An approach to ground testing of rockets and space vehicles on transient processes by copra-spring stand

The authors propose an approach to research tests of copra-spring stand, designed for testing rockets and spacecraft on inertial forces of a pulse character. The authors present the design of the stand, consisting of two main parts: mobile and stationary. The authors present a method for calculating the magnitude of the load factors and the oscillation frequency of the test object, and calculate the parameters for adjusting the spring stiffness. They describe the possibility of carrying out dynamic tests for imitating transient loads that hermetic structures such as modules of habitable orbital stations, loaded by internal pneumatic pressure, withstand during their lifecycle. The authors present the results of research tests when the stand without any additional weight was falling from the height of 20, 35 and 50 mm. They determine the levels of axial and transverse accelerations on the envelope of the stand and the lower ring. A comparison of the original and filtered signal from the load factor sensors obtained in each test case was made. The authors present the results of calculating accelerations of the moving part of the stand using the video processing of the experiment. To determine the position of the stand envelope they developed special software. The essence of the software was to determine the coordinate of the border of the color change from the frame height from a light color to a darker one using averaging in rows. The authors show that the results of a comparison of manual frame-by-frame measurement and data obtained by the software method indicate a sufficient convergence of the results using a drop from the height of 20 mm experiment. The comparison of axial loads obtained by various methods is given, when the moving part of the stand is thrown from the height of 20, 35 and 50 mm, respectively. The zero time points for the video and accelerometers were determined so that the first maximum is reached simultaneously. According to the results of research tests, the authors describe the development and validation of the finite element model of the stand. The calculations were carried out in a nonlinear formulation, which makes it possible to correctly take into account the loading of the stand at all stages, using the method of direct solution of the equations of motion. The authors show the results if calculating the time dependences of displacements and load factors at the sensor installation places and a comparison with the experimental results, which shows a good convergence.