Advanced Testing of an Intravehicular Activity Space Suit

Final Frontier Design (FFD) has continued development and testing of their Intra-Vehicular Activity (IVA) space suit. This paper presents testing and analysis in preparation for human rating of the IVA suit, including human testing in high fidelity flight-like environments, as well as a summary of an Oxygen Compatibility Assessment (OCA), mechanisms review of our Automatic Pressure Regulator (APR), and vacuum chamber testing of FFD’s APR. Institutional Review Board (IRB) approved human testing of our suit for water egress took place in April 2018 at Survival Systems in Groton, CT, including 12 test subjects and drop scenarios from both parachute and capsule, in collaboration with Integrated Spaceflight Services. IRB approved microgravity flight testing continued for our 4th year with the National Research Council of Canada (NRC), also with Integrated Spaceflight Services. Four microgravity flights were completed with NRC, utilizing our IVA suit in pressurized operations. Our Space Act Agreement (SAA) with NASA JSC supported an OCA conducted by engineers at the Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) as well as a physical review of our automatic pressure regulator with MSFC engineers. Fabric weld strength testing of our pressure garment was conducted with assistance from Northeastern University. Finally, a high fidelity depressurization test of our suit system in simulation, inside a large vacuum chamber was conducted to validate the operation of FFD’s APR.