Development of a Deployable Boom for Microsatellites Using Elastic Memory Composite Material

Bending shape recovery of unidirectional carbon fiber reinforced epoxy-based shape memory polymer composites

“…The mechanical and activation properties of SMP composites depend on their formulation. The carbon fiber or fabric reinforcement in SMP composites enhances the general mechanical performance of these laminates, and especially their shape recovery force [4,5,7]. SMP composites also feature low density, adjustable Tg and high damping capability, which make these active composites suitable for aerospace applications, such as hinges, trusses, antennas, and solar arrays [2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13].…”

“…Only a minority of published papers deals with experiments to fully characterize fiber or fabric reinforced SMP composites. These latter papers could be broadly divided into two categories: one related to unidirectional fiber reinforced SMP composites and their microstructural mechanisms occurring during bending [7,8,10,[14][15][16][17][18]. The other group of papers concerns the analysis of the thermo-mechanical behavior of fabric reinforced SMP composites [11][12][13][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27].…”

“…The other group of papers concerns the analysis of the thermo-mechanical behavior of fabric reinforced SMP composites [11][12][13][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27]. Since 1999, Composite Technology Development, Inc. has been developing SMPs and related fiber reinforced composites (Elastic Memory Composite, EMC) [7,8,14,15,20]. Papers generated by teams of researchers associated to the company have focused on the out-of-plane and in-plane buckling of unidirectional carbon fiber reinforced EMCs [14,15].…”

“…As stated above, the thermo-mechanical behavior of SMP composites is an object of interest for several research teams [18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26]. Early works have focused on the evaluation of prototypes making use of the SMP effect, like furlable truss boom [7], EMC hinge [8], and reflector [20]. In those studies emphasis was placed on the packaging and other factors like deployment torque, precision, and repeatability.…”

A review of shape memory polymers bearing reversible binding groups

“…Potential applications of SMPs are not limited to biomedical applications. For example, the aerospace industry is interested in using SMPs in a variety of deployable structures such as booms, solar arrays, and morphing wings . In the automotive industry, potential SMP applications include morphable automotive body molding, tunable vehicle structures, and seat assemblies .…”