Dynamics Response of Rails for Electromagnetic Launcher with Acceleration Load

Abstract

One of the important problems in developing the railgun is design of the rail and the related elements. The evaluation of the loads on rails is an important task. On operation, the armature runs at an acceleration. The acceleration load can cause more complicated dynamic responses of the railgun. Here, the equations for the forced responses of the rail on acceleration load are developed. Using these equations, the dynamic displacement responses of the rail to the running electromagnetic force for various accelerations are investigated. The results show that the maximum dynamic displacement peak of the rail and its position depends on the acceleration of the running armature. The larger is the acceleration, the more obvious is the increase of the dynamic displacements under condition that the armature velocity is above the critical velocity. The results are useful for design and application of the railgun system.