Evaluation of a heated-air airship for the environment of Titan
Name
765924719-MIT.pdf
Description
Full printable version
Size
7.06 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
fbe84ada979e6f38b6b83d76fea5f287
Author(s)
Heller, Richard, S.M. Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Advisor(s)
John J. Leonard.
Date Issued
2011
Publisher
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Abstract
Future exploration of Saturn's moon Titan can be carried out by airships, which have the capability to study the atmosphere as well as the capability to land and study the surface at multiple locations. Several lighter-than-air gas airships and passive drifting heated-air balloon designs have been studied, but a heated-air airship could combine the best of both. A design tool was created to enable iteration through different design parameters of a heated-air airship (diameter, number of layers, and insulating gas pocket thicknesses) and evaluate the feasibility of the resulting airship. A baseline heated-air airship was designed to have a diameter of 6 m (outer diameter of 6.2 m), 3 layers, and an insulating gas pocket thickness of 0.05 m between each layer. This heated-air airship also had a mass of 161.87 kg. A similar mission making use of a hydrogen-filled airship would require a diameter of 4.3 m and a mass of about 200 kg. For a desired long-term mission, the heated-air airship appears better suited. However for a desired mission under 180 days, the less complex hydrogen airship would likely be a better option.
Description
Thesis (S.M.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, 2011.
Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 59-63).
Subjects
Mechanical Engineering.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical Engineering
Terms of Use
M.I.T. theses are protected by
copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but
reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written
permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.
copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but
reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written
permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.
Persistent DSpace Link
