How Flocking Protects the Mars Rover Mission
In addition to jewelry boxes and automobile components, flock fibers made in the USA are now being used by NASA to prevent lithium battery fires on the Mars Rover.
Cellusuede Products, Inc., of Rockford, Illinois, is providing the chopped carbon fibers used by a company called KULR to manufacture flocked carbon fiber sheets sold to NASA to reduce the chance of a fire on the Mars Rover.
Called Fiber Thermal Interface (FTI), the sheets, incorporated with other materials, are wrapped around the Rover’s lithium batteries to prevent fire spread, known as thermal runaway. For example, if one of the Rover’s lithium batteries catches fire, the flocked carbon fire thermal wraps can reduce the fire and prevent it from damaging the Rover’s other batteries and equipment. The FTI’s carbon fibers draw heat away from the batteries and other equipment, which also prevents overheating.
The FTI sheets are used for thermal management on the rover’s “Sherloc” instrument, which, according to NASA, is mounted on the rover's robotic arm “and uses cameras, spectrometers, and a laser to search for organics and minerals that have been altered by watery environments and may be signs of past microbial life.”
The sheet’s carbon fibers are cut on what is called a Z-Axis. This is an alignment process that enables chopped carbon fibers to be oriented vertically onto a surface using a roll-to-roll (or other) flocking process. The sheets look much like velour or velvet, thanks to the vertical fibers. Carbon fibers can also be used for EMI (Electromagnetic) Shielding, a process that lowers the electromagnetic field in an area by barricading it with conductive or magnetic material.
To learn more about FTI carbon flocked fiber sheets, you can view KULR’s CNN interview on YouTube. Here, carbon fiber flocking is referenced from about 29 seconds to 1:29 minutes.
Editors Note: Our thanks to Eric Honkamp at Cellusuede Products for help with this story.