Controlled Partial Gravity Platform for Milligravity in Drop Tower Experiments

TL;DR

This paper presents a novel platform that creates controlled partial gravity conditions in a drop tower for simulating asteroid impacts, enabling low-velocity impact experiments in a vacuum environment.

Contribution

The authors develop a two-stage approach to generate partial gravity in a drop tower, combining microgravity with steady acceleration, and demonstrate its use in asteroid surface impact simulations.

Findings

Achieved controlled partial gravity down to mm/s² range

Successfully simulated asteroid impact conditions in vacuum

Platform offers 9.3 seconds of stable partial gravity

Abstract

We detail a platform for partial g environment and an experiment for simulated impacts on asteroid surfaces based on it. The partial g environment is created by a two stage approach: First, create microgravity using the ZARM drop tower. Second, convert microgravity to partial gravity by steady acceleration of experiment volume on linear drive inside microgravity environment. The experiment we conducted on this platform simulates low-velocity impacts into a simulated asteroid surface. To recreate the asteroid environment, in addition to the partial gravity, a vacuum chamber is used. We explain requirements, setup and operation of partial gravity platform and experiment and discuss its performance. Finally, we are open for requests for external experiments which might benefit from our platform with $9.3\,$s of controlled partial gravity down to the mm/s$^2$ range with low g-jitter.