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Thermal Protection for Mars Sample Return Earth Entry Vehicle: A Grand Challenge for Design Methodology and Reliability VerificationMars Sample Return is our Grand Challenge for the coming decade. TPS (Thermal Protection System) nominal performance is not the key challenge. The main difficulty for designers is the need to verify unprecedented reliability for the entry system: current guidelines for prevention of backward contamination require that the probability of spores larger than 1 micron diameter escaping into the Earth environment be lower than 1 million for the entire system, and the allocation to TPS would be more stringent than that. For reference, the reliability allocation for Orion TPS is closer to 11000, and the demonstrated reliability for previous human Earth return systems was closer to 1100. Improving reliability by more than 3 orders of magnitude is a grand challenge indeed. The TPS community must embrace the possibility of new architectures that are focused on reliability above thermal performance and mass efficiency. MSR (Mars Sample Return) EEV (Earth Entry Vehicle) will be hit with MMOD (Micrometeoroid and Orbital Debris) prior to reentry. A chute-less aero-shell design which allows for self-righting shape was baselined in prior MSR studies, with the assumption that a passive system will maximize EEV robustness. Hence the aero-shell along with the TPS has to take ground impact and not break apart. System verification will require testing to establish ablative performance and thermal failure but also testing of damage from MMOD, and structural performance at ground impact. Mission requirements will demand analysis, testing and verification that are focused on establishing reliability of the design. In this proposed talk, we will focus on the grand challenge of MSR EEV TPS and the need for innovative approaches to address challenges in modeling, testing, manufacturing and verification.
Document ID
20170012212
Acquisition Source
Ames Research Center
Document Type
Presentation
Authors
Venkatapathy, Ethiraj (NASA Ames Research Center Moffett Field, CA, United States)
Gage, Peter (Neerim Corp. Mountain View, CA, United States)
Wright, Michael J. (NASA Ames Research Center Moffett Field, CA, United States)
Date Acquired
December 18, 2017
Publication Date
August 30, 2017
Subject Category
Spacecraft Design, Testing And Performance
Lunar And Planetary Science And Exploration
Report/Patent Number
ARC-E-DAA-TN46348
Meeting Information
Meeting: Ablation Workshop
Location: Bozeman, MT
Country: United States
Start Date: August 30, 2017
End Date: August 31, 2017
Sponsors: Montana State Univ.
Funding Number(s)
CONTRACT_GRANT: NNA13AC87C
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Public Use Permitted.
Keywords
Design and Verification for Reliability
Mars Sample Return
TPS

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