Research on Large, Highly Accurate, Inflatable Reflectors

摘要

Very large and accurate reflective surfaces are required for future space applications such as solar rocket propulsion, radar, laser power transmission and relay, solar energy collection, telescopes, and others. Present techniques used to construct highly accurate reflectors are limited in application to diameters of a few meters. Metallized thin film membranes have the potential to satisfy the requirements of most future applications with minimum weight systems. The objective of this research was to identify materials, construction and control techniques to improve the surface accuracy of inflatable reflectors. Film joining and forming, support structure design options, surface accuracy measurement system options and electrostatic surface configuration control techniques were investigated. Prototype models were designed, built, and tested to demonstrate film forming techniques, support structure deployment, and electrostatic membrane configuration control utilizing segmented charge plates and an electron gun. A laser ray-tracing technique was employed to measure surface accuracies. These demonstrations verified the feasibility of the concepts. (Author)