Design and Experiment of Clamper Used in Antarctic Subglacial Bedrock Drilling

As a result of the severe natural environment with oxygen deficit in the Antarctic, using conventional manual work to screw and unscrew the drill pipe increases the labor intensity tremendously and causes an efficiency reduction. Therefore, it would be useful to design a clamper inside the drilling shelter, which could help to assemble and disassemble the ice core barrel with screw connection. This paper describes the design of and experiments with the clamper inside the movable drilling shelter. A related testing stand was also designed and built to experiment on relationships between the clamper motor current versus clamping torque and force. Through experimental data collation and calculation analysis, the following conclusions could be drawn: (1) according to the rotary ability of the Ice and Bedrock Electromechanical Drill (IBED) to calculate and determine the torque of clamper, the clamping torque required to provide by the clamper is 100 N·m; (2) finite element simulation and analysis of the non-standard transmission chain showed that the mechanical reliability of the subparts; (3) the experimental results showed the range of the clamping force and clamping torque of the clamper. The clamping force and clamping torque increased with the increase of clamper DC motor current, presenting proportional linear relationships. The clamper can meet the clamping requirements of IBED for screwing, unscrewing, and clamping, which will be greatly helpful when it is tested in the field.