Bengaluru:

ISRO has successfully conducted a long-duration test of its PS4 engine, re-designed for production using cutting-edge additive manufacturing (AM) techniques — also known in common parlance as 3D printing — and crafted in Indian industry, the space agency said on Friday.

The new engine, now a single piece, saves 97 per cent of raw materials and reduces production time by 60 per cent, ISRO said.

ISRO achieved the major milestone with the successful hot testing of a liquid rocket engine manufactured through AM technology for a duration of 665 seconds on May 9, a release from the space agency said.

The engine used is the PS4 engine of PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle) upper stage.

Design & Manufacturing Breakthrough:
ISRO successfully conducts a long-duration test of the PS4 engine, re-designed for production using cutting-edge additive manufacturing techniques and crafted in the Indian industry.

The new engine, now a single piece, saves 97% of raw… pic.twitter.com/YdDsDm3YGF

— ISRO (@isro) May 10, 2024

The PS4 engine manufactured in the conventional machining and welding route has been in use for the fourth stage of PSLV which has a thrust of 7.33 kN in vacuum condition. The same engine is also used in the Reaction Control System (RCS) of the first stage (PS1) of PSLV, the release said.

The engine uses the earth-storable bipropellant combinations of Nitrogen Tetroxide as oxidiser and Mono Methyl Hydrazine as fuel in pressure-fed mode. It was developed by ISRO’s Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre (LPSC).

LPSC redesigned the engine making it amenable to the Design for Additive Manufacturing (DfAM) concept thereby gaining considerable advantages.

The Laser Powder Bed Fusion technique employed has brought down the number of parts from 14 to a single-piece, and eliminated 19 weld joints, saving significantly on the raw material usage per engine (13.7 kg of metal powder compared to the 565 kg of forgings and sheets for conventional manufacturing process) and reduced 60 per cent in the overall production time, the ISRO release said.

The manufacturing of the engine was done in Indian industry (M/s WIPRO 3D), and the engine was hot tested at ISRO Propulsion Complex, Mahendragiri, Tamil Nadu.

As part of the development programme, the injector head of the engine was realised and successfully hot tested earlier. Detailed flow and thermal modelling, structural simulation, and cold flow characterisation of the proto hardware were carried out to gain confidence for the hot test, ISRO said.

Consequently, four successful developmental hot tests of integrated engine were conducted for a cumulative duration of 74 seconds which validated the engine performance parameters.

Furthermore, the engine was successfully tested for the full qualification duration of 665 seconds and observed that all the performance parameters were as expected. It is planned to induct this AM PS4 engine into the regular PSLV programme, ISRO added.
 

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New Delhi:

As part of India’s ambitious plans in space, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has started work on setting up the country’s maiden space station at the earliest. ISRO chief S Somanath says the first modules of the space station may be launched in the next few years.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has set an ambitious goal for ISRO — India’s own space station, up and running by 2035. ISRO has already started developing technologies for the space station. The space station to be placed in a low earth orbit. The Bharatiya Antariksh Station could accommodate 2 to 4 astronauts in space. Only Russia, the US and China have sent space stations in orbit. India may become the fourth country to have an independent space station in space.

NDTV got exclusive access to an artist’s impression of the space station displayed at the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre.

Dr Unnikrishnan Nair, director of Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre in Thiruvananthapuram, says work is on in full swing and the plan is to use India’s heaviest rocket, Bahubali, or Launch Vehicle Mark 3 to hoist the components into an orbit of about 400 km from earth.

India hopes to do microgravity experiments in space, including astrobiology experiments, and use the platform to explore the possibility of habitat on the surface of the moon.

According to initial estimates, the space station could weigh about 20 tonnes. It would be made of solid structures, but inflatable modules could be added. The final version could well go to about 400 tonnes.

One end of the space station will be a docking port for the crew module and rocket that will ferry astronauts. India is developing a 21st century special docking port for this and it may well be compatible with the docking port of International Space Station.

Once completed, the Indian space station can have four different modules and at least four pairs of solar panels. It will also have a permanently docked safety crew module escape system for use in case of emergencies.

The main module will be equipped with an India-made Environmental Life Support and Control System and it will help generate oxygen and remove carbon dioxide and keep relative humidity at optimum levels.

As per the current drawings, in the first phase, there will be two large solar panels that would generate the power required to run the Bharatiya Antariksh Station.

As part of the space vision 2047, Prime Minister Modi directed that India should now aim for ambitious goals, including setting up the space station and sending the first Indian to the Moon by 2040.