Effect of material properties on interaction of ceramic and glass flyer plates with hypervelocity jet

Abstract

AbstractA study on the effect of material properties on the interaction of explosively driven ceramic and glass plates with shaped charge jets is performed in order to bolster future studies on the design of reactive cassettes with non‐steel flyer plates. A symmetric steel reactive cassette construction is taken as a base, and front and back plates are selectively changed with ceramic or glass plates keeping the areal densities similar. Plates manufactured from two different grades of alumina, silicon carbide, boron carbide, and borosilicate glass are employed to assess the ballistic protection performance of reactive cassettes. It is seen that a high density and fracture toughness is desired for the front plate and high bulk impedance for the back plate, respectively. Moreover, replacing the front plate of a steel cassette with an alumina or silicon carbide plate increases the ballistic protection efficiency close to 50%. Finally, the effect of material selection is investigated by hydrocode numerical simulations. The early phases of the interaction process are presented to reveal the basics of initial hole closure on the flyer plate and the determination of the length of the jet precursor.