Challenger O Ring Material

The material of the failed o ring was fkm which was specified by the shuttle motor contractor morton thiokol.

Challenger o ring material.

Feynman now believed that he had the solution but to test it he dropped a piece of the o ring material squeezed with a c clamp to simulate the actual conditions of the shuttle into a glass of ice water. January 24 1985 shuttle flight that exhibited the worst o ring blowby. The disaster of challenger mission sts 51 l was the result of human engineering. Viton is the registered trade mark of.

If the gland has been designed and machined properly. In the parker o ring handbook ord 5700 paragraph 4 0 says it has been said that o rings are the finest static seals ever developed perhaps the prime reason for this is because they are almost human proof. August 19 1985 nasa level i management briefed on booster problem. Then when the the booster was lit and is casing expanded the o rings retained their cold compressed shapes and allowed hot gas from inside the casing to spurt out the resulting gap in the seal.

Report of the presidential commission on the space shuttle challenger accident 6 june 1986 volume 1 page 145 link color added. Feynman s famous c clamp experiment. Fkm is the short form for the fluoroelastomer category according to the american standard astm. Joint temperature incidents when o rings failed source.

The joint failed because at cold temperatures the silicone o ring material lost its resilience and took a set. Number of o ring incidents vs.