ZARM Drop Tower Bremen General Information
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1. I __ ws tino VAT Fig 5 The ZARM buildings ground floor A finemechanics workshop with state of the art machinery that besides the drop tower operation serves the ZARM scientists is to your hand free of charge whenever changes repairs adaptors or adaptations are needed The same accounts for an electronics laboratory that is equipped with all items and personal know how to develop and build spaceproof hardware 2 4 Accomodation As drop tower campaigns might last some weeks ZARM FABmbH can offer you on site accomodation in an appartment for a reasonable price The appartment has shower phone satellite TV and a kitchen with any items you need to serve yourself Otherwise ZARM FABmbH will make hotel guesthouse or vacation house bookings for you for special prices 12 Fig 5 On site appartment For scientists from foreign countries ZARM FABmbH can give you a car to your hands free of charge to enable you to explore the region in your free time international driving license required Both issues must be ordered some time in advance for planning reasons 132. of Facilities 1 2 How to choose the appropriate Facility Referring to Tab 1 it is easy to imagine that there is no general way to find the appropriate facility for your experiment Therefore a decision matrix must be elaborated for any individual experiment The first order aspect is the micro g level needed Zero g is a singularity that cannot realy exist As gravity is a fundamental interaction with infininte distance of reach connected to mass any experiment is exposed to residual accelerations at least induced by the mass distribution of the experiment itself In terms of mathematics microgravity research is approaching a division by zero problem This singularity problem is the reason why you can t extrapolate e g from macro g in a centrifuge via 1 g towards zero g A monotoneous function for this never exist This would request for the best micro g quality achievable On the other hand the question on the response time of your experiment needs to be answered The answer is based upon the inertia of the process you focus on The level of residual accelerations must be lower than the acceleration necessary to affect the process of interest This can be calculated in terms of response frequencies When the time scale of the process of interest is longer than one period at a given g level the facility is overqualified But this should be the case at least by one order of magnitude It is easy to imagine that e g in terms of flui
3. other hand downscaling is often limited by boundary conditions e g via interactions with container surfaces or radiative walls more and more affecting the process As an example near equilibrium crystal growth experiments require less time the smaller the sample and the growth lenght is But the effect of liquid gas or even worse liquid wall interactions increase with decreasing sample size Again similarity numbers have to be applied to appropiately design your experiment The third order aspect is related to costs Reflecting on what has been shown before when long term experiments are inevoidable the best facility might quite often be the unmanned orbital system But as being the most expensive one any mission is exclusively designed in accordance with the experiments requirements and in the Space Station age the number of missions will approach zero a step by step approach is indispensable Even though it doesn t make sens to perform experiments in an inapproriate environment a step by step approach is always possible and a direct access to orbital facilities does not exist Easy access is only possible to Parabolic Flight aircrafts and Drop Towers Parabolic Flight campaigns allow for conducting numerous experiments at low costs There is no real limitation in mass and power consumption and hardware ona laboratory status can be used Even if you might not get reproducible results due to the high level of residual accelerations an
4. tower users are coming from universities or research labs As long as your research is public fundet your national space agency should be the right partner to contact In cases your idea or project matches or overlaps with European research programs ESA could be the right partner to be addressed for covering the drop tower use expenses As the main customer of ZARM FABmbH is the German Aerospace Center DLR who acts also as the German national space agency cooperative projects with german research institutes or scientists could lead to a co funding through DLR As being financed only through drop tower operation you can imagine that it is also in our interest to support your ideas in terms of funding In any case we would be pleased if we could help out but it needs you contacting us Support in Design As addressed above a personal discussion will always be more straightforward than reeding manuals Most questions will occure concerning electrical and electronical interfaces ZARM FABmbH will support you in any occuring question on design free of any charge We can also offer you to take over partial or total design duties In this case please ask for a detailed offer Support in Integration The experimental campaign includes assistance of in average two engineers in integrating your setup into the drop bus Programming of the experiment time line will be done on site in co operation with you see chapter 3 A mechanical worksho
5. you in doing a quick look to your data 2 The Bremen Drop Tower 2 1 What is ZARM ZARM is the german acronym for Zentrum f r angewandte Raumfahrttechnologie und Mikrogravitation or Center of Applied Space Technology and Microgravity Behind the acronym ZARM are two institutions The one is the ZARM Institute as part of the University of Bremen The institutes own activities are in the fields of fluid physics combustion space science and space technology The other institution is your partner during drop tower campaigns This is the ZARM FABmbh This is the abbreviation for Fallturm Betriebsgesellschaft mbH or Drop Tower Operation and Service Company It is a public company owned by the Bremen State Government In the past the University and Institute background turned out to be one of the most important advantages of this facility as it serves you in an infrastructural way 2 2 The Site The Bremen Drop Tower is located on campus of the University of Bremen Fig 1 The Bremen Drop Tower 145m Upper end Release Mechanism 119m Sled Drop Capsul Drop Tube Lift Deceleration Unit Compensator Mounting Construction Decleration Chamber Deceleration Container Hanger Bars Deceleration Unit Drop Tube Foundation 13m PRS 10m Main Building Om Capsule Accelerator 11m Foundation 16m Fig 3 The Towers Interior 10 The tower buildin
6. 078 Fax 49 0 421 218 3889 e mail fab zarm uni bremen de 1 2 Content The Microgravity Research Facilities ecceccecesceececeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeseeeeeeeeesaseateeseeteneees 4 1 1 List of Micro g Facilities Comple mentary not Competitive ccececeeeee 4 1 2 How to choose the appropriate Facility cecececcseeeeeceeeeeeeceeeeeeeeeeeeeseeeaseesaeeates 4 1 3 How we can support YOU cc aecnivn haven tac eeu a ae a eee Ye 6 The Bremen Drop TOWer sit ni ee ital gee i a ee edo le Ge nenene ne nen 9 Bele Wha ZAR M aE a a a a aa aa r aae eae a 9 PA EREET E A E E T E E tase sacs 9 2 3 Laboratories and WorkShop cececcecceceseeececeeeeeeeeeeeeceeeeeceseeeeesaseaseesaeeareeseeeaeeees 12 24 Accomoda ON ee ne ae ee aet aaiae ee Moa ae ea ae aie aa AEE nis inas 12 1__The Microgravity Research Facilities 1 1 List of Micro g Facilities Complementary not Competitive The following table compares the most common microgravity research facilities in its important details NASA Glenn USA INTA Madrid E Novespace Airbus ZARM Bremen D Mini TEXUS NASA KC 135 JAMIC J Nee NASA DCQ MG LAB J EURECA weeks months weeks months ves no 10s ves eee ge ee Ino yes tyes ees intermittant yes intermittant Campaianes _____ an pi 2 year_ not reqular_ not regular _ Flexibility to hardware changes low high no Jo dow on site support no yes pg no yes O Tab 1 Comparison
7. ZARM Drop Tower Bremen General Information Version 28 April 2000 Drop Tower Operation and Service Company ZARM FABmbH Am Fallturm D 28359 Bremen Phone 49 0 421 218 4078 Fax 49 0 421 218 3889 e mail fab zarm uni bremen de How to read this paper This paper shall serve for both as a general introduction into microgravity research when firstly approaching it and as an introduction into the Bremen drop tower facility As your experiment can only be integrated if in accordance with the given boundary conditions it is mandatory to refer to the Drop Tower Users Manual When reading this paper is your first approach to a drop tower experiment it is recommended to read it carefully from the beginning Later you may refer to the related chapters As our aim is to serve the scientists needs as best as possible please contact us as soon as possible Keep in mind that many items of the technical equipment have been implemented upon former users requests As the drop tower facility is a cutting edge facility for microgravity research it is under constant development Even though we try to be downward compatible with any new development this can not be guarantied in any case Therefore for most actual informations please refer to our web page http www zarm uni bremen de download htm or directely contact Drop Tower Operation and Service Company ZARM FABmbH Am Fallturm D 28359 Bremen Phone 49 0 421 218 4
8. besides your field of expertise that might occure during a campaign We want you to imagine that you coming along with delicate instrumentation are treated as a guest and our aim is to do everything possible to make your stay successful and satisfactory The Bremen drop tower is the only microgravity facility worldwide ona technical university campus Therefore you will never be alone with your technical problems How to design a drop tower experiment Even though microgravity research might be in fame of high technology think simple should be the guideline of hardware realization Simple in two ways ensure yourself of your idea being able to answer basic instead of complex questions and try to design your hardware and measurement equipment as simple as possible Don t worry there will still be enough chances for failure First Aid In terms of approaching drop tower experimenting you are strongly encouraged to contact us as soon as possible At least looking onto details there are often various ways to turn an idea into hardware As there is quite a lot of experience at ZARM available to your hands please take advantage of this You can never compete with us in terms of whether your question or our answer is more stupid Be sure that any information you give us on your idea or its attempt of realization is strictly kept confidential as long as we are not encouraged through yours to act else Support for Funding Most of drop
9. d its jittering you get experience with the setup the measurement devices and you can get a feeling for the area of parameters to more carefully investigate on Besides reasonable scientific results are not excluded in many cases A clever approach often is to design the Parabolic Flight experiment in accordance with the manual as Drop Tower experimenting will be the next step when you don t necessarily need a long term facility Viceversa a Drop Tower hardware can always be mounted to a Parabolic Flight aircraft As Drop Towers offer the best micro g quality achievable this is a facility for serious research But the number of drops is limited to max three drops day 30 micro g periods day or so in a Parabolic Flight aircraft As you will see by reading the manual experimental hardware to be used in a drop tower is very close to laboratory standards There are only very few 5 requirements a setup must match that are based upon the necessity to withstand the deceleration forces Even in the case that long term experiments are necessary the experimental setup developments can benefit from preliminary test of hardware functionability by performing drop tower tests 1 3 How we can support you The idea behind the Bremen drop tower is to make a technical university background available for you during your stay at ZARM Laboratories workshops scientific personnel is prepared to assist you in any case of troubles or questions rising
10. d physics the driving force is temperature or concentration difference the inertia can be defined 4 through density and viscosity Therefore combustion or high temperature plasma experiments are very sensitive to residual accelerations as temperature differences are high and the counteracting density is low This the more as the time scales of the incorporated chemical processes are comparably short By the way this is the reason why combustion research is one of the major branches at drop towers In contrast transport processes in liquids driven by temperature gradients are of longer time scales due to the higher density This does not account e g for crystal growth experiments where the time scale of the solidification rate is long as temperature gradients are usually adjusted as low as possible In order to more accurately classify your experiment you must refer to the related numbers of similarity A second order aspect is the microgravity time Of course in seconds experiment time you cannot whatch plants growing But when long term experiments tell you that plants show a gravipercepsis you do not necessarily learn why In contrary when you investigate on single cells process time scales become short The keyword behind is scaling The more you scale down your experiment the shorter the time scales of the observed process become and by the way the more sensitive against residual accelerations the experiment gets On the
11. g contains the drop facility It consists of an evacuable steel tube which houses all technical parts to handle the drop capsule The capsule is a pressurized container described in the Drop Tower User Manual Braking of the fallen capsule is performed within the deceleration container filled with polystyrene pellets of 5mm diameter Below the drop and braking section the scetch depicts the capsule catapult that will become operational in 2001 It will allow for doubling the experiment time up to almost 10s You can reach the site from Bremen Airport and Main Station by tram No 6 The final station Universitat Klagenfurter Strasse is just 200m apart from the tower By car you reach ZARM via Autobahn A 27 direction Bremerhaven Cuxhaven Take the exit Horn Lehe Universitat and you can t miss Bremerhaven Hamburg HH AQ Universitat Bremer Kreuz Osnabr ck OS Hannover H Fig 4 Roadmap 11 2 3 Laboratories and Workshops Drop tower users can use all laboratories and laboratory equipment of ZARM free of charge Some laboratories are equipped for special purposes such as a laser lab a bio lab a chemistry lab and a cristallography lab However the equipment you need to prepare and evaluate your experiment is quite often such special that users must Clarifiy aforehand a campaign which equipment is available and what has to come along with the experiment or must be organized with the University of Bremen ZARM Holle
12. p is at your hands at ZARM whenever mechanical changes repairs or the manufacturing of additional small hardware elements holders etc is needed Costs for the utilization of this workshop are included An electronic workshop is also at your hands in terms of repairs of equipment or interface adoption is needed The engineers of this workshop will also be your partner in discussing problems concerning signal quality and how to help out Small electronic hardware developments and setups will then be build up in the workshop Costs for the utilization are also included Support during Campaigns All laboratories of ZARM are yours during your stay Visit our homepage http www zarm uni bremen de to get an idea on what we could do for you In case we cannot help you we will try to find appropriate assistance in other on campus institutes At least two engineers will be constantly available as contact persons during your campaign This is during data recovery recharging of your experiment for the next drop as well as to discuss results For accomodation you can either stay at the ZARM appartment or we will organize appropriate lodging for you Support in Evaluation of Results All data are handed to you on discettes CD ROM or tapes These data include houskeeping data to enable you to correlate the results with all events stored during your experiment In some cases special software solutions had been developed and are available to support
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