Using the SR3–60 Railgun in Augmented Mode

Augmentation is a well-known method to increase the velocity of railgun projectiles, while at the same time keeping the driving currents down. At the French-German Research Institute of Saint-Louis (ISL), several experiments using augmented railguns were performed. Here we report on a study using the SR3-60 as a augmented railgun. The SR3-60 is a 2-m-long railgun composed of three identical pairs of rails that are rotated by an angle of 60° with respect to each other. This railgun offers flexibility in use. In earlier experiments, it was used to accelerate a single projectile using a serial or overlapping configuration of the rail pairs, to enable a fire rate of 400 Hz, or to accelerate a strongly segmented projectile. In this paper, a brush armature projectile with a 20-g payload is accelerated using one pair, while the other two pairs are connected in series to augment the magnetic field inside the railgun. A series of shots with and without augmentation is performed and discussed.