Sierra Space’s Highest Volume-Capable Full-Scale Inflatable LIFE Habitat Burst Test With Integrated Blanking Plates
Bibliographic record
Abstract
On December 12th 2023, Sierra Space, ILC Dover Astrospace, and NASA/MSFC conducted an Ultimate Burst Test (UBP) of a 27-ft diameter LIFE® (Large Integrated Flexible Environment) habitat module. This module is called LIFE 285 which designates the module volume in cubic meters. Two full-scale blanking plates were integrated into the highest loaded cylinder region and prior subscale failure location. The blanking plate presents a stiff metallic penetration where windows, antennas, grapple fixtures, docking ports, and other structural penetrations can be integrated. This LIFE 285 UBP test is part of the Sierra Space test campaign to certify the LIFE habitat per the intent of the NASA JSC-67721, Certification Guidelines for Crewed Inflatable Softgoods Structures. Three subscale burst tests have been completed, all exceeding the NASA burst test requirement (4× of maximum design pressure (MDP) which is 15.2 psig) set forth in JSC-67721. The last subscale test was a third scale of LIFE 285. The burst test (third-scale, TS-05) included a blanking plate and exceeded the NASA burst test requirement by 33%. Sierra Space’s first LIFE 285 burst test (full-scale, FS-01) is built of the same construction as the three previously successful subscale tests where the straps are the same as full-scale. This first 27-ft diameter full-scale LIFE 285 test failed at 77 psig within 5% strap loading of the prior subscale test and exceeded the NASA burst test requirement by 27%, not only showing great repeatability but direct scalability. Since loading is a function of pressure and diameter, and negligibly by length of article, Sierra Space has not only shown the capability to build and certify a LIFE 285 but also the longer LIFE 500 (500 m3 habitable volume) since both modules are 27-ft in diameter. The latest third-scale and full-scale LIFE 285 tests represent the two highest loaded space habitat tests in history by a wide margin. Higher loading directly translates to a larger habitat diameter and thus more on-orbit volume by the diameter squared. By exceeding the NASA 4× burst requirement for a 27-ft diameter module by 33% and 27% at sub-scale and full-scale, through proven scalability, using the same design, construction methods, and materials, Sierra Space has also demonstrated the ability to build and certify a 33-ft diameter module utilized in LIFE 1400 (1400 m3 of habitable volume).
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.004 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".