Development of Non-Parasitic Integrated Acreage TPS/Airframe Material

The proposed Phase II effort involves 1) continued material development of lower cost high temperature composites (PIP C/SiC) begun in Phase I, 2) modifications to the hybrid truss core integrated TPS design concept in order to tailor the final design to specific re-entry and hypersonic cruise vehicles, 3) generation of an enhanced materials property database from measurements performed on these composites in Phases I and II, and 4) characterization of load-carrying and thermal protection capabilities of the proposed concept through subelement and subcomponent fabrication and testing. Subcontractors to assist Materials Research & Design, Inc. in the proposed program include Allcomp, Inc. of City of Industry, CA for the composite processing and subelement and subcomponent fabrication, Southern Research Institute of Birmingham, AL for the materials testing task, and NASA Dryden Flight Research Center of Edwards, CA for the subelement and subcomponent testing. The expected primary outcomes of the proposed effort include a) enhanced material performance capabilities from PIP-based carbon fiber reinforced SiC matrix composites and b) the demonstration of the suitability of this relatively new class of low cost, high temperature composite materials in load-bearing thermal protection system materials and components.