Results of railgun experiments powered by magnetic flux compression generators

Researchers from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and the Los Alamos National Laboratory initiated a joint railgun research and development program to explore the potential of electromagnetic railguns to accelerate projectiles to hypervelocities. The effort was intended to 1) determine experimentally the limits of railgun operation, 2) verify calculations of railgun performance, and 3) establish a data base at megampere currents. The program has led to the selection of a particular magnetic flux compression generator (MFCG) design for a set of initial experiments and the design of small- and large-square-bore railguns to match the expected MFCG power profile. The bore sizes are 12.7 and 50 mm, respectively. In this paper, we briefly describe the design of the railguns and the diagnostic and data reduction techniques, followed by the results of eight experiments with the two railgun types.