Performance of an induction coil launcher

Performance of an electromagnetic induction launcher is considered for three types of armatures. These are: solid; 1-element wound; and 16-element wound aluminum armatures. The one element wound armature has uniform current density throughout and thus can withstand field reversal (working against embedded armature flux) and still maintain low temperature. Slingshot simulations were performed for several configurations. Best performance was obtained for a single element wound armature with two field reversals. For a 60 kg projectile, 10.5 cm coil inner radius and 5.5 cm coil build, the velocity after 50 meters of launcher length (670 stages) exceeded 3.5 km/sec with an overall efficiency of about 45%. For the same parameters the solid and 16-element wound armatures reach a velocity of about 3.3 km/sec after 800 stages (60 meters of launcher length) but without field reversal. A velocity of 3.5 km/sec is possible after 60 meters of launcher length with the 16-element wound armature with one field reversal, but the temperature is close to the melting temperature of aluminum.<>