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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 145 records · Page 8

A Fully Redundant On-Line Mass Spectrometer System Used to Monitor Cryogenic Fuel Leaks on the Space Shuttle

An on-line gas monitoring system was developed to replace the older systems used to monitor for cryogenic leaks on the Space Shuttles before launch. The system uses a mass spectrometer to monitor multiple locations in the process, which allows the system to monitor all gas constituents of interest in a nearly simultaneous manner. The system is fully redundant and meets all requirements for ground support equipment (GSE). This includes ruggedness to withstand launch on the Mobile Launcher Platform (MLP), ease of operation, and minimal operator intervention. The system can be fully automated so that an operator is notified when an unusual situation or fault is detected. User inputs are through personal computer using mouse and keyboard commands. The graphical user for detecting cryogenic leaks, many other gas constituents could be monitored using the Hazardous Gas Detection System (HGDS) 2000.

Griffin, Timothy P.↗

A Three Dimensional Parallel Time Accurate Turbopump Simulation Procedure Using Overset Grid Systems

The objective of the current effort is to provide a computational framework for design and analysis of the entire fuel supply system of a liquid rocket engine, including high-fidelity unsteady turbopump flow analysis. This capability is needed to support the design of pump sub-systems for advanced space transportation vehicles that are likely to involve liquid propulsion systems. To date, computational tools for design/analysis of turbopump flows are based on relatively lower fidelity methods. An unsteady, three-dimensional viscous flow analysis tool involving stationary and rotational components for the entire turbopump assembly has not been available for real-world engineering applications. The present effort provides developers with information such as transient flow phenomena at start up, and non-uniform inflows, and will eventually impact on system vibration and structures. In the proposed paper, the progress toward the capability of complete simulation of the turbo-pump for a liquid rocket engine is reported. The Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME) turbo-pump is used as a test case for evaluation of the hybrid MPI/Open-MP and MLP versions of the INS3D code. CAD to solution auto-scripting capability is being developed for turbopump applications. The relative motion of the grid systems for the rotor-stator interaction was obtained using overset grid techniques. Unsteady computations for the SSME turbo-pump, which contains 114 zones with 34.5 million grid points, are carried out on Origin 3000 systems at NASA Ames Research Center. Results from these time-accurate simulations with moving boundary capability will be presented along with the performance of parallel versions of the code.

Kiris, Cetin↗

Wearout Free

Because of on an SBIR contract with NASA, Cornell-Dubilier has been able to commercialize electrolytic capacitors, based on the design of hermetically sealed electrolytic capacitors used by the Marshall Space Flight Center. The NASA contract was for the development of hermetic aluminum electrolytic capacitors, and through which Cornell-Dubilier's Type MLP and Type MLS Flatback Aluminum Electrolytic Capacitors have emerged. As opposed to gassing electrolytic capacitors, the development of nongassing electrolytes makes it possible to manufacture hermetic aluminum electrolytic capacitors free of "wearout" from electrolytic loss. Tests of the hermetic capacitors designed for NASA demonstrated expected life-spans of more than 20 years.

Source record↗

A Three-Dimensional Parallel Time-Accurate Turbopump Simulation Procedure Using Overset Grid System

The objective of the current effort is to provide a computational framework for design and analysis of the entire fuel supply system of a liquid rocket engine, including high-fidelity unsteady turbopump flow analysis. This capability is needed to support the design of pump sub-systems for advanced space transportation vehicles that are likely to involve liquid propulsion systems. To date, computational tools for design/analysis of turbopump flows are based on relatively lower fidelity methods. An unsteady, three-dimensional viscous flow analysis tool involving stationary and rotational components for the entire turbopump assembly has not been available for real-world engineering applications. The present effort provides developers with information such as transient flow phenomena at start up, and nonuniform inflows, and will eventually impact on system vibration and structures. In the proposed paper, the progress toward the capability of complete simulation of the turbo-pump for a liquid rocket engine is reported. The Space Shuttle Main Engine (SSME) turbo-pump is used as a test case for evaluation of the hybrid MPI/Open-MP and MLP versions of the INS3D code. CAD to solution auto-scripting capability is being developed for turbopump applications. The relative motion of the grid systems for the rotor-stator interaction was obtained using overset grid techniques. Unsteady computations for the SSME turbo-pump, which contains 114 zones with 34.5 million grid points, are carried out on Origin 3000 systems at NASA Ames Research Center. Results from these time-accurate simulations with moving boundary capability are presented along with the performance of parallel versions of the code.

Kiris, Cetin↗

Time-Dependent Simulations of Turbopump Flows

Unsteady flow simulations for RLV (Reusable Launch Vehicles) 2nd Generation baseline turbopump for one and half impeller rotations have been completed by using a 34.3 Million grid points model. MLP (Multi-Level Parallelism) shared memory parallelism has been implemented in INS3D, and benchmarked. Code optimization for cash based platforms will be completed by the end of September 2001. Moving boundary capability is obtained by using DCF module. Scripting capability from CAD (computer aided design) geometry to solution has been developed. Data compression is applied to reduce data size in post processing. Fluid/Structure coupling has been initiated.

Kiris, Cetin↗

Progress in Unsteady Turbopump Flow Simulations Using Overset Grid Systems

This viewgraph presentation provides information on unsteady flow simulations for the Second Generation RLV (Reusable Launch Vehicle) baseline turbopump. Three impeller rotations were simulated by using a 34.3 million grid points model. MPI/OpenMP hybrid parallelism and MLP shared memory parallelism has been implemented and benchmarked in INS3D, an incompressible Navier-Stokes solver. For RLV turbopump simulations a speed up of more than 30 times has been obtained. Moving boundary capability is obtained by using the DCF module. Scripting capability from CAD geometry to solution is developed. Unsteady flow simulations for advanced consortium impeller/diffuser by using a 39 million grid points model are currently underway. 1.2 impeller rotations are completed. The fluid/structure coupling is initiated.

Kiris, Cetin C.↗

Aerocoat 7 Replacement Coatings

Kennedy Space Center has used Aerocoat 7 (AR-7) to protect stainless-steel flex hoses at Launch Complex (LC-39) and hydraulic lines of the Mobile Launcher Platform (MLP) because it provides excellent corrosion protection in low-temperature applications. The Sovereign Company produced AR-7 exclusively for NASA but discontinued production because the coating released high levels of volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and had a significant environmental impact. The purpose of this project was to select and evaluate potential replacement coatings for AR-7 that would be more environmentally sound. The physical and mechanical properties of commercially available coatings were investigated through the Internet. The ideal coating would be fluid enough to penetrate the outer mesh of a stainless-steel flex hose and coat the inner hose, and flexible enough to withstand the movement of the hose, as well as the expansion and contraction of its metal caused by changes in temperature.

Source record↗

Partial Least Squares and Neural Networks for Quantitative Calibration of Laser-induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBs) of Geologic Samples

The ChemCam instrument [1] on the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) rover will be used to obtain the chemical composition of surface targets within 7 m of the rover using Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS). ChemCam analyzes atomic emission spectra (240-800 nm) from a plasma created by a pulsed Nd:KGW 1067 nm laser. The LIBS spectra can be used in a semiquantitative way to rapidly classify targets (e.g., basalt, andesite, carbonate, sulfate, etc.) and in a quantitative way to estimate their major and minor element chemical compositions. Quantitative chemical analysis from LIBS spectra is complicated by a number of factors, including chemical matrix effects [2]. Recent work has shown promising results using multivariate techniques such as partial least squares (PLS) regression and artificial neural networks (ANN) to predict elemental abundances in samples [e.g. 2-6]. To develop, refine, and evaluate analysis schemes for LIBS spectra of geologic materials, we collected spectra of a diverse set of well-characterized natural geologic samples and are comparing the predictive abilities of PLS, cascade correlation ANN (CC-ANN) and multilayer perceptron ANN (MLP-ANN) analysis procedures.

Anderson, R. B.↗

Wind Tunnel Investigation of Ground Wind Loads for Ares Launch Vehicle

A three year program was conducted at the NASA Langley Research Center (LaRC) Aeroelasticity Branch (AB) and Transonic Dynamics Tunnel (TDT) with the primary objective to acquire scaled steady and dynamic ground-wind loads (GWL) wind-tunnel data for rollout, on-pad stay, and on-pad launch configurations for the Ares I-X Flight Test Vehicle (FTV). The experimental effort was conducted to obtain an understanding of the coupling of aerodynamic and structural characteristics that can result in large sustained wind-induced oscillations (WIO) on such a tall and slender launch vehicle and to generate a unique database for development and evaluation of analytical methods for predicting steady and dynamic GWL, especially those caused by vortex shedding, and resulting in significant WIO. This paper summarizes the wind-tunnel test program that employed two dynamically-aeroelastically scaled GWL models based on the Ares I-X Flight Test Vehicle. The first model tested, the GWL Checkout Model (CM), was a relatively simple model with a secondary objective of restoration and development of processes and methods for design, fabrication, testing, and data analysis of a representative ground wind loads model. In addition, parametric variations in surface roughness, Reynolds number, and protuberances (on/off) were investigated to determine effects on GWL characteristics. The second windtunnel model, the Ares I-X GWL Model, was significantly more complex and representative of the Ares I-X FTV and included the addition of simplified rigid geometrically-scaled models of the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) Mobile Launch Platform (MLP) and Launch Complex 39B primary structures. Steady and dynamic base bending moment as well as model response and steady and unsteady pressure data was acquired during the testing of both models. During wind-tunnel testing of each model, flow conditions (speed and azimuth) where significant WIO occurred, were identified and thoroughly investigated. Scaled data from the Ares I-X GWL model test was used in the determination of worst-case loads for the analysis of Ares I-X FTV design wind conditions. Finally, this paper includes a brief discussion of the limited full-scale GWL data acquired during the rollout and on-pad stay of the Ares I-X FTV that was launched from KSC on October 28, 2009.

Keller, Donald F.↗

E-Nose Vapor Identification Based on Dempster-Shafer Fusion of Multiple Classifiers

Electronic nose (e-nose) vapor identification is an efficient approach to monitor air contaminants in space stations and shuttles in order to ensure the health and safety of astronauts. Data preprocessing (measurement denoising and feature extraction) and pattern classification are important components of an e-nose system. In this paper, a wavelet-based denoising method is applied to filter the noisy sensor measurements. Transient-state features are then extracted from the denoised sensor measurements, and are used to train multiple classifiers such as multi-layer perceptions (MLP), support vector machines (SVM), k nearest neighbor (KNN), and Parzen classifier. The Dempster-Shafer (DS) technique is used at the end to fuse the results of the multiple classifiers to get the final classification. Experimental analysis based on real vapor data shows that the wavelet denoising method can remove both random noise and outliers successfully, and the classification rate can be improved by using classifier fusion.

Li, Winston↗

Replacement for a Flex Hose Coating at the Space Shuttle Launch Pad

Aerocoat AR-7 is a coating that has been used to protect stainless steel flex hoses at NASA's Kennedy Space Center launch complex and hydraulic lines of the mobile launch platform (MLP). This coating has great corrosion control performance and low temperature application. AR-7 was developed by NASA and produced exclusively for NASA but its production has been discontinued due to its high content of volatile organic compounds (VOC) and significant environmental impact. The purpose of this project was to select and evaluate candidate coatings to find a replacement coating that is more environmentally friendly, with similar properties to AR-7. No coatings were identified that perform the same as AR-7 in all areas. Candidate coatings failed in comparison to AR-7 in salt fog, beachside atmospheric exposure, pencil hardness, Mandrel bend, chemical compatibility, adhesion, and ease of application tests. However, two coatings were selected for further evaluation.

Whitten, Mary↗

Space Shuttle Crawler Transporter Sound Attenuation Study

The crawler transporter (CT) is the world's largest tracked vehicle known, weighing 6 million pounds with a length of 131 feet and a width of 113 feet. The Kennedy Space Center (KSC) has two CTs that were designed and built for the Apollo program in the 1960's, maintained and retrofitted for use in the Space Shuttle program. As a key element of the Space Shuttle ground systems, the crawler transports the entire 12-million-pound stack comprising the orbiter, the mobile launch platform (MLP), the external tank (ET), and the solid rocket boosters (SRB) from the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) to the launch pad. This rollout, constituting a 3.5-5.0-mile journey at a top speed of 0.9 miles-per-hour, requires over 8 hours to reach either Launch Complex 39A or B. This activity is only a prelude to the spectacle of sound and fury of the Space Shuttle launch to orbit in less than 10 minutes and traveling at orbital velocities of Mach 24. This paper summarizes preliminary results from the Crawler Transporter Sound Attenuation Study, encompassing test and engineering analysis of significant sound sources to measure and record full frequency spectrum and intensity of the various noise sources and to analyze the conditions of vibration. Additionally, data such as ventilation criteria, plus operational procedures were considered to provide a comprehensive noise suppression design for implementation. To date, sound attenuation study and results on Crawler 2 have shown significant noise reductions ranging from 5 to 24 dBA.

Margasahayam, Ravi N.↗

CATIA V5 Virtual Environment Support for Constellation Ground Operations

This summer internship primarily involved using CATIA V5 modeling software to design and model parts to support ground operations for the Constellation program. I learned several new CATIA features, including the Imagine and Shape workbench and the Tubing Design workbench, and presented brief workbench lessons to my co-workers. Most modeling tasks involved visualizing design options for Launch Pad 39B operations, including Mobile Launcher Platform (MLP) access and internal access to the Ares I rocket. Other ground support equipment, including a hydrazine servicing cart, a mobile fuel vapor scrubber, a hypergolic propellant tank cart, and a SCAPE (Self Contained Atmospheric Protective Ensemble) suit, was created to aid in the visualization of pad operations.

Kelley, Andrew↗

Exploring the Solid Rocket Boosters and Properties of Matter

I worked for the United Space Alliance, LLC (USA) with the Solid Rocket Booster (SRB) Materials and Process engineers (M&P). I was assigned a project in which I needed to research and collect chemical and physical properties information, material safety data sheets (MSDS), and other product information from the vendor's websites and existing "inhouse" files for a select group of materials used in building and refurbishing the SRBs. This information was then compiled in a report that summarized the information collected. My work site was at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC). This allowed for many opportunities to visit and tour sites operated by NASA, by USA, and by the Air Force. This included the vehicle assembly building (VAB), orbital processing facilities (OPF), the crawler with the mobile launch pad (MLP), and the SRB assembly and refurbishment facility (ARF), to name a few. In addition, the launch, of STS- 117 took place within the first week of employment allowing a day by day following of that mission including post flight operations for the SRBs. Two Delta II rockets were also launched during these 7 weeks. The sights were incredible and the operations witnessed were amazing. I learned so many things I never knew about the entire program and the shuttle itself. The entire experience, especially my work with the SRB materials, inspired my plan for implementation into the classroom.

Moffett, Amy↗

Mobile Launch Platform Vehicle Assembly Building Area (SWMU 056) Hot Spot 3 Bioremediation Interim Measures Work Plan, Kennedy Space Center, Florida

This Interim Measures Work Plan (IMWP) presents an approach and design for the remediation of chlorinated volatile organic compound (CVOC) groundwater impacts using bioremediation (biostimulation and bioaugmentation) in Hot Spot 3, which is defined by the area where CVOC (trichloroethene [TCE], cis-1,2-dichloroethene [cDCE], and vinyl chloride [VC]) concentrations are greater than 10 times their respective Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) Natural Attenuation Default Concentration (NADC) [10xNADC] near the western Mobile Launch Platform (MLP) structure. The IM treatment area is the Hot Spot 3 area, which is approximately 0.07 acres and extends from approximately 6 to 22 and 41 to 55 feet below land surface (ft BLS). Within Hot Spot 3, a source zone (SZ; area with TCE concentrations greater than 1% solubility [11,000 micrograms per liter (micrograms/L)]) was delineated and is approximately 0.02 acres and extends from approximately 6 to 16 and 41 to 50 ft BLS.

MLPV↗

F-ANG+: A 3-D Augmented-Stencil Face-Averaged Nodal-Gradient Cell-Centered Finite-Volume Method for Hypersonic Flows

We describe the extension of a 2-D simplified face-averaged nodal-gradient (F-ANG) method to 3-D and demonstrate that the 3-D simplified F-ANG method is accomplished by augmenting the nodecentered gradient least squares stencil. This augmented stencil F-ANG method is shown to result in advection and diffusion schemes that are stable for hexahedral, prismatic, pyramidal and tetrahedral cells without having to resort to cell-averaged nodal gradients. In addition, we describe the modifications to the augmented stencil required to support the use of wall function boundary conditions. Finally we describe a consistent, face-stencil based multi-dimensional limiter procedure (MLP), and show it to be fully consistent and compatible with the linearity-preserving unstructured- MUSCL (LP-U-MUSCL) scheme for all values of kappa. These methods and schema are implemented in the cell-centered finite-volume code VULCAN-CFD, which is then used to investigate whether the robustness improvements demonstrated in 2-D carry over to 3-D by computing hypersonic flows using mixed-element grids as well as highly adapted tetrahedral grids.

Weighted Least-Squares↗

2021 Corrective Measures Implementation and Interim Measures Annual Status Report: Summary of Biosparge System Operation and Maintenance, and Interim Groundwater Monitoring Mobile Launch Platform Rehabilitation Sites / Vehicle Assembly Building Area (SWMU 056) Kennedy Space Center, Florida

This report presents a summary of the Corrective Measures Implementation (CMI) and Interim Measure (IM) implementation activities that occurred from January 2021 through December 2021 at the Mobile Launch Platform Rehabilitation Sites (MLP)/Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) Area, Solid Waste Management Unit 056 (SWMU 056), located at the John F. Kennedy Space Center, Florida. The following summaries briefly describe areas within SWMU 056 identified by historical site investigation activities where groundwater monitoring and remedial actions have been implemented to date.

Randall K. Sillan↗

Prediction of Stiffness and Fatigue Lives of Polymer Matrix Composite Laminates Using Artificial Neural Networks

Machine learning (ML) models are increasingly being used in many engineering fields due to the advancements in ML algorithms and availability of high-speed computing power. One of the most popular ML class of models is artificial neural networks (ANN). ML is increasingly being used in the design and analysis of composite materials and structures, specifically in the constitutive modeling of composite materials with the focus on greatly accelerating multiscale analyses of composite materials and structures through development of surrogate models. Towards that end, both Python and MATLAB-based neural nets have been developed to predict initial stiffness and fatigue life of an eight-ply symmetric polymer matrix composite laminate. Two types of neural networks, a Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) and a Recurrent Neural Network (RNN), have been developed for both platforms. Results show that the both neural net types can provide an excellent estimate of initial stiffness as well as fatigue life of eight-ply symmetric polymer matrix composite laminate. RNNs are better able to capture the shape of the fatigue curve of a laminate. This tool can be very useful for system level studies to obtain an estimate of desired properties and life of PMC composite laminates. The associated surrogate models could also be used in composite multiscale analyses to replace the actual physics-based calculations at lower scales and thereby significantly increase the computational efficiency of such analyses and thus make multiscale analyses a viable industrial tool for large scale structural problems.

Composite↗