here<\/a> on July 16 at 2 p.m. ET. Hear from Dragonfly scientists and engineers, direct from the clean room, as they discuss the spacecraft\u2019s latest milestones in integration and testing, explain how Dragonfly will explore Titan, and answer audience questions about the mission.<\/p>\nFrom May through early June, engineers and technicians at APL put the Dragonfly rotorcraft through vibration and sealing tests designed to show that the fuselage\u2019s structural backbone can withstand the loads of launch, entry through Titan\u2019s atmosphere, and landing on the surface of this ocean world.<\/p>\n
For vibration testing, the team installed mass simulators in place of the flight instruments and electronics being built and tested elsewhere. The ground vibration test gave the team a fleeting preview of Dragonfly in the air. Engineers suspended the rotorcraft\u2019s structure a few inches off the ground from long bungee cords, then measured how mechanical vibrations at the rotor locations traveled through the frame to key sensors on the main body.<\/p>\n
\u201cSuspended for a few hours during that test \u2014 even barely above the floor \u2014 was structurally akin to Dragonfly\u2019s first flight,\u201d said Gordon Maahs, the Dragonfly mechanical systems engineer from APL. \u201cIt gets the imagination going about what actual flight will look like.\u201d<\/p>\n
The test also included a \u201csit down\u201d configuration, lowering the lander onto protective padding so it rested on its skids while engineers measured how the structure would respond on Titan\u2019s surface.<\/p>\n
The sealing test was more unusual. Most planetary spacecraft are built for the vacuum of space or worlds with thin atmospheres. But Dragonfly is headed to Titan, where the surface atmosphere is dense, cold, and about 1.5 times the pressure of Earth\u2019s, so engineers needed to understand how well the assembled structure could keep that environment out. The solution: pressurize Dragonfly\u2019s outer structure to identify any gaps, cracks, or holes that could allow airflow in and out of the lander on Titan.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve never seen a test like it on any other spacecraft,\u201d Maahs said. \u201cWe get a total flow rate based off of the sealing test, and that feeds our thermal analysis to determine if we\u2019re sealed enough.\u201d<\/p>\n
The results, Maahs added, were \u201cextremely good.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Eye on Dragonfly Interested in learning more? Watch Eye on Dragonfly Live, an inside look at the mission\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":754375,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[35541,323351,65563,77763,2852,323349,718,79,323350,323348,193,323353,323346,32903,323352,323347],"class_list":["post-754374","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-antenna","tag-avionics","tag-dragonfly","tag-high-gain-antenna","tag-it","tag-johns-hopkins-apl","tag-nasa","tag-science","tag-sealing-test","tag-sealing-testing","tag-space","tag-spacecraft-assembly","tag-structural-build","tag-titan","tag-titan-mission","tag-vibration-testing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/754374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=754374"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/754374\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/754375"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=754374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=754374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=754374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}