Pulsed power driver for hypervelocity impact studies

Orbital debris, either natural or man-made, is becoming a significant hazard for spacecraft. At the Space Power Institute at Auburn University a facility has been developed to accelerate microparticles to hypervelocities. Its purpose is to simulate impacts occurring in earth orbits in order to learn how to minimize the impact damage. The hypervelocity scheme presented utilizes an exploding foil drive, requiring a high-current source with a fast risetime. The pulsed power source consists of a 67 kJ capacitor bank, a solid dielectric spark-gap switch, and a high current vacuum feedthrough to the foil drive. The initial operation of the source will be compared to computer simulations, and impact studies will be discussed.