Speeding up the methods for manufacturing super-fast engines is the goal of a new $34 million facility under construction at the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI).
Research and development experts for the federal government and industry broke ground Monday on the Center for Accelerating Materials and Processes (CAMP), a building where scientists and engineers will come up with faster and more efficient ways to produce hypersonic systems.
Hypersonic systems can travel extended flight times within the upper atmosphere at five times the speed of sound, making them virtually undetectable and thus critical in modern military operations.
The work to make hypersonic engine systems is expensive and time-consuming, said Barron Bichon, director of the materials engineering department and CAMP project lead. But national security depends on it.
“This project will help ensure the U.S. is a leader in high-speed propulsion research and development,” Barron said. “SwRI is committed to advancing this vital technology on behalf of Texas and the nation.”
Construction on the 36,600-square-foot facility at SwRI’s main campus is set to begin in the coming weeks and is expected to be complete within a year. An estimated 25 people will work in the CAMP building.
In recent years, the Department of Defense has identified hypersonics as a priority, as Russia and China develop their own systems.
Ahead of the groundbreaking, U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-San Antonio, said hypersonics is a “small sliver” of protecting the United States and its allies from adversaries around the world. “But it doesn’t just happen in a silo — it happens with the research, it happens with the dedication, and it happens with the tools,” Gonzales. “You can’t just do it in a break room.”
Last fall, the Defense Department awarded SwRI a $17 million contract through the Air Force Research Laboratory in Ohio for “research and development meant to reduce design-build-test cycles while improving speed and cost.” Bichon and a spokeswoman declined to provide additional details about that contract.
One of the CAMP facility’s first projects will involve procuring and installing manufacturing process test equipment, according to an announcement about the groundbreaking. Under a contract from the Office of the Secretary of Defense’s Manufacturing Science and Technology Program, SwRI engineers will show how CAMP can reduce production times and the cost when building hypersonic systems.
In 2021, UTSA’s Hypersonics Lab completed installation of a Mach 7 Ludwieg Tube Wind Tunnel that conducts a variety of tests under Mach 7 conditions. The SwRI facility is different from that hypersonics lab in that CAMP is a production facility more than a testing facility, Bichon said.
A materials researcher, Bichon is the brains behind CAMP, said Adam Hamilton, president and CEO of Southwest Research Institute, adding it’s an outstanding project for SwRI.
“There are a lot of people trying to get into this hypersonics market space,” he said. “This really does put San Antonio and the institute on the map of some very current and important technology development that’s happening.”
CAMP’s mission fits with the motto that the institute uses to describe the breadth of its work toward scientific solutions — “from deep sea to deep space,” Hamilton added.
“It’s very important to the future of our nation and our allies to make sure that we can provide the technology necessary to protect ourselves and our allies — that balance of power, so that peace will prevail,” he said.
SwRI, which employs more than 3,000 people, is also building a 4-story office building that is expected to be complete in fall 2025. It is in the planning stages for a pharmaceutical research facility that Hamilton expects will start this fall.
The nonprofit institute was established on ranch land in northwest San Antonio in 1947. Three years ago, the institute’s vice president of facilities, Paul Easley, developed a master plan for the sprawling 1,500-acre campus to improve its walkability, create a sense of community and allow for future development.
In May, SwRI broke ground on land in Warner Robins, Ga., for an $18.5 million, 33,000-square-foot facility for defense and intelligence research and development. The project is its first project outside San Antonio.
