An overview of the application of 3D printed spacecraft structures within the ReDSHIFT project

Walker, Scott, Romei, Federico, Rodriguez, Jonathan Becedas, Vedova, Florio Dalla, Beck, James, Holbrough, Ian, Francesconi, Alessandro, Olivieri, Lorenzo, Caparros, Andrés, Rodriguez Flores, Geraldo, Morillo, Pablo, Stokes, Hedley, Rossi, A and Colombo, C. (2019) An overview of the application of 3D printed spacecraft structures within the ReDSHIFT project. In 70th International Astronautical Congress (IAC). International Astronautical Federation..

Abstract

The investigation of additive manufacturing technology started in the 1980’s and over the previousfour decades has developed dramatically. The advantages of this technology, such as increased geometricaldesign freedom, faster production times, the possibility of increased functional integration, the reduction ofmaterial waste and reduced costs have driven the development of this technology in many market sectors.However, the benefits of additive manufacturing is only starting to be realised within the spacecraftindustry. Within the last five years there has been a growing momentum of research and development intothe application of additive manufacturing for spacecraft and in many cases, this has been constrained tothe optimisation and production of small secondary structural components. The European Union funded1Paper ID: 52963oralresearch project entitled ‘ReDSHIFT’ (Revolutionary Design of Spacecraft through Holistic Integration ofFuture Technologies) began in 2016 and focused on passive means of reducing the impact of space debrisby prevention, mitigation and protection. The main innovative aspect of the project came as a result ofa synergy between theoretical and experimental aspects, such as long term astrodynamics simulations,de-orbiting devices, hypervelocity impact testing, design for demise and the application of 3D printingfor future satellite design. This paper will present an overview of the work performed on the applicationof 3D printing to future satellite design as part of the ReDSHIFT project, which finished in March 2019,along with the key results. This work was led by the University of Southampton in the UK with thecoordination and support of the project partners and involved the design, simulation and test of manyfunctional components as well as a complete 3D printed small satellite 8U cubesat structure. The workperformed within ReDSHIFT has enabled the potential of this technology for multiple applications to bequantifiably identified.

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Contributors

Author: Federico Romei

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