Sandia National Laboratories shock thermodynamics applied research (STAR) facility

The Sandia National Laboratories Shock Thermodynamics Applied Research (STAR) Facility has recently consolidated three different guns and a variety of instrumentation capabilities into a single location. The guns available at the facility consist of a single-stage light gas gun, a single-stage propellant gun and a two-stage light gas gun, which cover a velocity range from 15 m/s to 8 km/s. Instrumentation available at the facility includes optical and microwave interferometry, time-resolved holography, fast x-radiography, framing and streak photography, fast multi-wavelength pyrometry, piezoelectric and piezoresistive gauges and computer data reduction. This report discusses the guns and instrumentation available at the facility and selected recent applications.