Title: Portable infrared reflectometer for evaluating emittance
Abstract: Optical methods are frequently used to evaluate the emittance of candidate spacecraft thermal control materials. One new optical method utilizes a portable infrared reflectometer capable of obtaining spectral reflectance of an opaque surface in the range of 2 to 25 microns using a Michelson-Type FTIR interferometer. This miniature interferometer collects many infrared spectra over a short period of time. It also allows the size of the instrument to be small such that spectra can be collected in the laboratory or in the field. Infrared spectra are averaged and integrated with respect to the room temperature black body spectrum to yield emittance at 300 K. Integrating with respect to other black body spectra yields emittance values at other temperatures. Absorption bands in the spectra may also be used for chemical species identification. The emittance of several samples was evaluated using this portable infrared reflectometer, an old infrared reflectometer equipped with dual rotating black body cavities, and a bench top thermal vacuum chamber. Samples for evaluation were purposely selected such that a range of emittance values and thermal control material types would be represented, including polished aluminum, Kapton®, silvered Teflon®, and the inorganic paint Z-93-P. Results indicate an excellent linear relationship between the room temperature emittance calculated from infrared spectral data and the emittance obtained from the dual rotating black body cavities and thermal vacuum chamber. The prospect of using the infrared spectral data for chemical species identification will also be discussed.
Publication Year: 2000
Publication Date: 2000-01-01
Language: en
Type: article
Indexed In: ['crossref']
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Cited By Count: 21
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