Page 12 - Aerotech News and Review Dec. 16 2016

Armstrong advanced aeronautics, science in 2016
by Peter W. Merlin
staff writer
Now in its 70th year of operation, NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., continues to advance the agency’s overall missions of aeronautics research, Earth and space science, and development of aero- space technology.
In the first few decades after it was founded in September 1946, NASA’s lead center of ex- cellence for atmospheric flight research initially focused on experimental aircraft called X-planes that pushed the boundaries of speed and altitude performance.
Since then, the center’s mission has expanded to include vital roles in the human spaceflight program, aviation safety, airborne science and technology advancement. In keeping with its roots, Armstrong is now returning to a new era of X-planes with the introduction of NASA’s first all-electric-propulsion aircraft as well as plans for a supersonic X-plane that could substantially decrease the noise made when an aircraft exceeds the speed of sound.
Aeronautics
X-57 Maxwell
NASA will soon fly an experimental aircraft powered by electric motors integrated into a high-aspect-ratio wing. The Air Force issued the official designation X-57 and NASA researchers dubbed the new X-plane “Maxwell” to honor James Clerk Maxwell, the 19th century Scottish physicist best known for his groundbreaking work in electromagnetism.
The X-57 is the latest part of a four-year NASA flight-demonstration project called Scalable Con- vergent Electric Propulsion Operations Research, or SCEPTOR. The testbed is a highly modified Italian-designed Tecnam P2006T twin-engine light aircraft, in which the original wing and two gas-fueled piston engines have been replaced with a long, slender airfoil containing 14 embedded electric motors and propellers – 12 on the lead- ing edge for takeoff and landing, and one on each wingtip for use at cruising altitudes.
NASA/Advanced Concepts Lab, AMA, Inc.
This artist’s concept of NASA’s X-57 Maxwell aircraft shows the plane’s specially designed wing and 14 electric motors. NASA Aeronautics researchers will use the X-57 to demonstrate that electric propulsion can make planes quieter, more efficient and more environmentally friendly.
performance of an air-data probe originally devel- oped by Eagle Aeronautics of Hampton, Va., and subsequently redesigned by NASA. The Eagle Aero Probe was carried during seven flights on a specially instrumented flight-test fixture attached to Armstrong’s F-15B to measure the strength of the airplane’s supersonic shock wave. These tests continued work undertaken in 2011 and 2014. In future tests, the probe will be installed on either the nose of the F-15B, or on one of NASA’s F- 15D aircraft based at Armstrong to study shock waves generated by another nearby supersonic aircraft. Expected to obtain more accurate data than traditional air-data sensors, the Eagle Aero Probe could help improve aircraft design tools for reducing the loudness of sonic booms from future aircraft.
Armstrong researchers are also refining tech- niques for capturing images of supersonic shock waves using schlieren photography. Flow visual- ization is one of the fundamental tools of aeronau- tics research, and schlieren methods incorporating a speckled background have been used for many years to visualize air density gradients caused by aerodynamic flow.
A technology called Background Oriented Schlieren using Celestial Objects (BOSCO) ef- fectively uses the sun as a background for captur- ing unique, measurable images of shockwaves. In March, a high-speed camera equipped with a hydrogen-alpha lens filter — commonly used when photographing the sun – was positioned strategically on the ground to capture a supersonic jet as it passed between the camera and the solar disk. The filter brings out the texture of the sun’s surface, and scientists then use that texture when processing raw photos into schlieren images of the supersonic airplane. Improved image-processing technology makes it possible to capture hundreds of observations of each shock wave and reveal details never seen before. These experiments, us- ing a T-38 from the Air Force Test Pilot School at Edwards, built upon previous similar experiments undertaken at Armstrong in 2015.
In February, NASA awarded a contract for the
See NASA, page 14
culminates a year of dedicated hard work by the LAE Integrated Product Team at Aerojet Rocketdyne,” said Aerojet Rocketdyne CEO and Presi- dent Eileen Drake. “This is another important step forward as our nation prepares to safely and reliably send humans back to the space station from American soil.”
Under the CCtCap subcontract to Boeing, Aerojet Rocketdyne will provide propulsion system hardware, which includes LAEs, Orbital Maneu- vering and Attitude Control thrusters, Reaction Control System thrusters, and more. Boeing will assemble propulsion hardware kits into the service module section of the Starliner spacecraft at its Commercial Crew and Cargo Process- ing Facility at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Aerojet Rocketdyne also provides hardware supporting service module hot-fire testing, which will take place at NASA’s White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico; the pad abort and system qualifica- tion testing, which will occur at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico; and the orbital flight test, which will be launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.
AFRL, from 10
The implementation of this kick pump in an ORSC engine provides for a performance improvement compared to other foreign engines, such as the Russian RD-180.
“This is an exciting day in the rocket propulsion industry,” said Dr. Shawn Phillips, the Rocket Propulsion Divi- sion chief. “The completion of this test is a key milestone that has been years in the making. So far everything looks good; there were no anomalies and the data indicates that the pump is functioning nominally.”
Phillips added that this test effec- tively achieves the harshest test point of the kick pump test campaign.
Robert Bernstein, AFRL’s Hydro- carbon Boost program manager, said “The 100-percent test confirms that the kick pump is operating as designed, but we’re not done putting it through its paces. There are more than 100 tests before we’re ready to integrate the kick pump with the rest of the engine. The next battery of tests will refine our understanding of how this pump operates and provide the data we need to gear up for testing of the demonstrator engine.”
The sheer number and duration of
tests is beyond that of typical test cam- paigns for development pumps and is an example of the technology push and intense research focus of the HBTD program. As the campaign progress- es, the kick pump will be pushed to its limits, testing the pump’s efficiency and potential life of the bearings and seals. These tests will provide data from 113 instruments that will con- tinuously monitor the pump’s health during operation and allow engineers to directly measure parameters that would otherwise need to be determined analytically.
This is one of the most highly in- strumented turbopumps of its size ever developed and will provide criti- cal data to the full-scale demonstrator engine test campaign, Bernstein said. The demonstrator engine will integrate the kick pump with other full-scale components like the main turbopump and preburner for integrated power- head testing.
“The massive amount of data we’ll be collecting will validate some key technologies and help us reduce risk for the full-scale, demonstrator en- gine,” said Bernstein.
The demonstrator engine’s full-scale
components are designed for 250,000 lbf of thrust and a throttling range of 33 to 100 percent, eclipsing the perfor- mance and efficiencies of domestic and foreign rocket engines of today.
The testing of the full-scale compo- nents will help the U.S. rocket industry understand one of the most challeng- ing rocket engine technologies ever developed and are intended to achieve the ambitious goals of the Rocket Propulsion Directorate for the 21st Century (RP-21) program, said Bern- stein. This activity will benefit the Air Force and the nation by demonstrat- ing the viability of key technologies and materials necessary for this cycle while making available the design and data to all of the American aerospace industry he said.
The lessons learned from the HBTD program are vital to maintaining America’s superiority in rocket and space technology, Bernstein said.
And now, the Rocket Lab is again involved in sending humans back to space.
Aerojet Rocketdyne is testing its Launch Abort Engines at the site..
The LAE feature innovate new propellant valves for Boeing’s Crew
Space Transportation-100 Starliner service module propulsion system. The tests confirmed the ability for the new valves to modulate propellant flow and control peak LAE thrust in the event of a launch abort.
The LAEs, designed by Aerojet Rocketdyne, include a fuel valve and oxidizer valve, which were developed and tested under the company’s Com- mercial Crew Transportation Capabil- ity (CCtCap) subcontract to Boeing. The Starliner will open a new era of spaceflight, carrying humans to the In- ternational Space Station once again from United States soil.
The LAEs, designed by Aerojet Rocketdyne, include a fuel valve and oxidizer valve, which were developed and tested under the company’s Com- mercial Crew Transportation Capabil- ity (CCtCap) subcontract to Boeing. The Starliner will open a new era of spaceflight, carrying humans to the In- ternational Space Station once again from United States soil.
“These innovative valves success- fully enabled the engine to demon- strate precise timing, peak thrust con- trol and steady-state thrust necessary during a mission abort. This testing
The airframe for the X-57 was shipped from Naples, Italy, and arrived at Empirical Systems Aerospace’s (ESAero) facility at Oceano Airport, near Pismo Beach, Calif., on July 19. In Septem- ber, technicians at Scaled Composites in Mojave, Calif., integrated Maxwell’s wing with its fuse- lage. NASA researchers hope to validate the idea that distributing electric power across a number of motors will result in a substantial reduction in the amount of energy required for a small general aviation plane to cruise at 175 mph. Flight-testing of the X-57 is expected to begin in 2017.
This research continues NASA efforts to reduce aircraft noise, exhaust emissions, and fuel con- sumption. Electric motors are generally quieter than piston engines, and by using only battery power the X-57 will eliminate carbon emissions and demonstrate that aircraft need not rely on
lead-based aviation fuel. These are all key ele- ments in NASA’s New Aviation Horizons initia- tive, a 10-year plan for fielding a number of X- planes to demonstrate 21st century innovations for flight.
Commercial Supersonic Technology
NASA scientists are also exploring methods for controlling and lessening the effects of supersonic shock waves in the hope that federal regulators may one day allow commercial and civil super- sonic flight over land in the United States. Such flying is currently restricted to military training operations within tightly controlled supersonic corridors in the National Airspace. Efforts at Arm- strong in 2016 focused on better understanding the nature and structure of sonic booms.
In March and April, researchers evaluated the
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December 16, 2016
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