Low-temperature co-fired ceramic (LTCC) technology has been first successfully employed for the realization of a solid propellant microthruster. The microthruster has potential applications in microspacecraft as an excellent micropropulsion system for high-accuracy station keeping, attitude control, drag compensation and orbit adjust. The design, fabrication and experimental investigation of LTCC microthrusters are reported. Results from experiments on microcombustion, and thrust and impulse measurements both at sea level and in vacuum are presented. Initial tests employing gunpowder-based solid propellant have produced 3.81 x 10(-5)-1.27 x 10(-4) N s of total impulse and 5.55-14.41 s of specific impulse at sea level, and 1.31 x 10(-4)-2.79 x 10(-4) N s of total impulse and 19.05-31.55 s of specific impulse in vacuum. The performance of the LTCC solid propellant microthruster is also compared with that of a silicon-based solid propellant microthruster.
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机译：低温共烧陶瓷（LTCC）技术已首先成功地用于实现固体推进剂微推进器。微型推力器作为一种出色的微型推进系统，在高精度航天器保持，姿态控制，阻力补偿和轨道调整中具有潜在的应用。报告了LTCC微型推力器的设计，制造和实验研究。给出了微燃烧实验的结果，以及海平面和真空中的推力和脉冲测量结果。使用火药基固体推进剂的初始测试产生了3.81 x 10（-5）-1.27 x 10（-4）N s的总冲量和5.55-14.41 s的海比冲量，以及1.31 x 10（-4）在真空中，总脉冲为-2.79 x 10（-4）N s，比脉冲为19.05-31.55 s。还将LTCC固体推进剂微推进器的性能与硅基固体推进剂微推进器的性能进行了比较。
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