SBIR/STTR Award attributes
Legacy rocket launch systems rely on analog electromechanical intervalometers to provide reliable, precise timing of rocket launch events via squibs or electro-explosive devices (EEDs) while maintaining necessary requirements for ARM, LOAD, and FIRE events on launch systems such as the LAU-68 or LAU-131. Current analog intervalometer designs require use of mechanical timing and indexing switches to determine state and only allow limited operational scenarios that do not easily account for anomalous operation (i.e., hang-fire). A digital solution could eliminate the entire use of the mechanical intervalometer by monitoring the state of the launcher via feedback from the firing signal event or other sensors. In addition, the use of a modern microcontroller to control the firing device would allow compensation for a wide range of system variables (e.g., storage and operational temperature effects on circuit resistance) which could then be accounted for in the stored fire control algorithms thus allowing for more precise and robust firing events when compared with the heritage intervalometer while providing the ability to fire individual rockets in a preferred order rather than sequentially. Exo-Atmospheric Technologies will implement an Integrated Digital Ignition Device (IDID) powered by a microcontroller to replace current legacy analog intervalometer designs. The avionics will be designed, built, and tested to verify performance specifications and requirements are met via bench-top demonstrations and environmental system-level testing. Planned experiments for Phase II will build upon the successful prototype demonstrated in Phase I and will qualify the new digital system for use over its full range of environments. Additional testing and integration of the IDID system will also be conducted to demonstrate the utility, performance, diagnostic, and communication capabilities of the new architecture that can be further adapted to support drop-in replacements for legacy hardware currently operating in the field. Final testing in Phase II will demonstrate operation in a USN test and evaluation platform.
