Erosion Results of the MISSE 9-15 Polymers and Composites Experiment 1-4 (PCE 1-4)

Polymers and other oxidizable materials on the exterior of spacecraft in the low Earth orbit (LEO) space environment can be eroded from reaction with atomic oxygen (AO). Therefore, in order to design durable spacecraft it is important to know the extent of erosion that will occur during a mission. This can be determined by knowing the LEO AO erosion yield, Ey (volume loss per incident oxygen atom), of materials susceptible to AO reaction. In addition, recent flight experiments have shown that the AO Ey can vary with the AO fluence and/or solar exposure. Therefore, obtaining AO Ey data for materials flown on various spaceflight missions is important. NASA Glenn Research Center has flown numerous experiments as part of the Materials International Space Station Experiment (MISSE) missions on the exterior of the International Space Station (ISS) to characterize the LEO Ey of polymers, composites, protective coatings, and other spacecraft materials. Recently, four Glenn experiments with 365 flight (F) samples were flown on ISS’s MISSE-Flight Facility (MISSE-FF). These experiments are the Polymers and Composites Experiment-1 (PCE-1) flown as part of the MISSE-9 mission, the PCE-2 flown as part of the MISSE-10 mission, the PCE-3 flown as part of the MISSE-12 and MISSE-15 missions, and the PCE-4 flown as part of the MISSE-13 mission. Although each experiment had numerous sample objectives, the primary objective was to determine the LEO AO Ey of various spacecraft materials as a function of solar irradiation and AO fluence. This paper provides a summary of the erosion data for the PCE 1-4 AO Ey samples. The AO Ey for 150 samples flown in either the LEO ram, wake, zenith or nadir directions are provided. The AO ram fluence varied from 2.97×1020 atoms/cm2 after 0.89 years of direct space exposure (with relatively high levels of Si contamination) on MISSE 12 to 3.93×1020 atoms/cm2 after 1.17 years of direct space exposure on MISSE-10. The ram AO Ey values for uncoated polymers range from 3.81×10–25 cm3/atom for polytetrafluoroethylene (M9R-C20 F) exposed to an AO fluence of 3.44×1020 atoms/cm2 on MISSE-9 to 4.43×10–23 cm3/atom for AO etched low density polyimide aerogel (M12R-C21 F) exposed to an AO fluence of 2.97×1021 atoms/cm2 on MISSE-12. Because of the low AO fluence and relatively high Si contamination, a number of PCE-3 wake samples experienced mass gain. Thus, AO Ey values are not provided for these samples. Although there are calculated AO Ey values for the zenith, wake and nadir samples, the ram AO Ey for a particular material is a more reliable value in terms of AO exposure because the zenith, wake and nadir directions were exposed to either no or very little AO fluence and thus other space environmental factors (i.e. vacuum, thermal extremes and thermal cycling, and/or various types of radiation) are responsible for the mass loss.