Award Data

The purpose of this project is to demonstrate the feasibility of using an innovative, durable, low friction, and non-toxic solid lubricant coating for foil air bearings for air cycle machines (ACM). Acrees coating provides superior wear characteristics at all temperatures and provides a substantial improvement over polyimide type coatings that are currently used on ACMs. The coating consists of tw ...

Additive manufacturing (AM) is a very promising technique for rapid, low-cost production of aircraft parts directly from a CAD file. AM is especially appealing for complex parts that would be costly or impossible to fabricate by machining or casting. At the current time there are no reliable, cost-effective techniques to qualify the finished parts. Several government studies have noted this gap an ...

A critical aspect of exoskeleton control that has to date introduced a performance limitation is the ability of the exoskeleton to recognize the intent of the operator so it can apply assistance to their desired motion. This intent recognition effort is typically solved using ad-hoc methods where subject matter experts make design decisions and tune transitions to identify intended maneuvers as re ...

Coating materials and coating methods used to protect U.S. military aircraft and weapon systems from corrosion and wear are in need of environmentally benign alternatives in order to keep up with dynamic regulations associated with environment, safety, and occupational health. Thus, the Air Force is supporting research to develop alternatives to the dangerous materials identified on the OSD Emergi ...

A human produces more than 100 Watts of waste heat during normal activity. If a fraction of this heat energy can be harvested it can replace the stored chemical energy in one or more of the batteries typically carried by soldiers in the field. The current generation batteries, such as the BB2590 are bulky and rigid. The PowerFelt material developed by Wake Forest University is ideally suited for h ...