Additive Manufacturing for Thermal Protection

October 19, 2020 - Amendment 1 This is an amendment to the sysposis entitiled Additive Manufacturing for Thermal Protection which was posted on October 15, 2020. This amendment is posted to add a 3-page limit to each question and the preferred Microsoft Word or .pdf formats for the responses. The due date for responses is not extended. This notice is issued by the NASA Johnson Space Center to post a draft Request for Information(RFI) via the internet and solicit responses from interested parties. This is for information and planning purposes and to allow industry the opportunity to verify reasonableness and feasibility of the requirement, as well as promote competition. Prospective offerors are invited to submit written comments or questions to Bermuda Brittingham at bermuda.a.brittingham@nasa.gov and Kristin Tauber at Kristin.m.tauber@nasa.gov, no later than November 30, 2020. When responding reference 80JSC021THERMAL, Additive Manufacturing for Thermal Protection. NASA's strategic goals include - Extend human presence deeper into space and to the moon for sustainable long-term exploration and utilization and - Address national challenges and catalyze economic growth. One of the approaches to meeting these goals is to - Develop and Transfer Revolutionary Technologies to Enable Exploration Capabilities for NASA and the Nation. One of the revolutionary technologies is additive manufacturing (AM) which is changing the way we design and manufacture hardware. NASA has been investigating the feasibility of this rapidly changing technology being used in the design and fabrication of thermal protection for spacecraft. The potential applications include any components of spacecraft that are exposed to high-heating from high-speed flight in planetary atmospheres and/or are exposed to heating from the operation of spacecraft propulsion systems. For the purposes of this Request for Information (RFI), a broad approach for thermal protection is considered and includes both traditional thermal protection systems (TPS) and hot structures. Traditional TPS protects the structure to which it is bonded solely for the purpose of maintaining the structure below an allowable temperature. Both the ceramic tiles on the Space Shuttle Orbiter and the ablative heat shield on the Orion vehicle are examples of a traditional TPS. Hot structures are systems in which the aeroshell structure is directly exposed to the heating environments. The wing-leading edge panels and nose-cap on the Space Shuttle Orbiter are examples. The use of additive manufacturing methods to facilitate the fabrication of either types of TPS are of interest. Additive manufacturing could provide novel approaches to TPS design and manufacturing including varying material properties to optimize thermal-structural performance and to minimize mass. Furthermore, AM may provide a more integrated approach to manufacturing a spacecraft aeroshell and open the door for automated TPS manufacturing and assembly. Such possibilities could significantly open the design space for future thermal protection systems and future spacecraft and may allow for reduced manufacturing time and cost. Since NASA's intent is to develop technology that benefits future NASA missions and also benefits commercial companies that are developing systems to explore the solar system, this RFI has been written to engage industry, universities, and other Governmental organizations to assist NASA in assessing the application of AM technology for manufacturing TPS and in formulating a TPS AM technology development plan. As part of developing the plan, NASA plans to conduct a TPS AM workshop and if you are interested in contributing to the workshop, in addition to answering the questions, NASA would be very interested in engaging you in the planning and participation. NASA plans to invite experts from Other Government Agencies (OGA) and Universities in addition to industry. The RFI includes a set of questions that will be used in organizing the workshop and by NASA to potentially plan future technology projects and future solicitations. Responses will be held confidential and not shared outside of the government. Questions: 1) Does your organization design and build aircraft, spacecraft and/or hypersonic vehicles, or are you a supplier to companies that build these vehicles? 2) Is your organization actively using additive manufacturing to fabricate hardware for engineering applications? If yes, please describe the types of hardware and the materials used. 3) Does your organization design and build AM equipment? If yes, are they offered for sale or used for research purposes. 4) Does your organization develop polymer based materials for use by the AM industry? If yes, please describe the types of materials and their uses. 5) Does your organization verify the material properties of AM parts in-house? If yes, what process and testing does your organization conduct to verify material properties for AM parts? 6) Does your organization use Non-Destructive Evaluation (NDE) techniques to inspect AM parts? If yes, please describe them. 7) Currently, manufacturing specifications are being developed, or are already available, for composite structures and additively manufactured parts. How could these specifications be leveraged for additively manufactured TPS? 8) Does your organization currently fabricate thermal protection systems for spacecraft? If yes, please describe the materials and do you use AM, or would you consider AM in fabrication of TPS in the future? 9) Currently, hardware fabricated using additive manufacturing techniques have known material quality concerns. These concerns include printed material porosity/flaws and layer-to-layer adhesion. For additively manufactured TPS, what are the primary concerns you have? 10) Does your organization conduct research into new thermal protection materials and the methods to fabricate them? If yes, please describe. 11) Does your organization have computational tools to assist with the design and/or manufacturing of thermal protection systems? Do you have computational tools to predict properties and/or performance of a thermal protection material? If yes, what are those tools? 12) Does your organization believe there is a role for additive manufacturing in fabricating structural components exposed to high-heating and/or applying thermal protection to structural components? Please explain your response and provide specific examples of the particular application. 13) What would be the benefits of using additive manufacturing in the fabrication of heat shields and which benefits would be most important for your application? 14) What type of thermal protection is most important to your organization - single use such as an ablator, or multi-use/reusable? If reusable, what is the minimum number of flights? 15) What are the most compelling reasons for using AM for TPS? Cost and schedule savings? Mass reduction? Material robustness? 16) If NASA invests in technologies to use additive manufacturing to fabricate structural components exposed to high-heating and/or for applying thermal protection to structural components, could your organization use this technology and what would be the benefits? What applications would you foresee for your organization in the next 5 years? 10 years? 17) If NASA invests in technologies to use additive manufacturing to fabricate structural components exposed to high-heating and/or for applying thermal protection to structural components, what role would your organization play'supplier of raw material, manufacturer, researcher, system integrator, other? 18) Are you interested in a TPS AM Workshop? If you are interested, would you like to be a presenter and/or a participant? 19) Please describe your organization: University, National Lab, Large/small business? Do not submit any proprietary data in response to the synopsis. Information with proprietary markings will not be read or considered. This synopsis does not obligate the Government to issue a solicitation in the future. Any future solicitation based on the requirements described in this synopsis will be published in beta.sam.gov. This pre-solicitation synopsis is not to be construed as a commitment by the Government, nor will the Government pay for the information submitted in response. Respondents will not be notified of the results. NASA Clause 1852.215-84, Ombudsman, is applicable. The Center Ombudsman for this acquisition can be found at http://prod.nais.nasa.gov/pub/pub_library/Omb.html . The solicitation and any documents related to this procurement will be available over the Internet. These documents will reside on a World Wide Web (WWW) server, which may be accessed using a WWW browser application. It is the offeror's responsibility to monitor the Internet site for the release of the solicitation and amendments (if any). Potential offerors will be responsible for downloading their own copy of the solicitation and amendments, if any.