Performance of Sulfur Concrete in Planetary Applications of Contour Crafting

Sulfur concrete is a high potential composite material which meets NASA’s ISRU (In-Situ Resource Utilization) requirements for some Lunar and most Martian structure construction by means of Contour Crafting (CC). The performance of sulfur concrete is sensitive to its ingredients and to the variables in the thermal process used for applying the material. The sulfur concrete extrusion process is implemented on a mini-scale auger extruder and a novel full-scale extruder. An experiment is designed to study the factors that influence the workability of sulfur concrete. The research result may be instrumental for improving the workability of sulfur concrete, which also has significant terrestrial applications.