Miniature Turbomolecular and Turbo/Drag Pumps

Under funding from NASA, Creare has developed specialized analytical tools, vacuum pump test and fabrication facilities, and a series of miniature, low-power, very high-speed electric motors. These capabilities allow Creare to develop unique vacuum pumps that are tailored to challenging customer requirements.

For example, Creare has developed the world’s smallest hybrid turbomolecular/molecular drag vacuum pump to support portable, battery-powered analytical equipment such as mass spectrometers.

This miniature turbo/drag pump is about the size of a D-cell flashlight battery: it has a diameter of 3.4 cm and a length of 8 cm. Its mass is only 150 grams, and it can develop an ultimate pressure in the 10^-8 Torr range, while working against a foreline pressure as high as 10 Torr. The pumping speed is 4 L/s at a nominal rotational speed of 200,000 rpm. Substantial efforts were made to minimize power consumption, and the pump draws less than 2 W at foreline pressures of 1 Torr or less, and only 7 W at a 10 Torr foreline pressure.

Creare developed a space-qualified pump that was part of the Sample Analysis at Mars instrument that is the key analytical measurement suite on the Mars Science Laboratory mission launched on November 26, 2011. We are currently working on space qualifying another pump for use on the European Space Agency ExoMars mission scheduled for launch in 2018. We also are working on small, low-power, vacuum pumps for portable mass spectrometers that can be used for homeland security, atmospheric sampling, and monitoring of weapons of mass destruction.