Modification of boron nitride ceramic to replicate hall effect thruster surface wear

Pristine and worn Hall-effect thruster boron nitride channel materials show significant differences in surface features, and chemical compositions. Worn thruster channels are typically created by running test thrusters in vacuum chambers for hundreds of hours. This paper studies ways to manually modified pristine samples of boron nitride without the use of a Hall-effect thruster. Sandpaper and abrasive blaster tests were used to modify surface roughness values of sample from 10,000 Å to 150,000 Å. These values match the range of surface roughness seen in worn Hall-effect thrusters. Vacuum heat treatments were preformed on samples, these treatments showed the ability to modify chemical compositions of boron nitride samples, but not in a manner matching changes seen in worn thruster channels.