个人数控磨机帮助NASA大胆去...

By using various machines and a PCNC 1100 mill from Tormach, the NASA team can quickly prototype and develop different versions of unique components. “We’re making parts for flight projects, high-altitude balloons, and prototyping things for an eventual satellite mission,” said Alan Kogut.

Both the costs and risks of spaceflight are always high. So what do you do when you don’t have the time, budget and room for error to outsource the machining of ever-evolving prototypes? NASA Goddard Spaceflight Center uses an array of manufacturing and engineering tools to develop their one-off, highly customized technologies. In fact, they use a shop that is connected to their labs, which houses an array of manual milling, CNC and production machines.

According to Alan Kogut, an astrophysicist at the center, without their attached shop they would be relegated to outsourcing the creation of various components and instruments. By using various manual machines and a PCNC 1100 mill from Tormach, the team can quickly prototype and develop different iterations of unique components. “We’re making parts for flight projects, high-altitude balloons, and prototyping things for an eventual satellite mission,” he said.

戈达德航天中心正在生产吹笛者（原始通胀偏振探险器）等项目，以测量宇宙微波背景的线性极化。卫星仪器在大爆炸后不久，在通胀时期兴奋的原始重力波的信号看起来。

它们在液氦容器中飞动这些望远镜，使温度保持在绝对零（约1.5k）附近。寒冷的温度保持望远镜的热辐射干扰研究人员试图看到的辐射，这限制为每十亿的几个部分。

对于Piper的精密传感器和仪器在这种低温下正确运行，该团队需要补偿其设计中组件的差异收缩。支架和固定装置保持敏感仪器，用于将数据作为返回地球储存在这些冰冷的温度中。如果在设计中没有补偿差分收缩，则信号和测量可能会在外层空间的广泛方面丢失。这是让机器商店如此紧密，更便宜的原型和飞行准备的最终组件是有利的。

The teams at Goddard have customized their Tormach mill with a unique fixture for wire-winding.

The teams at Goddard have also customized their Tormach mill with a unique fixture for wire-winding. According to Kogut, they have to wrap a couple miles of thin wire—about 1⁄3 as thick as a human hair—in an extremely uniform manner for the satellites. “You take a couple miles of this wire and you wrap it around to make a whole bunch of parallel strands over large distances,” he said. This creates a grid that is about 2 ft across.

The strands have to be held to a plane so they form a flat surface (to a few millionths of a meter) and the wires have to be spaced accurately to about 4 or 5 µm, which is where the need for CNC comes into play. “We are able to use the mill to both cut the fixture that the wires get wound onto, and then use it to put the wires in place,” said Kogut.

使用高精度CNC机器对这样的组件的正常操作至关重要。由于制造商运动出现了，手动和自动化机器都变得更加容易获得，更便宜。它还迎来了能够生产质量工作的方法，但在预算和占地面积中提供的制作质量的机器以及小企业和消费者可以处理的机器。

The PIPER (the Primordial Inflation Polarization Explorer), measures the linear polarization of the cosmic microwave background. The satellite instrument looks for the signal from primordial gravity waves excited shortly after the Big Bang.

NASA has been able to circumvent traditional manufacturing within this facility, allowing them to prototype, produce and innovate faster and on a tighter budget.

“这些项目不是高预算项目，但他们仍然涉及有很多零件，这些部分是定制的适合，”Kogut说。“而不是难以弄清楚究竟究竟想出了我们想要的东西，弥补商店的图纸，向商店发送出来，获得报价，然后获得所产生的部分，我们决定让我们自己的机器我们可以让我们自己的括号和夹具更快的周转。“

虽然它们不使用许多异国情调的材料 - 主要是铝，不锈钢，铜，钛 - 美国宇航局的偶尔块必须保持紧张的宽容，并且他们的预算甚至更紧。

Tormach
www.tormach.com.