Aerospace engineers in the private sector and with NASA unveiled a new process for constructing space fuel tanks that could reduce costs and weight by as much as 25 percent. The results are the opposite of what normally happens when cutting weight. “Usually, when you reduce weight, the cost goes up, ” Marshall Space Flight Center engineer Dr. Sandeep Shah said. “When you reduce cost, the weight goes up.”
The project took approximately 5 years to complete. In the long term, the new production capability can be used for a wide range of products including “any bulkhead in space, ” Shah said.
Dr. Ray Johnson, senior VP and CTO at Lockheed Martin, said “Innovations like this can help us move forward.”
