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At least 523 records · Page 29

Experimental Techniques Verified for Determining Yield and Flow Surfaces

Structural components in aircraft engines are subjected to multiaxial loads when in service. For such components, life prediction methodologies are dependent on the accuracy of the constitutive models that determine the elastic and inelastic portions of a loading cycle. A threshold surface (such as a yield surface) is customarily used to differentiate between reversible and irreversible flow. For elastoplastic materials, a yield surface can be used to delimit the elastic region in a given stress space. The concept of a yield surface is central to the mathematical formulation of a classical plasticity theory, but at elevated temperatures, material response can be highly time dependent. Thus, viscoplastic theories have been developed to account for this time dependency. Since the key to many of these theories is experimental validation, the objective of this work (refs. 1 and 2) at the NASA Lewis Research Center was to verify that current laboratory techniques and equipment are sufficient to determine flow surfaces at elevated temperatures. By probing many times in the axial-torsional stress space, we could define the yield and flow surfaces. A small offset definition of yield (10 me) was used to delineate the boundary between reversible and irreversible behavior so that the material state remained essentially unchanged and multiple probes could be done on the same specimen. The strain was measured with an off-the-shelf multiaxial extensometer that could measure the axial and torsional strains over a wide range of temperatures. The accuracy and resolution of this extensometer was verified by comparing its data with strain gauge data at room temperature. The extensometer was found to have sufficient resolution for these experiments. In addition, the amount of crosstalk (i.e., the accumulation of apparent strain in one direction when strain in the other direction is applied) was found to be negligible. Tubular specimens were induction heated to determine the flow surfaces at elevated temperatures. The heating system induced a large amount of noise in the data. By reducing thermal fluctuations and using appropriate data averaging schemes, we could render the noise inconsequential. Thus, accurate and reproducible flow surfaces (see the figure) could be obtained.

Lerch, Brad A.↗

3D Simulations of gas injection on callovo-oxfordian claystone assuming spatial heterogeneity and anisotropy

A series of gas injection tests on Callovo-Oxfordian (COx) claystone from the Bure underground research laboratory (URL) in France were carried out at the British Geological Survey (BGS). The tests were performed using a triaxial apparatus specifically designed to capture small volumetric strains induced by the injected gas flow and consequent material dilatancy. The long-duration experiments were monitored throughout. Measurements also included pressure, stresses (axial and radial stresses prescribed for each test stage), rate of gas inflow, gas outflow volume as well as pore-pressures observed at various points of the sample. A coupled hydro-gas-mechanical 3D numerical model has been developed to simulate the tests. Initial permeability is assumed heterogeneous throughout the specimen and embedded fractures are incorporated in the formulation. Gas pressure-induced deformations during the test lead to variations of permeability due to changes in matrix porosity and, especially, fracture aperture as well as fracture orientation due to material anisotropy. A programme of sensitivity analyses involving the variation of different aspects and parameters of the model contributes to a better understanding of the phenomena and highlights its complexity. The model is able to reproduce the observed behaviour of the tests.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗

Ballistic Performance Model of Crater Formation in Monolithic, Porous Thermal Protection Systems

Porous monolithic ablative systems insulate atmospheric reentry vehicles from reentry plasmas generated by atmospheric braking from orbital and exo-orbital velocities. Due to the necessity that these materials create a temperature gradient up to several thousand Kelvin over their thickness, it is important that these materials are near their pristine state prior to reentry. These materials may also be on exposed surfaces to space environment threats like orbital debris and meteoroids leaving a probability that these exposed surfaces will be below their prescribed values. Owing to the typical small size of impact craters in these materials, the local flow fields over these craters and the ablative process afford some margin in thermal protection designs for these locally reduced performance values. In this work, tests to develop ballistic performance models for thermal protection materials typical of those being used on Orion are discussed. A density profile as a function of depth of a typical monolithic ablator and substructure system is shown in Figure 1a.

Miller, J. E.↗

Ablation of carbonaceous materials in a hydrogen-helium arc-jet flow

The stagnation-point ablation rates of a graphite, a carbon-carbon composite, and four carbon-phenolic materials are measured in an arc-jet wind tunnel with a 50 percent hydrogen-50 percent helium mixture as the test gas. Flow environments are determined through measurements of static and impact pressures, heat-transfer rates to a calorimeter, and radiation spectra, and through numerical calculation of the flow through the wind tunnel, spectra, and heat-transfer rates. The environments so determined are: impact pressure approximately equal to 3 atm, Mach number approximately equal to 2.1, convective heat-transfer rate approximately equal to 14 kW/sq cm, and radiative heat-transfer rate approximately equal to 7 kW/sq cm in the absence of ablation. Ablation rates are determined from the measured rates of mass loss and recession of the ablation specimens. Compared with the predicted ablation rates obtained by running RASLE and CMA codes, the measured rates are higher by about 15 percent for all tested materials.

Park, C.↗

Mare Imbrium lava flows and their relationship to color boundaries, part M

The Apollo 15 metric camera photography provided a number of spectacular views of most of the southern and central portions of the unique systems of major lava flows that stretch diagonally across Mare Imbrium from the general area of Euler Crater to a point east of Le Verrier Crater. A preliminary examination of the photographs indicates that the source of the material comprising the major flows is situated to the west of Euler Crater and south of the limits of the photographic coverage. The photographs also show clearly that most, if not all, the mare ridges included were formed after the solidification of the flows. Few color boundaries exist in the area of metric photography where the illumination angle is low enough to show the fronts of some of the very thin flows. However, patches of redder material lying northeast of Mt. Lahire are found to be enclosed by low flow fronts, confirming the theory that the redder material represents an earlier filling of the Imbrium basin.

Whitaker, E. A.↗

Visualization of bulk and edge photocurrent flow in anisotropic Weyl semimetals

Materials that rectify light into current in their bulk are desired for optoelectronic applications. In Weyl semimetals that break inversion symmetry, bulk photocurrents may arise due to nonlinear optical processes that are enhanced near the Weyl nodes. However, the photoresponse of these materials is commonly studied by scanning photocurrent microscopy, which convolves the effects of photocurrent generation and collection. Here we directly image the photocurrent flow inside the type-II Weyl semimetals WTe 2 and TaIrTe 4 using high-sensitivity quantum magnetometry with nitrogen-vacancy centre spins. We elucidate a mechanism for bulk photocurrent generation, which we call the anisotropic photothermoelectric effect, where unequal thermopowers along different crystal axes drive intricate circulations of photocurrent around the photoexcitation. Using overlapping scanning photocurrent microscopy and magnetic imaging at the interior and edges of the sample, we visualize how the anisotropic photothermoelectric effect stimulates the long-range photocurrent collected in our WTe 2 and TaIrTe 4 devices through the Shockley–Ramo mechanism. Furthermore, our results highlight a widely relevant source of current flow and will inspire photodetectors that utilize bulk materials with thermoelectric anisotropy.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗

Numerical simulations of a siphon mechanism for quiescent prominence formation

Quiescent prominences represent a significant challenge to our understanding of the flow of mass and energy in the outer layers of the solar atmosphere. A small number of quiescent prominences contain as much mass as the entire corona (Athay, 1976). The problem then is how to get that much material into the relatively small volume of a prominence and maintain it at a temperature of 10,000 K in close proximity to material at one million K. The thermal insulation to conduction provided by the magnetic field explains the disparate temperatures. The mass source problem is less well understood. One method for supplying mass to the prominence is to siphon it from the chromosphere. The siphon mechanism begins with a magnetic loop that evolves into a configuration with a gravitational well, such as that described by Kippenhahn and Schluter (1957). This could be formed, for example, by a twist in the magnetic field. A gravitational well could also be formed by a condensation induced sag in the field. This could further enhance the condensation process. Once this well has formed, or as it is forming, the material in the well area of the loop must cool and condense to the point where radiative losses exceed any heat input. Additional material must also flow into the well from the underlying chromosphere to supply the mass required to form the prominence. One example from a series of numerical simulations that were performed to study the formation of quiescent prominences is presented.

Poland, A. I.↗

2003 NASA Seal/Secondary Air System Workshop

The following reports were included in the 2003 NASA Seal/Secondary Air System Workshop:Low Emissions Alternative Power (LEAP); Overview of NASA Glenn Seal Developments; NASA Ultra Efficient Engine Technology Project Overview; Development of Higher Temperature Abradable Seals for Industrial Gas Turbines; High Misalignment Carbon Seals for the Fan Drive Gear System Technologies; Compliant Foil Seal Investigations; Test Rig for Evaluating Active Turbine Blade Tip Clearance Control Concepts; Controls Considerations for Turbine Active Clearance Control; Non-Contacting Finger Seal Developments and Design Considerations; Effect of Flow-Induced Radial Load on Brush Seal/Rotor Contact Mechanics; Seal Developments at Flowserve Corporation; Investigations of High Pressure Acoustic Waves in Resonators With Seal-Like Features; Numerical Investigations of High Pressure Acoustic Waves in Resonators; Feltmetal Seal Material Through-Flow; "Bimodal" Nuclear Thermal Rocket (BNTR) Propulsion for Future Human Mars Exploration Missions; High Temperature Propulsion System Structural Seals for Future Space Launch Vehicles; Advanced Control Surface Seal Development for Future Space Vehicles; High Temperature Metallic Seal Development for Aero Propulsion and Gas Turbine Applications; and BrazeFoil Honeycomb.

Steinetz, Bruce M.↗

Trajectory Engineering with Modular Patched Conics for Entry Systems and TPS (TEMPEST)

Brief Presenter Biography (35 word limit): Bohdan Wesely is an Aerospace Engineer in the Entry Systems and Technology Division at Ames. He has worked on a variety of projects for NASA including integrated TPS (thermal protection system) flight hardware deliveries and testing services for commercial partners. Introduction: TEMPEST is a new trajectory analysis framework that is designed to fill the gap between dedicated flight mechanics tools and aerothermal and TPS sizing tools. The project started as an SJSU master’s thesis and has since evolved into a general conceptual design tool capable of studying a wide variety of entry problems. Development is ongoing in the Entry Systems and Technology Division at NASA ARC. Why TEMPEST: Space missions involving entry into a planetary atmosphere involve a series of unique requirements across multiple disciplines. Whether it is traditional entry descent and landing (EDL), or aerocapture, the vehicle must navigate to its target landing location or orbit state, and the TPS must protect the payload during entry. The design process typically involves iterative handoffs between various flight mechanics, flow solver, and material response level tools. During the early conceptual phase, a wide variety of feasible trajectories are simulated in a Monte Carlo scenario which broadly satisfy the mission or landing requirements. Next, computational fluid dynamics (CFD), direct simulation Monte Carlo (DSMC), and other flow solver analyses are performed at various key trajectory points to generate an aero-database, heating and TPS design requirements also emerge at this stage. At this point, with updated aerodynamics from the various flow solvers, trajectories can be re-run, this in turn can change the required freestream conditions for the CFD tools, and as a project progresses, these analyses converge, and uncertainty is reduced. However, there is always a “hand-off” occurring between two inherently coupled phenomena. Analysis Description: One of the goals with TEMPEST is to use a variety of first principles estimation methods coupled with an atmosphere model to predict vehicle aerothermodynamics across the entire flight regime while propagating a 3 or 6 degree of freedom (DoF) trajectory. Aerodynamics methods include modified Newtonian, Maxwell and Cercignani- Lampis-Lord (CLL) for continuum, transitional, and free molecular flow regimes. Aerothermodynamics include boundary layer and reference enthalpy methods, and Mutation++ for non-equilibrium chemistry modeling. TEMPEST is also capable of stitching multiple trajectory segments together to study mission scenarios like multi-pass aerocapture and aero-gravity assists. Most of the program is implemented in MATLAB using modern system objects, it relies on several C++ shared libraries for supporting tools like Gmsh, the Global Reference Atmospheric Model (GRAM), and Mutation++. The various first principles aerothermal estimation methods are discretized across either a structured axisymmetric panel mesh or an unstructured tri-mesh generated from an open-source tool such as Gmsh, this allows solutions on the same mesh to be compared across tools such as CB-Aero. CFD Coupling. A physics-aware, gaussian process CFD anchoring scheme is proposed to adjust the various first principles methods as a CFD database is populated. One goal for this anchoring module is to inform the project where CFD should be run. Full knowledge of the entire trajectory, atmosphere, and aerothermodynamics allows for easier identification of high sensitivity areas and uncertainty quantification. While the first principles effects are well known and proven accurate in existing tools such as CB- Aero and Cart3D, a physics aware CFD anchoring scheme increases tool credibility across a project lifecycle. Material Response Modeling. Correct TPS sizing is critical for optimizing mass for science payloads and ensuring mission success. The process typically involves a thermal analysis along the trajectory with surface heating environments as a boundary condition. Several design constraints are maximum bondline temperature and maximum recession with various margining techniques. The material response tool FIAT, developed out of NASA Ames, is currently being integrated into the TEMPEST environment. TPS recession, shape change, mass loss, and mass property alteration are all factors that can perturb an entry trajectory. For missions like Mars 2020, recession was minimal and was safely handled separately as a post process. For missions such as Jupiter Galileo with a high TPS mass fraction or asteroid entries, recession plays a major role. The proposed fully coupled scheme is to use an epoch-based approach where the trajectory integration is halted after a recession threshold, the energy balance and FIAT are solved at each panel, the mesh, aerodynamics, and mass properties are updated, and the trajectory continues. Several computational tradeoffs have been made during the development of TEMPEST to limit the cost of a single trajectory and preserve its utility as a conceptual, rapid iteration tool. Conclusion: Development of TEMPEST is ongoing and the project is still in its infancy. This talk aims to showcase its unique capabilities to support future NASA entry systems missions.

Bohdan O Wesely↗

Autoclave processing for composite material fabrication. 1: An analysis of resin flows and fiber compactions for thin laminate

High quality long fiber reinforced composites, such as those used in aerospace and industrial applications, are commonly processed in autoclaves. An adequate resin flow model for the entire system (laminate/bleeder/breather), which provides a description of the time-dependent laminate consolidation process, is useful in predicting the loss of resin, heat transfer characteristics, fiber volume fraction and part dimension, etc., under a specified set of processing conditions. This could be accomplished by properly analyzing the flow patterns and pressure profiles inside the laminate during processing. A newly formulated resin flow model for composite prepreg lamination process is reported. This model considers viscous resin flows in both directions perpendicular and parallel to the composite plane. In the horizontal direction, a squeezing flow between two nonporous parallel plates is analyzed, while in the vertical direction, a poiseuille type pressure flow through porous media is assumed. Proper force and mass balances have been made and solved for the whole system. The effects of fiber-fiber interactions during lamination are included as well. The unique features of this analysis are: (1) the pressure gradient inside the laminate is assumed to be generated from squeezing action between two adjacent approaching fiber layers, and (2) the behavior of fiber bundles is simulated by a Finitely Extendable Nonlinear Elastic (FENE) spring.

Hou, T. H.↗

The influence of flowing afterglow exposure on the degradation of various polymeric materials

Changes in polymer properties which result after exposure to an atomic oxygen-rich environment of a flowing afterglow are presented. Dynamic mechanical and Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectra as well as scanning electron microscopy micrographs were employed to monitor variations in mechanical properties and chemical and physical structure. Polymers analyzed include polystyrene, PEKK, and a polyester.

Letton, Alan↗

Bench-scale synthesis of nanoscale materials

A novel flow-through hydrothermal method used to synthesize nanoscale powders is introduced by Pacific Northwest Laboratory. The process, Rapid Thermal Decomposition of precursors in Solution (RTDS), uniquely combines high-pressure and high-temperature conditions to rapidly form nanoscale particles. The RTDS process was initially demonstrated on a laboratory scale and was subsequently scaled up to accommodate production rates attractive to industry. The process is able to produce a wide variety of metal oxides and oxyhydroxides. The powders are characterized by scanning and transmission electron microscopic methods, surface-area measurements, and x-ray diffraction. Typical crystallite sizes are less than 20 nanometers, with BET surface areas ranging from 100 to 400 sq m/g. A description of the RTDS process is presented along with powder characterization results. In addition, data on the sintering of nanoscale ZrO2 produced by RTDS are included.

Buehler, M. F.↗

Boundary-layer behavior of the flow at the inner edge of black hole accretion disks

The flow of accreting material into black holes from Keplerian disks surrounding them is studied. Solving the system of radial structure equations in Schwarzschild geometry for the case where the kinematic viscosity is constant, the paper discovers a boundary layer at the disk's inner edge, where the flow becomes non-Keplerian. It is also shown that, despite the operation of viscous stresses across this inner edge and the presence of the boundary layer there, very little extra energy or angular momentum is radiated or transported outward from inside that radius - a result many have often assumed but no one has carefully demonstrated. These results constitute a solution to the problem of adequately describing the flow across the inner edge and properly setting the boundary conditions there and at the event horizon.

Stoeger, W. R.↗

Effect Of Low External Flow On Flame Spreading Over ETFE Insulated Wire Under Microgravity

Fire safety is one of the most important issues for manned space missions. A likely cause of fires in spacecraft is wire insulation combustion in electrical system. Regarding the wire insulation combustion it important to know the effect of low external flow on the combustion because of the presence of ventilation flow in spacecraft. Although, there are many researches on flame spreading over solid material at low external flows under microgravity, research dealing with wire insulation is very limited. An example of wire insulation combustion in microgravity is the Space Shuttle experiments carried out by Greenberg et al. However, the number of experiments was very limited. Therefore, the effect of low flow velocity is still not clear. The authors have reported results on flame spreading over ETFE (ethylene - tetrafluoroetylene) insulated wire in a quiescent atmosphere in microgravity by 10 seconds drop tower. The authors also performed experiments of polyethylene insulated nichrom wire combustion in low flow velocity under microgravity. The results suggested that flame spread rate had maximum value in low flow velocity condition. Another interesting issue is the effect of dilution gas, especially CO2, which is used for fire extinguisher in ISS. There are some researches working on dilution gas effect on flame spreading over solid material in quiescent atmosphere in microgravity. However the research with low external flow is limited and, of course, the research discussing a relation of the appearance of maximum wire flammability in low flow velocity region with different dilution gas cannot be found yet. The present paper, therefore, investigates the effect of opposed flow with different dilution gas on flame spreading over ETFE insulated wire and change in the presence of the maximum flammability depending on the dilution gas type is discussed within the limit of microgravity time given by ground-based facility.

Nishizawa, Katsuhiro↗