Bi-Axial Test Facility

ESA’s new Bi-Axial Test Facility – installed at the Agency’s Materials and Electrical Components Laboratory at its ESTEC technical centre in the Netherlands – replicates bi-directional application of load, allowing higher-fidelity testing of candidate materials for space missions.

“This is a new add-on to our existing Instron hydraulic test system, which is able to apply up to 250 kilonewtons of force in a single direction,” explains ESA materials engineer Donato Girolamo, who commissioned the design of the new facility to fulfil space material testing requirements.

“This extra jig works somewhat like a car jack. It has four rotating arms connected to sliding clamps onto the sides of the test item. Then as the hydraulic load is applied these arms rotate and the clamps slide outwards, pulling the material out along all four directions, to apply loading in both the x and y axes.”

Such bi-axial testing is especially valuable for composite structures, widely used in space, which can possess differing material properties along different directions.

The custom-made tooling for the new facility was designed and built by Enduteq  in the Netherlands.

To see a photo of the new facility, click here.