SOLICITATION NOTICE
66 -- MICROFLASH LASER FLASH
- Notice Date
- 2/27/2009
- Notice Type
- Modification/Amendment
- NAICS
- 334516
— Analytical Laboratory Instrument Manufacturing
- Contracting Office
- Department of the Air Force, Air Education and Training Command, Tyndall AFB Contracting Squadron, 501 Illinois Ave, Ste 5, Bldg 647, Tyndall AFB, Florida, 32403-5526
- ZIP Code
- 32403-5526
- Solicitation Number
- F4AB008346A001A
- Archive Date
- 3/31/2009
- Point of Contact
- Crystal Selvaggio,, Phone: 850-283-8630, Melissa J Mullinax,, Phone: 850-283-8644
- E-Mail Address
-
crystal.selvaggio@tyndall.af.mil, melissa.mullinax@tyndall.af.mil
- Small Business Set-Aside
- N/A
- Description
- Specifications for Laser Flash Thermal Diffusivity Instrument Hardware 1. The instrument must have a temperature range of -125 to +1100C with two user-exchanged furnaces. Justification: This is the temperature range required for characterization of the materials of interest. 2. The instrument must be equipped with a two-stage rotary vacuum pump and be vacuum-tight to at least 1 x 10-2 mbar. Justification: For testing materials that are oxidation sensitive. If oxide layers form on the sample and/or the material microstructure changes due to oxidation, the measured thermal diffusivity/thermal conductivity will be greatly affected. It is therefore imperative that the instrument be vacuum-tight in order to evacuate and backfill with a pure inert gas to reduce the partial pressure of oxygen in the system. 3. The system must be vertical with the laser mounted below the sample so that it shoots from the bottom and the detector must be located above the sample. In addition, the detector must be a bottom-mounted InSb with a wave guide from the sample to the detector and be located no more than 6 inches from the sample. Justification: Many materials are extremely sensitive to the heat flux and can be easily damaged. It is therefore imperative that the laser energy be kept to a minimum. The specified configuration allows a high detector sensitivity with low laser pulse energy. Systems that shoot from the top and direct the sample energy to a side-mounted IR detector via a mirror are not acceptable because of the high heat losses. 4. The system must be top-loading and equipped with a motorized furnace hoist. Justification: Top-loading systems are more convenient to work with because of the ease of sample placement and because they are more robust. The motorized furnace also contributes to ease of operation. 5. The instrument must be equipped with water safety switches. Justification: This feature automatically shuts down the system in case the cooling water supply is interrupted, thus preventing damage to the furnace. 6. The system must conform to Laser Class I. Justification: Because of safety considerations, the system must be equipped with interlocks, so that the laser will not fire when the furnace is open, i.e. the system must conform to Laser Class I. 7. The instrument must be capable of testing samples under oxidizing, reducing and inert atmospheres, as well as under vacuum. Justification: It will be necessary to test many materials under a variety of atmospheres. It is therefore required that the system function properly under the specified atmospheric conditions. 8. An alignment laser must be supplied with the instrument. Justification: The alignment laser permits easy realignment after system repair or exchange of major components. 9. The system must be equipped with a combination laser pulse mapping device/finite pulse correction software model which will allow accurate measurement of extremely "fast" samples. Justification: The measured thermal diffusivity of so-called "fast" samples (combination of thin and/or high thermal diffusivity) must be corrected for the finite pulse width of the laser. In order to do this accurately, the pulse form of the laser must be accurately mapped with each shot and the experimental data corrected using a sophisticated finite pulse correction model. This is therefore a critical system component. The system must have a laser pulse mapping device and finite pulse correction software model. 10. The temperature range of the system must be expandable to -125 to +500C by adding only a user-exchangeable low-temperature furnace, LN2 cooling system and MCT detector. Justification: Work for the system may include thermal diffusivity/thermal conductivity measurements at subambient temperatures. It is therefore required that the system be immediately expandable to cover the temperature range of -125 to 500C by adding only a user-exchangeable furnace, LN2 cooling system and MCT detector. System modification is not allowed. Further, the sample temperature rise must be measured by an IR detector and not a thermocouple. Systems that utilize thermocouples to measure the sample temperature rise are not acceptable because of the slow response time and contact problems between the thermocouple and sample. 11. The instrument must contain an automatic sample changer for at least 3 samples of varying geometries and types, e.g. square, round, rectangular, liquid, laminate, etc. Justification: Testing will involve many different types of materials and, therefore, sample geometries and types will vary. Efficiency will be increased greatly by testing at least 3 different configurations of samples in one run. 12. A holder for 25.4 mm diameter samples must be delivered with the instrument. Justification: Testing will involve many low-density and inhomogeneous materials. In the case of the inhomogeneous materials, a larger sample size is required in order to obtain representative results. For low-density materials, a thicker sample is sometimes required for accurate thermal diffusivity measurements because of the surface roughness (depressions, pores, etc.). Beyond a certain point, as the sample thickness is increased, the diameter must also be increased to avoid two-dimensional heat flow. It is therefore imperative that a holder for large diameter samples be supplied for this system. 13. A fiber sample holder must be available for the instrument. Justification: Future work may include measurements on fibers. Therefore, a fiber sample holder must be available from the manufacturer. 14. A laminate sample holder must be available for the instrument. Justification: It may be required to carry out measurements on anisotropic materials in which the thermal diffusivity is required in both the in-plane and cross-plane directions. In the case where the material is available only in thin layers, measurement of the in-plane thermal diffusivity requires the laminate sample holder. Therefore, this sample holder must be in the program of the manufacturer. Software 1. The software must allow operation of the instrument in the fully automatic or manual mode. Justification: Generally, the software will operate in the fully automatic mode, in many cases overnight or over the weekend. In some cases, however, the system will be operated in the manual mode to allow optimum operator interaction. Therefore, the software must operate in both the manual and fully automatic modes. 2. The software must contain a wizard for selection of the best model. Justification: This feature will aid in selecting the best model for a particular set of operating conditions. 3. The software must contain mathematical models which correct for sample heat loss on both the rise portion and/or trailing readings of the experimental data. Justification: Depending upon the material type and particular test conditions, heat loss corrections must be carried out either on the rise portion or trailing readings of the curve. Therefore, the software must contain mathematical models that allow heat loss correction on the two sections of the curve independently. 4. The software must contain finite pulse width correction models, which utilize the measured pulse form data acquired for that particular shot. Justification: In some cases, there will be testing of "fast" samples, requiring correction of the data using a finite pulse model. For optimum finite pulse width correction, the model must utilize experimental pulse form data. 5. The software must have the capability of correcting the experimental data for finite pulse width and heat loss (radial and facial) simultaneously (based on a non-linear regression routine and the modified (proprietary) Cape-Lehman model). Justification: Generally, it is advisable to carry out both finite pulse width and heat loss corrections simultaneously on the same set of data. Therefore, in many cases this capability will be required in order to obtain optimum results. 6. Two- and three-layer models as well as a contact resistance model must be contained in the software. In addition, these models must be capable of simultaneously correcting data for finite pulse width and heat loss. Justification: In some cases, there will be testing multi-layered samples. There may be a need to characterize the development of contact resistance between two layers as a function of temperature. Therefore these software models are required. Optimum results are obtained if the models correct for finite pulse width and heat loss simultaneously. Therefore, these are essential features of the required models. 7. The software must contain a model for computation of the specific heat. Justification: In some cases, there will be calculating the specific heat of certain materials using this instrument. Therefore this model is a required component of the software package. 8. The software must contain a temperature recalibration routine. Justification: The thermal diffusivity of many of materials is a strong function of temperature. Therefore, small errors in the measured sample temperature can translate into large errors in the thermal diffusivity. For this reason, the software must contain a routine to recalibrate the measured sample temperature based on experimental results obtained using temperature calibration standards. 9. A kinetics software package must be available from the manufacturer. Justification: The transport properties of materials are generally extremely sensitive to small microstructural changes. Therefore, thermal diffusivity data utilized in kinetic software can be an excellent tool for characterizing transitions in many materials. The manufacturer must have available a kinetics software package, which can read and evaluate thermal diffusivity data.
- Web Link
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- Place of Performance
- Address: Tyndall AFB, Florida, 32403, United States
- Zip Code: 32403
- Zip Code: 32403
- Record
- SN01758646-W 20090301/090227215833-ddfe106044cf12b557c28f1c787974fd (fbodaily.com)
- Source
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