Antero™ 840CN03 is a high-performance PEKK-based FDM® thermoplastic with strong mechanical properties along with exceptional material properties, such as electro-static dissipation, temperature resistance, chemical resistance, exceptional wear properties, and ultra-low outgassing. This makes it ideal for low-volume, highly-customized production parts and functional prototypes that need to withstand more intemperate conditions. Antero 840CN03’s primary advantages over other Stratasys high-performance materials – such as ULTEM™ 9085 resin, ULTEM™ 1010 resin and PPSF – are its ESD, high chemical resistance, and low outgassing properties.
NEW MATERIAL ENABLES 3D PRINTED PARTS ON ORION If space is the final frontier, then human travel in to deep space, beyond the Moon, is the ultimate frontier. NASA’s Orion program intends to do just that – travel with humans on board back to the Moon and out into deep space, and one day soon, Mars. But before human travel, NASA is launching a series of test missions to target risk reduction, efficiencies identification, and industry partnerships enhancement. A successful Exploration Flight Test-1 is already behind them and NASA is poised to launch the next un-crewed phase of its mission, Exploration Mission-1 (EM-1), in late 2019. And then, EM-2 will follow in 2023, but with one major addition; this spacecraft will be crewed.
The conditions of deep space require a multi-mission approach with rigorous parts testing and the construction of a new spacecraft for each mission. This ensures both the integrity of the parts but also poses a challenge for Lockheed Martin, prime contractor for the Orion vehicle: repeatability. “The goal of the Exploration Missions and the spacecrafts themselves are that you’ll start to limit the design changes and the design updates as you go from one mission to the next,” said Brian Kaplun, manager, additive manufacturing at Lockheed Martin Space. The idea is that a part would be thoroughly tested before going forward “because these capsules become copies of one another, so that each one is an enhancement but the baseline remains static.”
The electro static dissipative qualities of Antero™ (ESD) PEKK material make this part flight-worthy
Material Makes the Part In its quest to position the nation and U.S. companies as world leaders, NASA is using advanced manufacturing techniques, such as 3D printing on board both the rocket and spacecraft. In fact, EM-1 has more than 100-3D printed parts on board. “What’s become apparent recently is the maturity of the 3D printing systems,” said Kaplun. “The actual machines doing the printing are more reliable and when you install a new piece of equipment and you print a part on two separate machines with the type of quality controls we have in place, you will get a part that will perform very similarly.”
In addition to the manufacturing process, the materials used have a rigorous needs assessment attached to them. “The granddaddy of flight components has been the ULTEM™ 9085 material,” said Kaplun. “It’s well-understood, has excellent strength properties, excellent thermal properties, excellent out-gassing; it really is ideal for utilization in space environments.” But one property has been missing in this material for use in deep space: electro-static dissipative (ESD) capabilities.
Also, the properties of the ESD PEKK eliminate a large amount of the post processing that we would otherwise have had to do. So that also nets a tremendous amount of time savings.” ESD PEKK “has enabled us to achieve very consistent builds that move beyond the realm of prototyping and into production in a manner that is consistent,” said Kaplun. “It yields repeatable results, and we can now, with a high degree of confidence, know that we’re not just making a single part but a family of parts.”
The Stratasys Antero (ESD) part on Orion is the outside of the docking hatch and measures one meter in diameter. “The hatch covering is made entirely of ESD PEKK,” said Kaplun. ULTEM 9085 covers would still have needed some sort of coating or nickel plating to deflect the static charge, making ESD PEKK very attractive to Lockheed. The six-piece part joins together to form a ring on the outside of the docking hatch, “much like a pizza in six slices with a hole in the middle, or a donut,” said Kaplun.
