这US Naval Surface Warfare Center Dahlgren Division(NSWCDD) has announced that it will be doubling down on the development of hypersonic missile technology, and it’s using advanced manufacturing processes such as 3D printing to do so.
这division recently unveiled its strategic plan for 2021 – 2025, which prioritizes hypersonic weapons advancement in a bid to establish Dahlgren as the Surface Navy Lead in integrating hypersonic weapon systems. This ‘hypersonic technology thrust’ ultimately aims to develop a sustained defense workforce dedicated to hypersonic technologies.
As part of the initiative, Dahlgren has already set up several collaborations with other Department of Defense (DoD) agencies, industry partners, and academic experts through the Naval Surface Technology and Innovation Consortium and the Navy Engineering Education Consortium. This includes theJohns Hopkins University Extreme Materials Institute和迈阿密大学3D Printing Center.
“We come to work each day seeking ways to put new capabilities into the hands of our warfighters,” said Adam Jones, head of the NSWCDD advanced hypersonics and guided munitions division. “Offensive and defensive hypersonic weapons will give our Navy the edge it needs to maintain naval superiority against our adversaries.”
Hypersonics: blink and you might miss it
Hypersonic flight is defined as a speed of at least Mach 5, which is five times the speed of sound or about 6,800 miles per hour. With today’s aviation technology, a flight from LA to New York takes around five hours but at Mach 5, it would only take 40 minutes. When applied to the world of defense, the technology has its uses in hypersonic missiles – high-velocity warhead carriers that are much harder for aerial defense systems to intercept.
印象深刻？国防部也是如此。在2020年，美国将高超音速武器和反激发系统排名最高，高级技术现代化优先级列表，这意味着一旦现场就可以，它们将成为非常有用的工具。
Dahlgren at the forefront
这NSWCDD is well-suited to leading the US’ hypersonic technology advancement efforts as it already has an extensive history of supporting similar projects. After WWII, Dahlgren oversaw a feasibility study concerning hypervelocity guns to defend against supersonic aircraft and missiles, which were futuristic at the time. Over the decades since then, the NSWCDD has also developed software to launch the Navy’s submarine-based high-speed ballistic missiles, as well as engineered a ramjet capable of flying at Mach 4.
“NSWCDD has over six decades of expertise in developing, testing, and evaluating advanced materials for systems that operate in extreme thermal and ablative environments, as is the case with hypersonic and reentry vehicles—it is in our DNA,” added Dr. Pearl Rayms-Keller, chief scientist of the NSWCDD strategic and computing systems department.
最近，该部门获得了超过400万美元的内部投资，以资助22个海军创新科学工程（NISE）超音速项目，其中包括开发新的高超音速材料和高级超音速模拟。Partnering with the University of Miami’s 3D Printing Center, the division’s research teams will now have additive manufacturing systems at their disposal, meaning they’ll be able to leverage improved cycle times, design flexibility, and tool-free production to expedite their hypersonic development efforts.
This certainly isn’t the first time the DoD has applied additive manufacturing to hypersonics research either, as the Pentagon recently awarded 18 university-led hypersonic projects a total of $25.5 million. One of the projects, led by the弗吉尼亚大学, seeks to 3D print high-temperature parts made of previously unused niobium alloys. The hopes are that these proposed3D printing capabilities will eventually be applied to hypersonic scramjets。
Astro America应用科学技术研究组织，此前还已经完成了美国DARPA-commissioned study to accelerate the使用3D打印生产超声导弹。研究详细介绍了高超音速生产加速器设施（HPAF）的设计计划，该计划巩固了政府客户和一个屋顶下每个层的领先制造商。
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特色图片显示，美国测试了来自夏威夷考艾岛太平洋导弹范围设施的高超音速滑行机构。通过美国海军的照片。
