Design of Fixture for Booster Rocket to Optimize Manufacturing Process

Abstract

The Process planning acts as a bridge between design and manufacturing, by translating design specifications into manufacturing process detail. Boosters are generally necessary to launch spacecraft into Earth orbit or beyond. The booster is dropped to fall back to Earth once its fuel is expended, a point known as booster engine cut-off (BECO). The rest of the launch vehicle continues flight with its core or upper-stage engines. The booster may be recovered and reused, as in the case of the Space Shuttle. Design specification ensures the functionality aspect. Next step to follow is to assemble these components into final product. In manufacturing, the goal is to produce components that meet the design specifications. Missile parts should be manufactured with high accurate dimensions. Due to its complicated structure, it requires fixture to stop vibrations while machining and to reduce number of setups as well as the production rate also increases by reducing machining time. Because of its complexity in manufacturing, there is a demand to design fixture which reduces the machine time and setups. This project deals with the 3d modeling and fixture design for Booster rocket using NX-CAD software. This project also deals with development of manufacturing process plan of missile component (Booster Rocket used in missile) using CAM software (NX 7.5) which is exclusively CAM software used to generate part program by feeding the geometry of the component) and defining the proper tool path and thus transferring the generated part program to the required CNC machine with the help of DNC lines. The operator thus executes the program with suitable requirements.