A study of the penetration behaviour of mild-steel-cored ammunition against boron carbide ceramic armours

Abstract

The low mass and high specific strength of composite systems has led to their widespread adoption in aerospace applications. Consequently their performance under impact from offnormal events, or even deliberate insult, for example from a munition such as an anti-aircraft missile, is of paramount importance. Experimental and computational work to-date has typically focused on the response of composite systems to impact from projectiles with simple spherical or cylindrical geometries. However, such geometries are not representative of the full range of likely threats. In addition, even within this simple set of constraints the effects of projectile geometry on composite response under impact have been highlighted. Here an attempt has been made to investigate the effect of more complex geometric structures-comprising two-dimensional flat and peaked-nosed structures-on composite systems. A series of ballistic tests were carried out accelerating various geometric 'fragment simulants' into an aerospace-grade composite material. Damage was monitored in real time using highspeed cameras. Resultant calculations of projectile energy loss in the target, combined with analysis of recovered material via ultrasonic c-scan, have shown a clear relationship between projectile geometry and CFRP failure mode.

Cylindro-Conical Mild Steel Projectile Impact on E-Glass Fiber Reinforced Laminated Composite Plate Including Delamination Analysis

“…Ballistic protective structures could be constructed using metal alloys (e.g., BR7 class steel) [4], ceramics (e.g., B 4 C) [5], and composite materials (e.g., aramid reinforced composites) [6]. In general, fiber reinforced composites withstand against the penetration of threat by dissipating its energy via different modes of failure mechanisms such as fiber fracture, fiber pull out, fiber split, fiber-matrix debonding, matrix cracking [7].…”

Effect of Cover Plate on the Ballistic Performance of Ceramic Armor

“…However, a cover plate with enough thickness is still necessary to prevent it from bulging, indicating that an optimal thickness value exists for the cover plate. Many new cover materials have been developed, such as fiber-reinforced polymer (FRP) [20], glass fiber composite materials [21,22] and boron carbide composite materials [23], while their experimental results need to be further discussed. In general, metal cover plates are more commonly used at present; Zhai et al [17] confirmed that the performance of the armored steel cover plate is the best, followed by copper.…”

A model incorporating damage evolution to predict the penetration behavior of a ceramic target subjected to the long projectile impact

“…As the key component in lightweight layered armour composites, ceramic materials provide the high resistance and energy dissipation capacity against penetrating impact. The ballistic performance of such armour ceramics has been studied experimentally and numerically under a range of small calibre ammunition impact [1][2][3][4][5][6]. The design and optimisation of the armour composite system require the accurate prediction of the penetration behaviour of ceramic materials subjected to high speed impact loading.…”