The status of NASA's Evolutionary Xenon Thruster (NEXT) Long Duration Test (LDT) is presented. The test will be conducted with a 36 cm diameter engineering model ion thruster, designated EM3, to validate and qualify the NEXT thruster propellant throughput capability of 450 kg xenon. The ion thruster will be operated at various input powers from the NEXT throttle table. Pretest performance assessments demonstrated that EM3 satisfies all thruster performance requirements. As of June 26, 2005, the ion thruster has accumulated 493 hours of operation and processed 10.2 kg of xenon at a thruster input power of 6.9 kW. Overall ion thruster performance, which includes thrust, thruster input power, specific impulse, and thrust efficiency, has been steady to date with very little variation in performance parameters.
Status of the NEXT Ion Thruster Long Duration Test
41st AIAA/ASME/SAE/ASEE Joint Propulsion Conference and Exhibit ; 2005 ; Tucson, AZ, United States
2005-09-01
Report
Keine Angabe
Englisch
Status of the Next Ion Thruster Long Duration Test
AIAA | 2005
|Status of the NEXT Ion Thruster Long Duration Test
NTIS | 2005
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