Publications Details
Hypervelocity launch capabilities to over 10. 4 km/s
A systematic study is described which addresses the technical issues associated with launching flier-plates intact to hypervelocitites. First, very high pressures are needed to launch the flier plates to hypervelocitites, and second this high pressure loading must be uniform and nearly shockless. To achieve both these criteria, a graded-density material referred to as a pillow'' is used to impact a flier plate. When this graded-density material is used to impact a flier plate at high velocities on a two-stage light-gas gun, nearly shockless megabar pressure pulses are introduced into the flier plate. Since the loading on the flier plate is shockless, melting of the flier plate is prevented. This technique has been used to launch a 2-mm thick titanium alloy (Ti-6Al-4V) plate to a velocity of 8.1 km/s, and a 1-mm thick aluminum alloy (6061-T6) plate to a velocity of 10.4 km/s. A method is described by which the flier plate velocities could be further augmented to velocities approaching 14 km/s. 18 refs., 16 figs.