Analysis on Varying Cross-sectional Design Parameters of Lenticular Deployable Composite Boom

Abstract

Thin-walled deployable composite booms (DCB) possessing excellent strain abilities have high demand in the current space industry. They help in compact packaging of large volumes during various space activities and have superior stowability when it is fabricated with a lenticular cross-section. The work carried out aims to investigate the most efficient cross-sectional parameters for a thin-walled DCB fabricated with high strained carbon fiber reinforced composites. The study utilized ABAQUS software to run computational analysis of the tensile test, to determine the strain energy attained, maximum force developed, and the stress and strain distribution over the cross-section. The analysis was done by varying cross-sectional parameters such as radii of curvature and thickness along the cross-section of the boom. The results were obtained for strain energy, maximum force, stress and strain distribution along the cross-section for varying cross-sectional design parameters. It was found that when curvature radii rise, the strain energy as well as force developed decreases. The force value dropped from 120.8 N to 53.62 N as the radius of curvature increased from 24 to 44 mm in the 0.4 mm model segment, indicating that less the radii more is the force required for flattening the structure. From stress and strain distribution, the areas prone to high stress and strain were at inflection points. Thus, the present study helps the designer to select the appropriate geometric parameters of lenticular DCB suiting the application.