Designed to Crash, Built to Survive: An Additive Manufacturing Approach
Design Engineering 2025 Graduate ExhibitionPresentation by Shreyas Nagaraj
Copresented by Zulfiqar Islahqamat
Exhibition Number 603
Abstract
Protecting fragile payloads during high-impact landings is a critical challenge in planetary exploration. Inspired by NASA's Mars Sample Return (MSR) mission, the Pixy Stix Return (PSR) Challenge in EDSGN 562: Design for Additive Manufacturing – DfAM (24/SP) set teams with designing an impact-resistant, additively manufactured container capable of surviving a 100-foot freefall onto concrete without a parachute. This project aimed to develop a lightweight, structurally optimized solution that balances impact resistance, manufacturability, and aerospace engineering constraints. Integrating bio-inspired elements for impact absorption and descent control, the final design comprises a multi-component system. The base container, incorporating a body-centered cubic (BCC) lattice, mimics natural cellular frameworks to dissipate impact forces while maintaining minimal weight. A detachable lid secures the payload, while aerodynamic propellers, inspired by seed dispersal mechanisms, generate drag to reduce freefall velocity. Gradient-density lattice structures further increase strength while simultaneously reducing mass, resulting in a total weight of 300.3 grams—40% below the 500-gram limit of the challenge. A prototype was 3D-printed using polylactic acid (PLA) and fused deposition modeling (FDM) to validate the design. The prototype was then subjected to drop tests. The findings validated that the lattice structure efficiently absorbed impact, whilst the propellers facilitated descent control. Anticipated small failures in the PLA prototype guided enhancements for manufacturing in high-strength metal alloys (AlSi10Mg, Ti6Al4V, or Inconel 718). This project showcases the aerospace applications' potential for bio-inspired additive manufacturing (AM) by providing solutions for high-performance impact mitigation, crash-resistant enclosures, and sample return systems.
Importance
Surviving a high-impact landing without damage is a daunting challenge—especially when the payload contains fragile, high-value materials. NASA’s MSR mission and similar space initiatives require high-impact resistance and weight-optimized enclosures to protect valuable extraterrestrial materials. Designed to absorb impact energy while keeping minimum weight, this project offers a crash-resistant additively built sample return container. This approach finds uses in aerospace, logistics, and automotive engineering outside space exploration. Lightweight, lattice-optimized enclosures are applicable in satellites, planetary landers, and drone systems. In logistics, similar designs improve packaging of vulnerable cargo, while in the automotive sector, crash-resistant structures could reduce material weight and enhance safety. By integrating DfAM principles, lattice optimization, and impact-absorbing mechanisms, this work advances high-performance structural design for extreme environments.