Assessing the ageing of solid rocket motors is extremely important to all branches of the DoD. While it is known that key mechanical parameters such as modulus and relaxation modulus are key indicators of solid rocket motor health in term of ageing, the equipment to characterize and track these properties is bulky and complicated to use. For the past two decades, Tanner Research has been working with all types of energetics along with custom mechatronics (robots and sensor & actuators system). The company has developed a variety of energetics health monitoring techniques for the Air Force, Missile Defense Agency, and the Army. For this topic, Tanner Research proposes to develop a compact robotic mechanical tester that can traverse the full length of a variety of rocket motor bores to determine changes in mechanical stiffness (modulus) and plasticity as well as relaxation modulus and other dynamic mechanical characteristics. In the Phase I, Tanner will demonstrate a basic mechatronic architecture that can meet HERO requirements as well as a form factor that is compatible with the rocket nozzle volumes and propellant wall profiles.
Benefit: A highly compact, reliable, direct mechanical characterization of modulus and other parameters has the potential to robustly measure solid rocket motor degradation. This automated HERO compliant tool could also be used to evaluate other energetic fills where changing internal stiffness parameters are directly related to ageing and associated performance degradation.
Keywords: Youngs modulus, Youngs modulus, strain measurment, HERO compliant, Health monitoring, solid rocket motor propellant, SRM propellant, elastic resilience, Modulus
