Ballistics and Explosives Research and Hazard Assessment
Institute research in ballistics and explosion effects encompasses a range of activities for the military and civilian sectors. Military projects include the analysis and testing of kinetic energy weapons and body and vehicular armor. Civilian projects include evaluations of orbital debris shielding designs for the space station and vulnerability analyses for potential terrorist activities. Hazard analysis is employed to evaluate and reduce risks in processes and facilities involving potentially explosive events, such as the destruction of hazardous munitions.
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A four-pound simulated bird strikes the canopy of a U.S. Air Force T-1 trainer aircraft. Impact testing, used to verify the structural integrity of aircraft leading edge components, is a federal requirement for certifying airworthiness. |
The Institute is under contract to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to develop, fabricate, and proof test a steel container for on-site demolition of old munitions excavated at ordnance cleanup sites. The reusable container is designed to contain blast pressures and fragments from mortar and artillery shells, allowing on-site detonation when munitions are in populated areas and/or considered unsafe for transport.
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Institute engineers have helped design a number of critical components for the U.S. Army's up-armored High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle, which is under development for use in peace-keeping operations. To test the structural integrity of the underbody armor system, the vehicle was subjected to an anti-tank mine blast. Significant damage occurred in the engine compartment, but, by design, the crew cab sustained only minor damage, demonstrating that the crew would be protected. |
In support of the U. S. Army's effort to develop up-armored High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles, SwRI® personnel have worked with the prime contractor to design a number of critical components. These include the underbody armor system, which successfully protected dummy crew members from blast effects during anti-tank mine tests.
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The Institute is working with E.I. Brown, L.P., and the Science Applications International Corporation to develop BLASTCAD software, a security and analysis tool that aids in the prediction of facility and personnel vulnerability to internal and external terrorist explosions. Facilities such as the one shown are modeled using computer aided design, but BLASTCAD also allows individual components to be designed as specific construction materials by selecting properties from a database contained in the software. The program allows levels of facility bomb damage and the potential for human injury to be displayed graphically. |
In conjunction with U.S. government security agencies, SwRI has developed a software program called BLASTCAD that provides a quick assessment of the vulnerability of complex, multistory facilities subjected to terrorist bombings. The program allows a facility or complex of facilities to be described as a representation of rooms, floors, and buildings. The user can identify building components by selecting one of more than 80 definitions. Validated through full-scale explosion tests, BLASTCAD has been used in the vulnerability analyses of several blast locations.
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The Institute has acquired an ultra high-speed digital imaging system to support high-speed events such as explosive testing and armor studies. The system has an image rate of 100 million frames per second, and photographic-quality hard copies are available within 15 minutes after a test. In the sequence of images shown here, a .44 magnum projectile, traveling at approximately 1,350 feet per second, perforates an aluminum plate. |
The Institute is assisting the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in its support of the former Soviet Union's construction of facilities for high-level radioactive waste storage. A number of critical questions concerning cooling air flow and temperatures in facility waste storage compartments were investigated using computational fluid dynamics. The computational model highlighted the importance of inlet air plenum design on flow patterns and revealed hot spots in storage compartments containing waste-filled canisters. The knowledge gained from such models permits corrective procedures or redesign prior to actual waste storage.
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Institute engineers are using numerical simulations to investigate thin, ceramic tiles for body armor applications. In the image at left above, a hard steel armor-piercing bullet (green), traveling at approximately 2,800 feet per second, impacts an alumina ceramic tile (light blue) bonded to an aluminum alloy backing sheet (dark blue). Eighty microseconds after impact (right above), the deformed projectile perforates the layered material, producing deformation in the aluminum sheet and fracture of the ceramic material.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is overseeing the cleanup of ordnance and explosive wastes at several former defense sites. In support of this effort, SwRI is developing hazard and risk assessment training materials used by the Corps of Engineers to reinforce safe cleanup operations. The Institute has also documented work procedures, authorities, and responsibilities pertaining to ordnance removal actions in an ordnance and explosive waste field operations handbook.
As part of an internal research initiative in advanced modeling and simulation, Institute staff are developing an advanced methodology for studying systems involving fluid-structure interaction. As a result of this research, the Air Force's Wright Aeronautical Laboratories awarded the Institute a multiyear contract to use the new computational tools to investigate the hydrodynamic effects of a projectile penetrating a liquid-filled container, such as an aircraft fuel tank.
| Copyright© 1995 by Southwest Research Institute. All rights reserved under U.S. Copyright Law and International Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, without permission in writing from the publisher. All inquiries should be addressed to Communications Department, Southwest Research Institute, P.O. Drawer 28510, San Antonio, Texas 78228-0510. |
