Advanced Stirling Convertor Phase II Achievements and Planned Phase III Efforts

Wood, John; Collins, J.O.; Wilson, K. B.; Carroll, Cliff; Frye, Patrick; Matejczyk, Dan; Soendker, E.; Penswick, L. Barry

doi:10.2514/6.2006-4108

Cited by 5 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 4 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The use of MarM-247 as the heater head material, instead of Inconel 718, will be the first step towards achieving higher power output. Sunpower has demonstrated 38 percent conversion efficiency operating at 850 °C hot-end and 90 °C cold-end temperatures (temperature ratio of 3.1) (Wood, 2006b). The higher rejection temperature allows for less radiator surface area, which translates to lower mass for the generator housing and radiator fin combination.…”

Section: Asrg Flight Unit Specific Powermentioning

confidence: 99%

Development of Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator for Space Exploration

Chan

Wood²,

Schreiber

2007

AIP Conference Proceedings

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Section: Asrg Flight Unit Specific Powermentioning

confidence: 99%

Development of Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator for Space Exploration

Chan

Wood²,

Schreiber

2007

AIP Conference Proceedings

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

“…The units are expected to produce 88-We AC power at approximately 40 percent conversion efficiency with an input thermal power of 220 W (ref. 18). A key technological issue to overcome is to increase the hot-end operating temperature to 850 °C.…”

Section: Sunpower Advanced Stirling Convertor Accomplishmentsmentioning

confidence: 99%

NASA's Advanced Radioisotope Power Conversion Technology Development Status

Anderson

Sankovic

Wilt

et al. 2007

2007 IEEE Aerospace Conference

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

NASA's Advanced Radioisotope Power Systems (ARPS) project is developing the next generation of radioisotope power conversion technologies that will enable future missions that have requirements that cannot be met by either photovoltaic systems or by current radioisotope power systems (RPSs). Requirements of advanced RPSs include high efficiency and high specific power (watts/kilogram) in order to meet future mission requirements with less radioisotope fuel and lower mass so that these systems can meet requirements for a variety of future space applications, including continual operation surface missions, outerplanetary missions, and solar probe. These advances would enable a factor of 2 to 4 decrease in the amount of fuel required to generate electrical power. Advanced RPS development goals also include long-life, reliability, and scalability. This paper provides an update on the contractual efforts under the Radioisotope Power Conversion Technology (RPCT) NASA Research Announcement (NRA) for research and development of Stirling, thermoelectric, and thermophotovoltaic power conversion technologies. The paper summarizes the current RPCT NRA efforts with a brief description of the effort, a status and/or summary of the contractor's key accomplishments, a discussion of upcoming plans, and a discussion of relevant system-level benefits and implications. The paper also provides a general discussion of the benefits from the development of these advanced power conversion technologies and the eventual payoffs to future missions (discussing system benefits due to overall improvements in efficiency, specific power, etc.).

show abstract