T0044-P Sintering of Composite Materials Under Reduced Gravity Conditions

Program start date is on hold until Space Act Agreement is signed.  Placeholder date of January 2014 is used as placeholder.

Purpose of this experiment is to study how the reduced gravity conditions influence the formation of the micro-structures in the sintering process of powder materials. Previous experiments on powder mixing and compacting have been carried out on parabolic flights, using ceramic-based composite materials with different percentages of alumina and zircon oxide, which showed that in the samples compressed under reduced gravity the distribution of the zircon in the alumina is more homogenous as compared to the samples obtained under 1 g on ground. The proposed experiment will extend investigation, by heating pre-compressed samples to sintering temperature, under the reduced gravity conditions provided by a parabolic flight aircraft.