Flexible Dust-Excluding Fiber Seals

A multi-application solution for excluding dust in planetary regolith must be developed if landed technology is going to operate for an acceptable amount of time.nbsp; A range of dust management amp; mitigation innovations must be used for operations on dusty planetary surfaces.nbsp; This is especially true in dynamic regolith environments like rovers, ISRU plants, excavation, amp; EVAs where multiple layers of dust protection amp; exclusion are needed.nbsp;We will develop a flexible dust-excluding seal to provide multiple technologies with the protection they need to fulfill their missions. nbsp;The dust seals will be adaptable for use in static joints, covers, hatches, linear actuators, bearings, rotary joints, hinges, amp; linkages, amp; increase system life to provide a greater return on investment. nbsp;The nature of these dust seals allows for their rapid development for space environment testing. nbsp;Due to the materials used, producing the dust seals using in-situ resources can be explored for future missions.nbsp;The dust seal will not rely on elastomers or polymers that fail due to intense temperatures or volatile depletion in the vacuum of space.nbsp; The materials are resistant to many chemicals amp; oxidizers.nbsp; They will be capable of operating for 10s to 100s of months with little to no maintenance as part of a complete dust strategy.nbsp;The dust seals will be made with fine stainless steel and/or basalt fibers that align amp; interlock when compressed, conforming to the joint surfaces to seal out dust.nbsp; The fibers have a naturally low friction coefficient on smooth, hard surfaces which makes them ideal for use in dynamic amp; static applications.nbsp; The dust seals do not require a solid film or lubrication.nbsp; The dust seals retain a degree of flexibility amp; compressibility so they can be re-used. nbsp;The fibers can also be coated with other materials to impart additional useful properties such as shedding dust.