NSF Award
9760568
*** 9760568 Sherman This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I program will demonstrate the ability to fabricate a low cost titanium foam structural material. The resulting syntactic foam will offer improved structural efficiency without the limitations of currently available honeycomb core sandwich structures by improving the properties (primarily shear) of the core material and the care/facesheet bond. The primary objectives of the proposed program will be demonstrating improvements in structural efficiency and design flexibility that can be achieved using a titanium foam core sandwich panel, while, eliminating current sandwich panel design limitations. Powdermet will demonstrate the fabrication of syntactic titanium foam with 50-80% microsphere loadings using metal encapsulated ceramic microspheres prepared using chemical vapor deposition and consolidated through either sintering or a modified OSPREY process. The end result will be a low cost, high strength and structurally efficient syntactic titanium foam composite material. Aside from the obvious airframe applications of sandwich panels (a multibillion-dollar market), commercial spinoffs in spacecraft, sporting equipment, robotics, medical implants, automobiles, and other critical stiffness-driven material applications, as well as other specialized markets including filters and noise suppression structures, represent tremendous commercial potential for a reliable foam core sandwich structure. ***
