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Kosmatka, John

Publications and source records attributed to Kosmatka, John.

California Space Grant Consortium

The organizational and administrative structure of the CaSGC has the Consortium Headquarters Office (Principal Investigator - Dr. John Kosmatka, California Statewide Director - Dr. Michael Wiskerchen) at UC San Diego. Each affiliate member institution has a campus director and an scholarship/fellowship selection committee. Each affiliate campus director also serves on the CaSGC Advisory Council and coordinates CMIS data collection and submission. The CaSGC strives to maintain a balance between expanded affiliate membership and continued high quality in targeted program areas of aerospace research, education, workforce development, and public outreach. Associate members are encouraged to participate on a project-by-project basis that meets the needs of California and the goals and objectives of the CaSGC. Associate members have responsibilities relating only to the CaSGC projects they are directly engaged in. Each year, as part of the CaSGC Improvement Plan, the CaSGC Advisory Council evaluates the performance of the affiliate and associate membership in terms of contributions to the CaSGC Strategic Plan, These CaSGC membership evaluations provide a constructive means for elevating productive members and removing non-performing members. This Program Improvement and Results (PIR) report will document CaSGC program improvement results and impacts that directly respond to the specific needs of California in the area of aerospace-related education and human capital development and the Congressional mandate to "increase the understanding, assessment, development and utilization of space resources by promoting a strong education base, responsive research and training activities, and broad and prompt dissemination of knowledge and technology".

Kosmatka, John↗

Experimental Spin Testing of Integrally Damped Composite Plates

The experimental behavior of spinning laminated composite pretwisted plates (turbo-fan blade-like) with small (less than 10% by volume) integral viscoelastic damping patches was investigated at NASA-Lewis Research Center. Ten different plate sets were experimentally spin tested and the resulting data was analyzed. The first-four plate sets investigated tailoring patch locations and definitions to damp specific modes on spinning flat graphite/epoxy plates as a function of rotational speed. The remaining six plate sets investigated damping patch size and location on specific modes of pretwisted (30 degrees) graphite/epoxy plates. The results reveal that: (1) significant amount of damping can be added using a small amount of damping material, (2) the damped plates experienced no failures up to the tested 28,000 g's and 750,000 cycles, (3) centrifugal loads caused an increase in bending frequencies and corresponding reductions in bending damping levels that are proportional to the bending stiffness increase, and (4) the centrifugal loads caused a decrease in torsion natural frequency and increase in damping levels of pretwisted composite plates.

Kosmatka, John↗