Metal Rubber™ Replacements for Conventional Metal Materials in USVs

This SBIR program would demonstrate the feasibility of replacing heavy metal materials and components onboard unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) with equivalent materials and components fabricated using lightweight Metal Rubber™. Metal Rubber™ is a self-assembled nanocomposite material with an electrical conductivity on the order of that of bulk copper (107 S/m). Its mass density (1 g/cc) is much less than that of copper (8.96 g/cc), steel (8 g/cc) or aluminum (2.7 g/cc). Replacing copper or other bulk metal components onboard USVs with Metal Rubber™ thus may result in a weight savings of between 90% for copper to 60% for aluminum. During the Phase I program, NanoSonic would work with input from a major ship systems manufacturer, and design, fabricate and analyze the properties of representative structural, electrical, RF shielding and thermally conductive materials based on Metal Rubber™ materials. Materials large enough to be representative of full-size USV structures would be produced and tested. These hardware test articles will allow a direct calculation of the total weight savings possible by replacing conventional metals with Metal Rubber™. Technical specifications and weight savings would be used to downselect optimal development paths during a possible Phase II program in cooperation with that ship system manufacturer