The design and flight performance of advanced carrier projectiles at hypervelocity

The ability to destroy the key assets of an enemy is an important goal of an attacking force and requires an agile and adaptable military capability effective against a number of very different threats. In ballistics, this contributes to an interest in moving to higher projectile velocities to benefit from the potential to increase the range of a projectile. It also generates an interest in the study of the benefits of increased kinetic energy that can be delivered to a target. The paper describes the work to produce a projectile design solution under certain constraints but with an impact velocity of about 2 km s−1, good in-bore and in-flight stability and acceptable retardation at the target. The paper shows that a projectile with these characteristics was achieved with a projectile mass of 8.1 kg. The second phase of the research programme was concerned with building a hollow aluminium carrier shell. The paper describes the research to assess the integrity and stability of the projectile under gun launch conditions, to demonstrate acceptable dispersion and impact yaw at the target and to demonstrate a minimum impact velocity of 2.1 km s−1.