yee@trident.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee) (04/06/91)
Ed Campion Headquarters, Washington, D.C. April 5, 1991 (Phone: 202/453-8536) Jim Sahli Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala. (Phone: 205/544-0034) RELEASE: 91-51 FIRST SUBSCALE ADVANCED SOLID ROCKET MOTOR TEST FIRING SET NASA will begin a series of sub-scale test firings to evaluate materials intended for use in the new Space Shuttle Advanced Solid Rocket Motor. The first of these tests is scheduled to occur at the Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala., on Wednesday, April 10 at 8:30 p.m. EDT. The firing of a 20-foot-long, 48-inch-diameter, solid rocket motor for approximately 30 seconds will mark the first test of several candidate materials for the nozzle of the new Space Shuttle advanced motor. The advanced motor is being developed by NASA in Iuka, Miss. to replace the current motors in the Space Shuttle solid rocket boosters in the mid 1990s. The test will be conducted in Marshall's East Test Area by Aerojet Corp., ASRM Division in Iuka, Ms., under contract to Lockheed Missiles and Space Co., Sunnyvale, Calif., to design and build the new rocket motor. "The primary purpose of these nozzle tests is to evaluate performance of nozzle candidate materials. Full-scale static firings of the new NASA Advanced Solid Rocket Motors also will be conducted later at the Stennis Space Center in Mississippi to validate the nozzle's configuration," said Royce Mitchell, NASA's Advanced Motor Project Manager at Marshall. "We will have five nozzle material tests and five insulation tests at Marshall using this test motor. These are the initial The test motor is mounted in a Marshall test facility called cartridges weighing a total of approximately 10,000 pounds" said Alec Domal, Test Manager in Marshall's Advanced Motor Chief Engineer's Office. Approximately 150 measurements of temperatures, pressures, strains and other motor characteristics will be acquired during the firing. The test motor consists of one steel case segment, two solid propellant cartridges, a forward dome loaded with inert propellant, an aft dome segment with insulation, the test nozzle, an igniter and a safe and arm device. The maximum combustion chamber pressure predicted for the motor is 700 psi.