[meteorite-list] Heat Shield for NASA's Orion Spacecraft Arrives at Kennedy Space Center

[Ron Baalke]

December 4, 2013

Rachel Kraft
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1100
rachel.h.kraft at nasa.gov 

Brandi Dean
Johnson Space Center, Houston
281-483-5111
brandi.k.dean at nasa.gov 

Amber Philman
Kennedy Space Center, Fla.
321-867-2468
amber.n.philman at nasa.gov 
     
RELEASE 13-361
     
Heat Shield for NASA's Orion Spacecraft Arrives at Kennedy Space Center

NASA's Orion spacecraft is just about ready to turn up the heat. The  
spacecraft's heat shield arrived at the agency's Kennedy Space Center in  
Florida Wednesday night aboard the agency's Super Guppy aircraft.

The heat shield, the largest of its kind ever built, is to be unloaded  
Thursday and is scheduled for installation on the Orion crew module in March,  
in preparation for Orion's first flight test in September 2014.

"The heat shield completion and delivery to Kennedy, where Orion is being  
prepared, is a major step toward Exploration Flight Test-1 next year," said  
Dan Dumbacher, NASA's deputy associate administrator for exploration systems  
development in Washington. "Sending Orion into space for the first time is  
going to give us crucial data to improve our design decisions and develop  
Orion to send humans on future missions to an asteroid and Mars."

The heat shield began its journey in January 2012 in Colorado, at Orion prime  
contractor Lockheed Martin's Waterton Facility near Denver. That was the  
manufacturing site for a titanium skeleton and carbon fiber skin that give  
the heat shield its shape and provide structural support during landing. They  
were shipped in March to Textron Defense Systems near Boston, where they were  
used in construction of the heat shield itself.

Textron installed a fiberglass-phenolic honeycomb structure on the skin,  
filled each of the honeycomb's 320,000 cells with the ablative material  
Avcoat, then X-rayed and sanded each cell to match Orion's design  
specifications. The Avcoat-treated shell will shield Orion from the extreme  
heat it will experience as it returns to Earth. The ablative material will  
wear away as it heats up during Orion's re-entry into the atmosphere,  
preventing heat from being transferred to the rest of the capsule.

"Many people across the country have poured a tremendous amount of hard work  
into building this heat shield," said Orion Program Manager Mark Geyer.  
"Their efforts are a critical part of helping us understand what it takes to  
bring a human-rated spacecraft back safely from deep space."

Before and during its manufacture, the heat shield material was subjected to  
arc-jet testing NASA's Ames Research Center in California and NASA's Johnson  
Space Center in Houston. Arc jets heat and expand gasses to very high  
temperatures and supersonic and hypersonic speeds, thus simulating the  
heating conditions that a returning spacecraft will experience.

The heat shield delivered to Kennedy will be used during Exploration Flight  
Test-1, a two-orbit flight that will take an uncrewed Orion capsule to an  
altitude of 3,600 miles. The returning capsule is expected to encounter  
temperatures of almost 4,000 degrees Fahrenheit as it travels through Earth's  
atmosphere at up to 20,000 mph, faster than any spacecraft in the last 40  
years.

Data gathered during the flight will influence decisions about design  
improvements on the heat shield and other Orion systems, authenticate  
existing computer models, and innovative new approaches to space systems and  
development. It also will reduce overall mission risks and costs for future  
Orion missions, which include exploring an asteroid and Mars.

To learn more about Orion and Exploration Flight Test-1, visit

http://www.nasa.gov/orion 

-end-