Testing campaign for ECRIDA: the UV resin 3D printer flying on REXUS

Abstract

ECRIDA is a student project participating in the REXUS/BEXUS campaign that develops a UV resin 3D printer device capable of working in the low-gravity environment offered by the REXUS rocket flight. Our main objective is to describe the impact of low gravity on the UV resin 3D printing process by comparing samples printed on Earth with samples printed in space. Due to the requirements of the host vehicle and driven by the novel design of our device, a thorough testing campaign must be planned and completed to qualify the device for flight and maximise the success of the scientific objectives. This paper describes the requirements that the device must fulfil and goes into the design of our test plan describing the procedures and the results. Vacuum, vibration, pressure, and functional tests were performed and described together with our learned lessons and conclusions in our will to help student teams with their testing activities