Abstract:
A method for making a storage tank with an integral vane starts with a feed pipe. A thin, flat vane has a shape which defines an inner and outer curve extending between attachment and second ends. The outer curve of the vane is dimensioned to lie just within the inner periphery of the tank, spaced therefrom by a particular gap. The attachment end of the vane is affixed to a first part of a coupling region of the feed pipe, with the pipe axis lying in the plane of the vane. The vane-pipe combination is placed in the cavity of a mold having the desired interior shape of the tank, with the edge of the outer curve of the vane spaces away from the wall of the mold by the desired gap. A dissolvable, hardenable liquid is injected into the mold and hardened. The mold is removed, leaving a soluble mandrel in the shape of the cavity of the tank. A copper coating is applied to the mandrel and the pipe, to form a metal liner including a neck extending over the feed pipe. A composite reinforcing shell is applied over the liner, after which solvent is passed through the feed pipe to dissolve the mandrel, leaving a reinforced, metal-lined cavity including the vane. In one embodiment of the invention, the vane is supported at the second end by attachment to the liner
Abstract:
A composite packaging arrangement for dispensing a liquid monopropellant l comprising a first inner tank that is made of composite materials and a second and outer tank that has a dome structure at one end that is made of epoxy material that is bonded to one end of the first tank and the second tank includes a cylindrical intermediate structure that is bonded to the epoxy dome structure and has a remote end dome structure of nylon secured in a sealing arrangement to the cylindrical intermediate structure with composite material mounted on the outer surface of the second tank to provide a lightweight compact tankage arrangement.
Abstract:
An explusion system in which an inner tank is nested within a second and er tank to provide a very compact and space saving arrangement for an expulsion system for a rocket with the first and inner tank as well as the second and outer tank being reinforced with composite material to provide a space saving and relatively light expulsion system for a rocket.
Abstract:
This device comprises a flexible sheet member having cross convolutions oriented 45.degree. to the shear vector with spherical reliefs at the convolution junctions. The spherical reliefs are essential to the shear flexibility by interrupting the principal stress lines that act along the ridges of the convolutions. The spherical reliefs provide convolutions in both directions in the plane of the cross-convolution ridges.
Abstract:
A device for damping the vibrations of bellows, particularly bellows which are employed in storage tanks for liquid rocket propellants of rocket engines, comprises an outer tubular member with a bellows adapted to contain a propellant therein which is axially expandable and contractable within the tubular container. A damping device for the bellows comprises an inner wall formation made up of a plurality of circumferentially arranged segmental portions, each being arched in a radially inward direction to provide resilient contacting surfaces having crests which act inwardly against the bellows.
Abstract:
Disclosure relates to a rolling diaphragm for expelling a liquid, such as a propellant for a rocket engine, from a tank of frusto-conical shape in which the diaphragm is of the same frusto-conical shape as the tank has a flange at the end of the larger diameter which is directed radially inward and connected to the periphery of a piston of smaller diameter and so constructed that longitudinal movement of the piston by fluid pressure applied to one side thereof draws the peripheral wall of the diaphragm inwardly as it is moved with the piston longitudinally to fold the diaphragm from a larger to a smaller diameter as it rolls along the wall of the tank.