Development, Fabrication and Ground Test of an Inflatable Structure Space-Flight Experiment

Inflatable, rigidizable structures provide a solution to reduce the costs associated with design, fabrication and launch of a space system while simultaneously increasing the deployment reliability and mission success of the system%. This research focused on the follow on design, fabrication, and ground test of the Rigidizable Inflatable Get-Away-Special Experiment (RIGEX). RIGEX is a self-contained experiment that will test the deployment and structural characteristics of three inflatable rigidizable tubes. Once inflated and rigidized, each tube will be excited using piezoelectric transducers in order to collect vibration data for structural characterization. The goal of this research was to collect ground testing data that will later be used in conjunction with actual space flight results in an effort to validate ground testing methodologies.Air Force Inst of Tech Wright-Patterson AFB OH School of Engineering and Management is the author of 'Development, Fabrication and Ground Test of an Inflatable Structure Space-Flight Experiment', published 2003 under ISBN 9781423504436 and ISBN 1423504437.