ROCKLEDGE, FL — December 9th, 2020 — Mainstream Engineering Corporation (Rockledge, FL) has been awarded a contract from the US Army for Improved Techniques in Chemical-Biological Personal Protective Equipment.

The Joint Chemical and Biological Defense Program is funding Mainstream to demonstrate an means to improve chemical-biological (CB) personal protective equipment (PPE).

Current military CB suits utilize activated carbon as a protective barrier against chemical warfare agents (CWAs). While effective, carbon does not efficiently detoxify CWAs. The ability to integrate a reactive material into suits represents an advantage for mitigating the chemical hazard.

About Mainstream Engineering Corporation

Mainstream Engineering Corporation is a 34-year-old Brevard County, Florida manufacturer with a history of leading-edge research and development that has resulted in advanced cost-competitive products, which are made in the USA.  Founded in 1986, Mainstream’s mission is to transition advanced R&D into high-quality, environmentally-safe, green, commercial products using lean manufacturing techniques. Areas of research include thermal control, energy conversion, power electronics, biomass conversion, chemical technology and materials science.

ROCKLEDGE, FL — December 7th, 2020 — Mainstream Engineering Corporation has been awarded a contract from the U.S. Army to Develop an Advanced Power Conditioning Surge Module.

Standalone power systems and tactical microgrids are used by the Army to provide power to equipment used in forward operations. Unlike a full-scale power grid, Army tactical microgrids are powered by 60 kW generators. Because these generators are very small sources compared to those on a full-scale power grid, they are sensitive to power surges, inrush current, and current harmonics generated by non-linear loads. Power surges can cause system brownouts and generator failures. Current harmonics can cause communication errors and damage to equipment from overheating. The current solution to these issues is to oversize generators which decreases power system efficiency as well as generator reliability and lifespan. To provide a more practical and efficient solution, Mainstream has developed an advanced power conditioning surge module (PCSM) capable of providing the microgrids with up to 15 kW of 120/208 Vac, 50/60 Hz and 400 Hz power for up to 5 seconds while also removing the adverse harmonics generated by non-linear loads.

About Mainstream Engineering Corporation

Mainstream Engineering Corporation is a 34-year-old Brevard County, Florida manufacturer with a history of leading-edge research and development that has resulted in advanced cost-competitive products, which are made in the USA. Founded in 1986, Mainstream’s mission is to transition advanced R&D into high-quality, environmentally-safe, green, commercial products using lean manufacturing techniques. Areas of research include thermal control, energy conversion, power electronics, biomass conversion, chemical technology and materials science.

ROCKLEDGE, FL — September 11, 2020 —Mainstream Engineering Corporation has been awarded a contract from the Missile Defense Agency to demonstrate their prognostic health monitoring system for missile electronics. Called the Weapon Inspection, Sustainment, and Recording Device or WISARD,™  this miniature stamp-sized health monitoring system operates on just 0.0036 watts of power and is capable of predicting the remaining life of an electronics assembly based on prior exposure to temperature, humidity, shock, vibrations and the like. Mainstream is actively seeking additional commercial and military applications for this unique health monitoring system.

About Mainstream Engineering Corporation

Mainstream Engineering Corporation is a 34-year-old Brevard County, Florida manufacturer with a history of leading-edge research and development that has resulted in advanced cost-competitive products, which are made in the USA.  Founded in 1986, Mainstream’s mission is to transition advanced R&D into high-quality, environmentally-safe, green, commercial products using lean manufacturing techniques. Areas of research include thermal control, energy conversion, power electronics, biomass conversion, chemical technology and materials science.

ROCKLEDGE, FL — September 10, 2020 — Mainstream has been awarded a contract from NASA to demonstrate Mainstream’s Advanced Modular Deployable Radiator.  Mainstream’s Deployable Radiator  has a heat rejection turn-down ratio of 200 to 1, a mass of only 7.8 kg, a design life of over 15 years and integrates directly with NASA’s two-phase pumped loop configurations.  NASA has identified a need for improvements in the turndown ratio and specific weight of deployable radiator designs, for low Lunar orbit, Jupiter orbit, and inner to outer planet exploration mission applications and this technology directly address this established need.

About Mainstream Engineering Corporation

Mainstream Engineering Corporation is a 34-year-old Brevard County, Florida manufacturer with a history of leading-edge research and development that has resulted in advanced cost-competitive products, which are made in the USA.  Founded in 1986, Mainstream’s mission is to transition advanced R&D into high-quality, environmentally-safe, green, commercial products using lean manufacturing techniques. Areas of research include thermal control, energy conversion, power electronics, biomass conversion, chemical technology and materials science.

ROCKLEDGE, FL — September 4, 2020 —Mainstream has developed a single-loop vapor compression thermal control system (VCTCS) to replace currently-used two-loop Thermal Control Systems (TCSs).

NASA uses two-loop TCSs to mitigate crew toxicity risk whereby one loop collects heat within a crew module with a low-toxicity fluid and transfers the heat to a second loop in the external module that rejects heat through the radiators.  This architecture is used for crew but comes with a mass penalty due to the duplication of prime movers (pumps), mass of the intermediate heat exchanger, and extra radiator surface area to account for the additional temperature difference required for the intermediate heat exchange process.

The two-loop mass penalty is a driving force toward reducing the TCS to a single working fluid. However, the toxicity risk must be mitigated for this architecture to be realized. Mainstream will be demonstrating a single loop TCS architecture that has toxicity mitigating technology. This technology has specific NASA applications, including future Orion-like manned missions, Deep Space Gateway and Transport missions, and lunar habitation modules. Any manned space vehicle would benefit from the expected weight and crew safety advantage offered by this new TCS.

About Mainstream Engineering Corporation

Mainstream Engineering Corporation is a 34-year-old Brevard County, Florida manufacturer with a history of leading-edge research and development that has resulted in advanced cost-competitive products, which are made in the USA.  Founded in 1986, Mainstream’s mission is to transition advanced R&D into high-quality, environmentally-safe, green, commercial products using lean manufacturing techniques. Areas of research include thermal control, energy conversion, power electronics, biomass conversion, chemical technology and materials science.

ROCKLEDGE, FL — September 3, 2020 — Mainstream Engineering Corporation (Rockledge, FL) will be demonstrating the capability for optical elements to automatically and independently repair damage. The self-healing optics are capable of returning to their originally manufactured performance after receiving either physical or laser damage. The repair mechanism is automatically initiated by the damage and requires no human triggering and is completed within seconds.

U.S. Army sensor systems consist of the most advanced technology available and are routinely subjected to extreme environments including heat, cold, sand/dust, high winds, and intense lasers which can result in their damage. It is a burden upon the Army in terms of materiel and labor to replace these elements but an even greater threat is the tactical disadvantage of a system becoming inoperable during maneuvers. The Army needs self-healing optics that can be applied to its sensor systems.

About Mainstream Engineering Corporation

Mainstream Engineering Corporation is a 34-year-old Brevard County, Florida manufacturer with a history of leading-edge research and development that has resulted in advanced cost-competitive products, which are made in the USA.  Founded in 1986, Mainstream’s mission is to transition advanced R&D into high-quality, environmentally-safe, green, commercial products using lean manufacturing techniques. Areas of research include thermal control, energy conversion, power electronics, biomass conversion, chemical technology and materials science.

ROCKLEDGE, FL — [May 8, 2020] — Mainstream Engineering Corporation has been awarded a contract from the U.S. Air Force for development of a high-efficiency, turbocharged, diesel engine for use in a variety of heavy-fuel power applications.

Many existing military diesel-powered generators, all-terrain vehicles (ATVs), and auxiliary equipment, such as water pumps, use outdated industrial engines that are heavy and less efficient than their modern counterparts. Mainstream has addressed this issue by developing a power-dense engine that employs advanced automotive diesel technology and is capable of withstanding the rigors of military use. Mainstream’s AMD45, a 1.25-L three-cylinder turbodiesel, is specifically designed to fill the gap between the heavy industrial diesels that are currently fielded and larger automotive diesel engines on the market.  The size, weight, power, and efficiency of the AMD45 make it a well-suited powerplant for multiple military heavy-fuel engine applications.

About Mainstream Engineering Corporation

Mainstream Engineering Corporation is a 34-year-old Brevard County, Florida manufacturer with a history of leading-edge research and development that has resulted in advanced cost-competitive products, which are made in the USA.  Founded in 1986, Mainstream’s mission is to transition advanced R&D into high-quality, environmentally-safe, green, commercial products using lean manufacturing techniques. Areas of research include thermal control, energy conversion, power electronics, biomass conversion, chemical technology and materials science.

ROCKLEDGE, FL — [April 6, 2020] — Mainstream Engineering Corporation has been awarded a subcontract from Worcester Polytechnic Institute to support development of a catalytic process to convert municipal solid waste to energy for the Department of Energy.

The project goal is to improve processibility and conversion of municipal solid waste (MSW) to an energy dense liquid product by integrating green waste fractionation with hydrothermal liquefaction (HTL) and catalytic upgrading. As landfill space decreases, it is important that we develop new solutions that divert MSW from landfills to produce a valuable energy product. HTL is an excellent choice to process MSW because HTL can rapidly convert wet feeds into biocrude oil. Mainstream will perform analyses to quantify the benefits of different reaction conditions and configurations on the total cost of the energy product. Ultimately, the project will result in a strategy to convert wet wastes generated by municipalities to an economically viable energy product.

About Mainstream Engineering Corporation

Mainstream Engineering Corporation is a 34-year-old Brevard County, Florida manufacturer with a history of leading-edge research and development that has resulted in advanced cost-competitive products, which are made in the USA. Founded in 1986, Mainstream’s mission is to transition advanced R&D into high-quality, environmentally-safe, green, commercial products using lean manufacturing techniques. Areas of research include thermal control, energy conversion, power electronics, biomass conversion, chemical technology and materials science.

ROCKLEDGE, FL — March 18th, 2020] —For the foreseeable future, the energy needed to sustain economic growth will continue to come largely from hydrocarbon fuels.   However, as a nation we must use our fossil energy resources more wisely, cleanly, and efficiently. The development of innovative, cost‐effective technologies for improving the efficiency and environmental performance of advanced industrial and utility fossil energy power generation and natural gas recovery systems is imperative to accomplish this goal. The Gasification Systems Program, conducted under the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Fossil Energy is developing innovative, flexible and small‐scale, modular gasification systems. Gasification is the partial oxidation of combustible materials and operates in an oxygen‐lean environment where the necessary high-purity oxygen is produced by an oxygen separation unit (OSU). Mainstream has developed an OSU that reduces cost for smaller modular systems.

About Mainstream Engineering Corporation

Mainstream Engineering Corporation is a 34-year-old Brevard County, Florida manufacturer with a history of leading-edge research and development that has resulted in advanced cost-competitive products, which are made in the USA. Mainstream’s mission is to transition advanced R&D into high-quality, environmentally-safe, green, commercial products using lean manufacturing techniques. Areas of research include thermal control, energy conversion, power electronics, biomass conversion, chemical technology and materials science.

ROCKLEDGE, FL — March 18, 2020 — Chris Recio has joined Mainstream Engineering Corporation as its new Power Electronics Technology Leader. In this position, Mr. Recio will use his wealth of experience developing commercial power products to guide Mainstream’s existing team of power electronics experts in developing the next generation of high-tech, low-cost power converters for the U.S. military.

Mr. Recio has over fifteen years of experience in designing and developing power electronic converters and holds an M.S. degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where he specialized in Power and Energy Systems. He began his career at General Electric where he worked in the R&D group for power electronics and served as the lead design engineer for a variety of power converters and was the project leader for Smart Grid Enabled Devices for Demand-Side Management.

Most recently, he worked on the development and commercialization of energy products for a start-up company that reached an annual volume of 100k units, including AC motor controllers for the oil and gas industry, and voltage stabilizers for single, split and three-phase commercial, industrial and residential systems.

Mr. Recio has experience in both direct and indirect ac-ac converters, motor control, buck, boost, flyback, Ćuk and forward converters. Mr. Recio also holds multiple patents in the areas of power electronics, grid stabilization, power factor correction and reactive power support. With this broad background, Mr. Recio will drive the development of Mainstream’s expanding military product line of ac-dc, dc-dc, and dc-ac power converters.

About Mainstream Engineering Corporation

Mainstream Engineering Corporation is a 34-year-old Brevard County, Florida manufacturer with a history of leading-edge research and development that has resulted in advanced cost-competitive products, which are made in the USA. Mainstream’s mission is to transition advanced R&D into high-quality, military and commercial products using lean manufacturing techniques. Areas of research include thermal control, energy conversion, and power electronics.