Speaker
Description
Developing an understanding of thermal interface conductance is critical to managing an accurate spacecraft thermal balance. However, the real performance of assembled interfaces is often not well understood until the systems have been built and tested in vacuum. To facilitate more predictive design for space applications, Carbice Corporation has developed a suite of modeling tools that quickly provide accurate assessments of interface performance by solving the mechanical structural problem at the interface to determine the deflection of the components under load. When applied to an interface that adopts an elastic interface filler like the carbon nanotube based Space Pad line of products, an accurate assessment of contact pressure distribution within an interface can be determined, along with the resulting thermal map. This presentation will walk through several examples of real thermal interfaces that have been modeled using the Carbice SIM toolset along with experimental data validating model predictions. The presentation will then show model prediction for an actual Thales Alenia Space (TAS) traveling wave tube (TWT) application, showing the SIM tool’s performance predictions validated by actual TAS test data measurements.
