UNR Aerospace Club

The University of Nevada, Reno Aerospace Club is using FFF Metal by The Virtual Foundry to build a solid rocket motor. Once successful, the club will then evaluate a potential liquid engine with internal channeling to take full advantage of additive metal manufacturing.

Project leads Chris Zinser and Justin Powell outlined their project to make their current rocket more than triple its achievable flight distance.

They’ll be working with Stainless Steel 316L Filamet™ and Inconel® 718 Filamet™ for the project, printing on a Bambu Lab X1-Carbon 3D Printer and debinding & sintering in The Virtual Foundry Sintering Kiln.

Inconel will be used to make a metal casing for the rocket booster with a liner to absorb the heat. The Club chose this material because of its ability to withstand high pressures at reduced weight.

The final parts will be relatively large – 15-18″ (380-457mm) tall and about 1.5″ (38mm) diameter. Since FFF Metal really shines with smaller parts, the Club will likely break their engine down into multiple pieces and thread them together post-sinter.

For Phase I though, parts will be sub-scale like the 3DBenchy. This phase is focused on material science and data science – how the material reacts, how it shrinks, etc. They will narrow that down to eventually produce precision parts.

The result of Phase I will be an FFF Metal process that delivers consistent results.

Next spring, they’ll start applying the parts.

The rocket itself is 6′ (1.8m) long and has, so far, flown to 30,000 feet (9144m). The Club needs to create higher pressure in the rocket’s chamber so it can fly higher to 100,000 feet (30km).

We look forward to supporting the UNR Aerospace Club in their efforts!