tested in the North Carolina State University Subsonic Wind Tunnel and the pressure distribution that result from the deflections of the effectors are characterized. The results of the experiments are used to develop a simple, but accurate, prediction method, such that for any arrangement of the effector array the corresponding pressure distribution can be determined. Numerical analysis using the panel code CMARC verifies this prediction method.
NASA is developing an advanced portable life support system (PLSS) to meet the needs of a new NASA advanced space suit. The PLSS provides the necessary oxygen, ventilation, and thermal protection for an astronaut performing a spacewalk. The PLSS ventilation subsystem is responsible for providing adequate carbon dioxide (CO2) and water vapor removal. To experimentally validate the performance of CO2 removal and advanced CO2 sensing systems, NASA Johnson Space Center developed the Ventilation Test Loop 2.0 (VTL2) and tested the Oceaneering Swing Bed Scrubber (SBS) that was fabricated and delivered under the Constellation Space Suit System Contract in 2015. The SBS was designed to continuously remove CO2 and water vapor from a space suit ventilation loop with a pair of thermally integrated amine beds that alternately adsorb and desorb water vapor and CO2. The SBS hardware was recently resurrected and reassembled to support a full battery of performance testing in the VTL2. This paper describes the design and development of the SBS and the VTL2 along with the performance test results of the SBS.
Abstract In the framework of the ATLAS experiment’s Phase-II Upgrade at the High-Luminosity Large Hadron Collider (HL-LHC), new and improved trigger hardware and algorithms will be implemented onto a single-level, 10 μs-latency architecture. The Global Trigger is a new subsystem which will bring event-filter capabilities by performing offline-like algorithms on full-granularity calorimeter data. The implementation of the functionality is firmware-focused and composed of several processing nodes, which are hosted on identical hardware, made up of an Advanced Telecommunications Computing Architecture (ATCA) front board, called Global Common Module (GCM), and a rear transition module (RTM), called Generic RTM (GRM). The GRM, which was developed to mitigate the risks deriving from the complex design and power management of the GCM, features an advanced Xilinx Versal Prime system-on-chip and can handle communication with the GCM and Front-End Link eXchange (FELIX) subsystem and trigger processors through 124 25.8 Gb/s transceiver links, for readout and control. Additionally, the GRM mounts a Low-Power GigaBit Transceiver (lpGBT) chip which enables emulation of the detector front-ends for integration tests. This paper presents the GRM hardware design and its testing.