Design considerations in a 60 caliber electromagnetic railgun system

A design code has been developed to aid in the development of a compact 60-caliber EM (electromagnetic) launcher system, based on a standard multivariable optimization technique. A lumped circuit model which was verified with a sophisticated performance program serves as the core of the code. The design code provides an optimum set of 13 compulsator rotor design parameters that minimizes the rotor mass subject to eight design constraints for a single railgun discharge. These design parameters are rotor radius, rotor length, armature conductor thickness, banding thickness, number of conductors per pole, launcher length, launcher inductance gradient, projectile velocity, generator voltage, maximum allowable decrease in rotor angular velocity, pulse width, electrical frequency, and firing angle.<
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