Who we are
The Advanced Manufacturing Laboratory is hosted by the Science and Technology Facilities Council’s Rutherford Appleton Laboratory in Harwell, Oxfordshire, directly adjacent to ESA’s UK facility – the European Centre for Space Applications and Telecommunications (ECSAT).
A key aim of the laboratory is to exploit the expertise and world-leading facilities that are available on the Harwell Campus, to assess new material and manufacturing processes, joining techniques and 3D printing technologies for application in space. Though our focus is on components for space, we hope that the laboratory’s impact on the campus can extend well beyond.
What we aim to do
Our laboratory aims to assess candidate materials and manufacturing processes for space missions, pre-screening them early in their development cycle.
The lab has access to a metal-based 3D printer and is equipped with a suite of powerful microscopes, an X-ray CT machine and a range of furnaces. Mechanical testing such as tensile and micro-hardness testing is also performed.
With access also to the many large-scale facilities available at Harwell Campus including access to semiconductor cleanrooms, cryogenic laboratories, the UK’s Central Laser Facility, the ISIS neutron and muon source and Diamond Light Source.
Our capabilities test and validate space technology
Science and Technology Facilities Council
STFC’s mission is to deliver world-leading national and international research and innovation capabilities and, through those, discover the secrets of the Universe. STFC’s major research and innovation campuses at Harwell, Daresbury and research facilities across the UK and overseas support fundamental research in space science, astronomy, physics, and computational science.
European Space Agency
The ESA-RAL Advanced Manufacturing Laboratory is part of a network of ESA laboratories across Europe, making their expertise available to ESA missions as well as to the wider space sector.
The European Space Agency (ESA) provides Europe’s gateway to space.
ESA is an intergovernmental organisation, created in 1975, with the mission to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space delivers benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.
ESA develops the launchers, spacecraft and ground facilities needed to keep Europe at the forefront of global space activities.
Today, it develops and launches satellites for Earth observation, navigation, telecommunications and astronomy, sends probes to the far reaches of the Solar System and cooperates in the human exploration of space.
