PROCESSES FOR APOLLO LUNAR DRILL BORE STEMS.

The Apollo Lunar Surface Drill was used in the Heat Flow Experiment portion of the Apollo program. This paper explains the design requirements for the advanced composite drill stems, points out the fabrication problems and describes the solutions, outlines the manufacturing process, and reports the drill stem performance. The stem pieces were one inch in diameter with a maximum wall thickness of 0. 057 inch, and from 22 to 54 inches long. They were made of a combination of fiberglass/epoxy and boron/epoxy with integrally wound helical flutes on the surface. Astronauts on Apollo Flights 16 and 17 drilled the stems approximately 8 feet into the Lunar surface where they remain to provide low thermal conductivity castings for the Heat Flow Experiment.