Small caliber mobile EML

The Center for Electromechanics at the University of Texas at Austin (CEM-UT) is conducting a feasibility and conceptual design study of a vehicle mounted small bore railgun. The study is funded by the U.S. Army Armament Research and Development Center (Joint Services Small Arms Program), under subcontract to Battelle Columbus Labs. Details of the power supply feasibility study, including evaluations of batteries, capacitors, homopolar generators (HPG), and compensated pulsed alternators (compulsators or CPAs) are discussed. System parameter trade offs to be considered are total system weight, rate of fire, and complexity of required support auxiliaries. The system to be designed was initially a tactical railgun device of approximately 30 caliber to be capable of accelerating a 2.5-g projectile to near 1,500 m/s using a 1-m rail and solid armature. At this time, due to considerations which will be presented in this paper, this has evolved into a railgun system to accelerate a 20-g projectile to 2.5 km/s in a three shot burst or accelerate an 80-g projectile to 2.5 km/s in a single shot. The power supply selected for this system is an air-core compulsator weighing approximately 480 kg (1,060 Ib) which stores 7.3 MJ of inertial energy.