Swales Aerospace Awarded Contract By Boeing

Swales Aerospace has been awarded a contract by The Boeing Co. [BA] to develop, design, fabricate and test a suite of advanced two-phase thermal control components for NASA’s X-37 Reusable Re-entry Vehicle. Under the terms of the contract, Swales will manufacture Heat Pipe Cold Plates, Deployable Loop Heat Pipe Radiators and Thermal Storage Devices as well as provide welding and integration services for hardware installation.The Heat Pipe devises acquire and distribute heat from high-power electronics in order to maintain benign on-orbit operation temperatures, thereby improving system reliability. Likewise, the Thermal Storage Devices absorb excess heat loads during re-entry and landing.Swales will build several prototype units for verification in the first flight dorp test from a B-52 carrier plane in 2001. Additional units will be installed for full orbital test and operation in 2002.