The Full Scale Structural Testing Laboratory is located in NIAR's Aircraft Structural Testing and Evaluation Center (ASTEC). This center provides structural testing to aircraft manufacturers as well as governmental agencies. The Full-Scale Structural Test Lab personnel have a combination of more than 400 years of test and test-related experience.
The ASTEC facility provides an area roughly the size of a football field to hold numerous articles and associated fixturing. Approximately one-fourth of this space includes a structural floor with steel beams on six-foot centers and overhead steel super structure to provide rapid setup for component through complete airframe structural static testing. The remaining floor space is utilized principally for specialized fixtures to house components through complete airframes for durability and damage tolerance testing and for Aging Aircraft programs.
Typical tests range from full airframe durability and damage tolerance testing with 70 or more load systems and hundreds of data channels to single channel coupon or component testing. Although the lab’s main focus area is aircraft structural testing, any type of article will be considered. Items tested range from wind generator blades to communication pole reinforcements.
CAPABILITIES
Test load development from supplied aircraft loads
Test fixture design and fabrication
Load system design and fabrication
Strain gage and miscellaneous transducer installation
Data and load control system development and installation
Testing services and data handling
R&D, Certification or Qualification:
Full-scale and component testing (static, durability and damage tolerance)
Pressure cyclic testing
Hail strike testing
Material testing
Tireburst/explosive effects testing
FACILITIES & EQUIPMENT
4 load control systems with 280 channels that can be used on 13 separate load stations
14 data acquisition systems that can record over 2,500 channels of data
Secured data ports for customer data transfer
CATIA V5 capabilities
More than 420 hydraulic cylinders starting at 1” bore up to 6” bore
Approximately 400 servo valves ranging from 1 gpm to 10 gpm
1,200 gallon hydraulic reservoir with four each 60 gpm pumps for supplying hydraulic fluid throughout the test floor variable to 3,000 psi
500 load cells ranging from 50 lbs. - 200,000 lbs.
4 load frames with stroke and load control that can be used for material and component testing up to 200,000 lbs.
Five large durability test base fixtures for rapid development of durability test setup for aircraft up through business size jets
Pressure control equipment for fuselage cyclic and static pressure testing that includes both a 6” shop air supply from the local plant and a stand-alone 655 cubic foot per minute 125 hp air compressor
Hail gun
Both TIG and arch welding capability for test fixtures
Lathe, milling machine, plasma cutter and various large saws for support of test setups
Forklifts – 2 each capable of lifting 3,000 lbs. and one capable of lifting 10,000 lbs.
Broderson crane capable of lifting approximately 12,000 lbs.
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