NASA using giant robot to build large composite spaceship parts in Alabama

NASA'S new Deputy Administrator Dava Newman will travel to Alabama Thursday to see the space agency's latest tool in the fight to lower the cost of space flight. It's a giant robot that will build composite structures for new rockets. (See video below)

Composites are lighter than metal, and the first hurdle in space flight is always cheating gravity to get your spaceship off the ground. Lighter parts mean a lighter rocket, and that means either lower liftoff costs or more room for supplies like the habitats astronauts will need on Mars. More cargo per launch could also mean fewer launches, which would also save money.

The robot now installed at the Marshall Space Center's Composites Technology Center can build composite structures more than 26 feet wide. Those would be some of the largest composites ever built for spaceflight. The robot moves along a track and uses its 21-foot-long arm to apply heated carbon fibers to a surface held by a spinning form. The fibers look like a piece of tape and are as thin as human hairs. The arm can operate at different angles, and the head can be changed for different projects.

"Composite manufacturing has advanced tremendously in the last few years," lead engineer Justin Jackson said, "and NASA is using this industrial automated fiber placement tool in new ways to advance space exploration."

NASA will make several structures in a demonstration project at Marshall, and then it will test the products on Marshall's structural test stands. If they can handle the stress of the stands, NASA will be one step closer to cheaper spaceflight.

Composites aren't new. NASA already uses them "for everything from aircraft to human space vehicles to planetary probes," Marshall composites expert Larry Pelham said. But using the big robot to make them precise and reliable enough at the sizes needed for human space travel will be a big step forward.

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