- Journal
- INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF IMPACT ENGINEERING
- Année
- 2025
- Volume
- 206
- Article
- 105467
- Mois
- DEC
- DOI
- 10.1016/j.ijimpeng.2025.105467
Abstract
During ballistic testing, the condition of a projectile immediately after the end of the test may be of interest, as it could provide clues regarding how to further optimize either the projectile or the impacted target. However, said projectile will often experience further damage if it decelerates to zero velocity too quickly after testing. To ``soft catch'' a projectile without imparting further damage, a specially designed system is required that allows the projectile to slowly, but efficiently, decelerate over a long distance. By limiting deceleration, the forces imparted by the system on the projectile are minimized to prevent damage, which is defined here as either plastic deformation or fracture. One class of material that shows promise for this application includes urethane and polyurethane foams. Several foams, with densities ranging from 0.09 to 0.69 g/cm3, were subjected to confined and unconfined compression tests, the data from which were used to fit a strength model and equation of state for each foam. These models were then used in ballistic impact simulations in which specified projectiles impacted targets comprised of one of the various foams. The results indicate that deceleration of a non-deformed projectile is a function of the square of the projectile's current velocity. From this observation, a methodology is proposed to facilitate the design of soft catch systems comprised of multiple urethane foam layers and tuned to allow for efficient soft catch of the projectiles. These designs were used to successfully perform soft catches of projectiles up to 12.7 mm in diameter and at speeds up to 1 km/s, and test results were compared to pre-test predictions to demonstrate the accuracy of the methodology.