Design and test of a micro digital thruster

Dahai Ren; Gaofei Zhang; Xiaolu Wang; Zheng You

doi:10.1117/12.801179

9 September 2008 Design and test of a micro digital thruster

Dahai Ren, Gaofei Zhang, Xiaolu Wang, Zheng You

Proceedings Volume 7039, Nanoengineering: Fabrication, Properties, Optics, and Devices V; 703913 (2008) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.801179
Event: NanoScience + Engineering, 2008, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

To meet the requirement of the space applications, digital thrusters with larger scale units should be employed, which means that the dimension of each thruster unit should be further reduced. In this paper, the system function structure for the satellite attitude control is introduced and a micro arrayed thruster is designed to improve the ignition properties in tiny chambers. A four layers structure of the micro thruster unit is presented and the ignition resistor is studied in detail. The structural mechanics analyzing results and the fabrication sample are presented. As an important part, the solid propellant is analyzed and the prescription is presented. To improve the uniformity of the propellant loading, a special device is developed by which the propellant can be once loaded into the array. To test the performance of the thruster, we developed an optical measurement system based on a pendulum structure. The system principle is introduced and a series of mathematical model was established. The impulse measurement system based on laser interference is presented. By this system, the impulse property of the micro thruster based on the solid propellant is studied and the test results are analyzed.

Citation Download Citation

Dahai Ren, Gaofei Zhang, Xiaolu Wang, and Zheng You "Design and test of a micro digital thruster", Proc. SPIE 7039, Nanoengineering: Fabrication, Properties, Optics, and Devices V, 703913 (9 September 2008); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.801179

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