Research infrastructure

This manufacturing system for 3D printing allows the production of large metal parts with a building volume of up to 400 x 400 x 400 cubic millimeters at a laser power of one kilowatt. These characteristics make it one of the largest high-perfomance and commercially available facilities for the laser-sintering process. Regarding its deployment for research purposes, this size is even unique.

Laboratory acceleration facility for attaining impact velocities ranging from 10 meters per second to 10,000 meters per seconds.

Recording, description Recording and modeling of the physical processes observed during impact, shock-wave and laser effects.

Visualization techniques for transient processes: high-speed photography and high-speed videography, schlieren photography; flash X-ray photography, X-ray tomography and X-ray cinematography.

Implementation and development for high dynamic and transient processes as well as harsh environments; distance, speed, acceleration, impact load and pressure; EMC analyses.

Diagnostics developments such as optical and laser-based techniques intended for temperature and velocitiy of (combustion) gases and high dynamic surfaces (VISAR and PDV).

Development of sensors and electronics engineering for very fast processes or robust environments.

• Open-area test site for explosions and indoor detonation chamber 
• Shock-tube facility for blast simulation and research (BlastStar) 
• Universal testing machines
• Servohydraulic testing facilities 
• Drop-weight facilities 
• Hopkinson bar permitting pressure, tensile (spallation) and shear loading configuration with and without pressure chamber for triaxial static output voltage condition 
• Climatic chambers 

• High-temperature furnaces

• High-speed cameras 
• Acceleration sensors 
• Pressure and strain measurement techniques for dynamic loads 
• High-speed video systems
• Digital image correlation (DIC) systems in 2D and 3D 
• VISAR (velocity interferometer)
  
• Ultrasonics 
• Optical microscopy 
• Acoustic microscopy 
• Scanning electron microscope (SEM)

• ANSYS Autodyn
  
• LS-DYNA
  
• ABAQUS
  
• SOFiSTik
  
• APOLLO (computation software developed at EMI)
  
• SOPHIA (computation software developed at EMI)
  
• MaATLAB Simulink
  
• COMSOL
  
• Hazard analysis – FTA – FMEA

Fraunhofer EMI offers advisory and research services to manufacturers, designers, insurance companies and owners of buildings classified as critical infrastructure and helps to evaluate buildings and their components with regard to pressure shock loads. Our shock-tube facility BlastStar simulates shock loadings caused by detonations or gas explosions. We conduct tests for security glazing in accordance with current standards, which describe the testing procedures and classification. Without the classification part, these procedures are also applicable to other construction components with different materials.

Scope of services:

• Execution of standardized tests to classify the explosion resistance of safety glazing (laminated safety glass, safety windows, safety doors) according to: :
  
  – EN13541:2012 “Glass in building – Security glazing – Testing and classification of resistance against explosion pressure”
   
  – EN13123-1:2001 “Windows, doors and shutters – Explosion resistance; Requirements and classification – Part 1: Shock tube”
   
  – EN13124-1:2001 “Windows, doors and shutters – Explosion resistance; Requirements and classification – Part 1: Shock tube”
   
  – ISO16934:2007 “Glass in Building – Explosion-resistant security glazing – Test and classification by shock-tube loading”
   
  – And more international standards (GSA, ASTM F, 1624-04)
  
  
• Analysis of the explosion resistance with variable loading parameters p_max, i₊ based on each client’s specification
  
• Analysis of the blast resistance in case of gas explosions with loading parameters based on each client’s specification 
• Analysis of the blast resistance of building structures made of concrete, masonry, glass and lightweight materials 
• Analysis of the blast resistance in combination with static over- or underpressure 
  

Pressure shock waves are characterized by a high peak overpressure (p_max), a positive pressure time (t₊) and a positive specific impulse (i₊). Figure 3 shows an idealized pressure-time curve, which is defined in EN13123-1.

Advantages of the EMI shock-tube BlastStar operated by compressed air:

• High variability in producing loads: tests are possible for all ERP classes (detonations of explosives) and gas explosion (Figure 2)
• Test elements are loaded by a planar shock front (similar pressure-time curve at every part of the element)
• Undisturbed use of sensitive measurement technology (as under laboratory conditions) is possible
• Possibility of attaining a high variability in the dimensions of test elements (maximum 2900 mm * 2900 mm)
• No flow effects (as in free-field tests) due to the execution of the tests at a closed shock tube according to standardized guidelines
• Extensively high reproducibility of loading parameters with little scattering; shock front depends neither on shape nor mass of the explosive (Figure 4)
• Possibility to simulate pressure-time curves with multiple reflections

• Instron I II III
• Instron VHS I II
• Hardness measurement

• Drop weights
• Multiaxial test bench
• Split Hopkinson pressure bar
• Battery test bench
• Permeability test bench

• Microstructure analysis
• Mikroscopy
• Scanning electron microscope (SEM)
• Atomic force microscopy (AFM)
• Tomography

• High-temperature furnaces of up to 1100 degrees centigrade
• Cold-gas facilities/temperature control
• Climatic chambers for sample conditioning

Commercial finite-element codes

• SIMULIA Abaqus
• LSTC LS-DYNA
• ESI PAM-CRASH
• COMSOL Multiphysics
• ANSYS

In-house simulation software

• SOPHIA
• APOLLO

Optimization

• LS-OPT

Data analysis and evaluation

• OriginLab Origin
• Wolfram Mathematica
• GOM ARAMIS
• MathWorks MATLAB

• Acceleration facility HyperG 220
• Variable impact load configuration (frontal-, rear-, side impact, pole tests, offset crash)
• Drive: servohydraulic catapult – acceleration profiles of up to 70 g
• Length: 43 meters
• Maximum speed: 22 meters per second
• Maximum payload: 3000 kilograms

 

Equipment: 

• 3D force-measurement wall
• Impact force measurement
• High-speed 3D measurements

• Length: 16 meters
• Maximum speed: 22 meters per second
• Maximum payload: 800 kilograms

 

Equipment:

• Measuring cell for composites
• Pressure measurement technique for closed volumes
• Thermography
• 3D force measurement

• High-speed cameras
• Force, displacement, acceleration and pressure sensors
• VISAR (velocity interferometer)
• Pyrometer/thermal camera
• 3D hand-held scanner 
• Optical grayscale value analysis for surfaces/marker tracking
• Photogrammmetry

• Light-gas acceleration facility covering impact speeds from 2000 meters per second to 10,000 meters per second and disposing of projectiles with sizes ranging from micrometers to centimeters
• Simulation of functional environments during impact; high vacuum, electrical supply of components, pressure vessels, etc.
• Interfaces for external diagnostics

• High-speed photography and videography to optically visualize transient processes during experiment
• Time-resolved emission spectroscopy for analyzing impact plasmas
• Laser interferometry, laser Doppler velocimetry and acceleration sensors for recording accelerations and vibrations
• Laser light sheet technique to analyze ejection processes of materials under impact
• 3D scanner to record impact craters

• Software tool PIRAT to calculate the failure probability of intern and extern satellite components under hypervelocity impacts
• Hydrocodes and discrete-elements-methods tools to simulate impact phenomena
• Model to describe impact plasma

Technologies for the development of scientific payloads and nanosatellites

• Electronics laboratory  
• Additive-manufacturing facility 
• Integration room, clean room (gray room)
• Test benches for vibration tests, shock-UHF (ultrahigh frequency) ground station

Test laboratories observing standard climatic conditions are equipped with

• Universal testing machines
• Servo-hydraulic testing facilities
• Drop-tower test benches
• Multiaxial test bench
• Split Hopkinson bar (for tension and pressure)
• Climatic chambers for expanded measuring ranges
• Light-gas accelerators
• Crash Center of the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft with its research crash-test facility and component crash-test facility for structures and components up to a height of four meters  
• Lighting-strike test bench for plates and small components 

• High-speed video systems
• Acceleration sensors
• VISAR (velocity interferometer)
• Flash X-ray
• High-speed infrared cameras

• Microtomography (µCT): MacroScience CT-500 and CT-350
• Ultrasonics (up to 16 mm CFRP)
• Thermography
• Optical microscopy
• Acoustic microscopy
• Scanning electron microscopy (SEM)
• Laser scanning microscopy (LSM)
• Atomic force microscopy (AFM)

• Microsection
• Mechanical (DMS/strain gauges) and optical deformation measurement (DIC)
• Mechanical and optical extensometers
• Force sensors
• Temperature measurement
• Current and voltage measurement