Final design of an air core, compulsator driven, 60 caliber railgun system

The manufacturing phase of a laboratory-based small-caliber electromagnetic launcher and compulsator power supply is discussed. The objective of the 29-month program is to develop a compact, lightweight test bed capable of accelerating 32-g masses to 2 km/s at a rate of 10 Hz. Both the power supply and launcher feature significant component design advances which will allow the system to operate at considerably higher energy and power densities than previously demonstrated. The 750-kg compulsator will generate 2.2 kV, and the silicon-controlled rectifier switch will commutate 386-kA pulses into the 1.6-m long, 0.60 caliber augmented solid armature railgun. The final design and predicted characteristics of the compulsator system are described, including results from the optimization code used to aid in the design of the compulsator system. A system design overview is presented, with emphasis on new materials and state-of-the-art machine components to be used for the first time in a compulsator.