Ballistic Experiments with Titanium and Aluminum Targets

During the course of the project we conducted two sets of fundamental experiments in penetration mechanics in the LLNL Terminal Ballistics Laboratory of the Physics Directorate. The first set of full-scale experiments was conducted with a 14.5mm air propelled launcher. The object of the experiments was to determine the ballistic limit speed of 6Al-4V-alloy titanium, low fineness ratio projectiles centrally impacting 2024-T3 alloy aluminum flat plates and the failure modes of the projectiles and the targets. The second set of one-third scale experiments was conducted with a 14.5mm powder launcher. The object of these experiments was to determine the ballistic limit speed of 6Al-4V alloy titanium high fineness ratio projectiles centrally impacting 6Al-4V alloy titanium flat plates and the failure modes of the projectiles and the target. We employed radiography to observe a projectile just before and after interaction with a target plate. Early on, we employed a non-damaging ''soft-catch'' technique to capture projectiles after they perforated targets. Once we realized that a projectile was not damaged during interaction with a target, we used a 4-inch thick 6061-T6-alloy aluminum witness block with a 6.0-inch x 6.0-inch cross-section to measure projectile residual penetration. We have recorded and tabulated below projectile impactmore » speed, projectile residual (post-impact) speed, projectile failure mode, target failure mode, and pertinent comments for the experiments. The ballistic techniques employed for the experiments are similar to those employed in an earlier study.« less