We say it all the time, and if that’s not enough, the evidence surely speaks for itself: metal 3D printing is a pretty big deal these days, and growing bigger all the time. There are stories of new developments in metal 3D printing all the time, and the need is so great, Thrinno even introduced a worldwide sourcing platform for the metal 3D printing market. One industry that frequently uses metal 3D printing technology is the aerospace sector, whether it’s individual parts for commercial airplanes, military planes, or aircraft up in space. We’ve seen a metal 3D printed satellite bracket, a huge airliner door hinge manufactured on a powder bed 3D printer, 3D printed flexible metal space fabric, and 3D printed South Korean metal military jet parts.
The Rocket Team has been around for 14 years at MIT, and is an independent student group focused on (you guessed it!) rocket-related projects, from developing lighter, stronger composite airframes and designing and building a custom centrifugal liquid engine. In 2015, the team’s Project Odyssey won first place in the basic category at the Intercollegiate Rocket Engineering Competition. The team’s personal lab was recently renovated, and now features dedicated work stations for a multitude of activities, from an avionics workstation with stocked components perfect for prototyping to flammables storage lockers, which hold ejection charge powder, flammable solvents, and of course, rocket motors.
The team designed the motor case for single use only, but wanted to experiment with what would happen if it was fired a second time. A more energetic propellant was used for the second test, and the rocket motor case didn’t hold up quite as well. Since the throat was already a little worn from the first test, it eroded fast and was unable to maintain supersonic flow a second time. Little thrust was produced, and the rocket’s combustion quickly became unstable.
Garcia wrote, “While this unstable combustion is not useful for propulsion, it looks really cool in 240 fps slow motion!”
“Printing rocket motors from plastic is a unique accomplishment. Several groups, including SpaceX and NASA, print rocket engines from metal,” said Garcia. “But metal printers are expensive, costing north of six figures. Our plastic motor is produced on an innovative, lower-cost plastic printer, which has a price accessible to hobbyists and small teams. We also designed our case to work with modern composite propellants.”
So while metal 3D printing is definitely a continuously developing and necessary technology, with many possible applications, the MIT Rocket Team shows us that sometimes, you need to go back to the basics for a project to really lift off. Discuss in the MIT forum at 3DPB.com.
[Source/Images: MIT Rocket Team]