Fundamental research and numerical modelling of the internal ballistics of electrothermal chemical guns

Royal Ordnance is undertaking a fundamental research program into the internal ballistics of electrothermal chemical guns. The research is separated into two interdependent programs: numerical modeling and experimentation. The modeling separates the gun into three sections: power supply, plasma generator, and gun chamber/barrel. The latter two are modeled using a finite difference Eulerian code, using flux-corrected transport techniques in the algorithms. The experimental effort has concentrated on the fundamental physics of the plasma generator and has been confined to closed vessel experimentation. The authors present the progress to date