ULTRAMET — Department of Defense SBIR Phase II: MDA16-020

Description

In previous exit cone insulator development for MDA and heat shield fabrication for NASA, Ultramet developed advanced foam-reinforced carbon/phenolic ablators, now at TRL 6, that offer substantially increased performance under high heat flux conditions and reduced weight relative to conventional ablators. Solid rocket motor and arcjet testing showed that the foam provides effective reinforcement for a conventional chopped fiber ablator and helps retain the char layer, reducing erosion rate and heat transfer. The composite offers good strength and stiffness, does not suffer from delamination and pocketing issues that can occur in continuously reinforced ablators, and has demonstrated high resistance to alumina particulate erosion. However, the ablator formulation in ablator-filled foam contains carbonized rayon fiber from Enka (Germany). Through material fabrication and preliminary properties testing in Phase I, Ultramet demonstrated the initial feasibility of replacing carbonized rayon with carbonized Lyocell, which is domestically manufactured by a process that is not environmentally damaging. In Phase II, Ultramet will team with Southern Research, ARA Ablatives Laboratory, and Orbital ATK to optimize ablators containing carbonized Lyocell and perform solid rocket motor testing in support of OATKs development of a 21-inch tactical boost motor for the Standard Missile-3 Future Naval Capability third stage rocket motor.Approved for Public Release | 18-MDA-9522 (23 Feb 18)