Ballistic impact of thin-walled composite structures

Abstract

Methods of analysis have been developed that provide the means to determine whether a ballistic impactor of known shape, mass, and striking velocity will penetrate a given thin-walled composite material structure and if it does, what the residual velocity of the impactor will be. The methods developed require performing penetration experiments at two striking velocities (with suitable replicates for statistical purposes) for any given composite structural target. From this minimum number of tests, one can predict the penetration, nonpenetration, and residual velocity of an impact at other striking velocities. This provides a dramatic reduction in the amount of expensive testing required to study penetration due to ballistic impact. It also provides a less expensive and less time-consuming means to select the best material system and structural configuration to resist ballistic impact. Finally, it shows that the physics of ballistic impact and the penetration phenomena is modeled satisfactorily. These methods also accurately predict the ballistic limit.